Wednesday, September 28, 2011: Part I: The Temple of Heaven and Pearl Market

Wednesday morning after breakfast we walked to the Temple of Heaven, a reasonably comfortable walk due east. 

The Bicycle repair shop.

"The temple of heaven was the place where the emperors of the Ming and Qing dynasties would worship heaven and pray for bumper crops. The northern part of the outer surrounding wall is semicircular in shape while the southern part square, a pattern symbolic of the ancient belief that heaven was round and the earth square.

 The double surrounding wall separates the temple into two parts--the inner and outer temples with the main structures in the inner one, covering  space of 273 hectares in all. The inner temple is also partitioned by a wall into two groups of buildings.

 The south structure is the Circular Mound Altar used to worship heaven at the winter solstice where the principal construction is a large round marble terrace names the Circular Mound.

 The north structure is the Altar of Praying for Bumper Crops with the Hall of prayer for good harvests as the principal building used to pray in spring for a bumper harvest in the year.

 The two altars, connected by a 360 metre long raised walk called the Danbi Bridge, are arranged in a line forming a north-south axis 1,200 metres long, and flanked by century old cypresses in a spacious area with a formal and solemn environment.

 To the inner south of the west celestial gate is Abstinence Palace where the feudal emperors observed abstention before the rituals. In the western part of the outer temple is located the Divine Music Office, which was in charge of the teaching and performance of the ritual music.

 In the Temple of Heaven are situated such main buildings as the hall of Payer for Good Harvests, the Hall of Heavenly Emperor, the Circular Mound, the Imperial Vault of Heaven, the Beamless Hall the Long Corridor, as well as the Echo Wall, the Three Echo Stones, Seven Meteorites and Nine-Dragon Juniper.

 Built first in 1420, a masterpiece of the Ming and Qing architectural art and a precious example of China's ancient architecture, the Temple of Heaven is the largest architectural group for worshiping heaven in the world. In 1961 it was listed by the state council as "One of the key monuments under the state protection." In 1998 it was recognized by UNESCO as "one of the human heritages of the world.""

The Temple of Heaven is a huge complex with a lot of open areas surrounded by gardens and large trees.  

A lot of people congregated there, most to exercise, some just to gossip.  These folks are doing what looked like ballroom dancing.

This exercise involved a series of steps while waving the red flags in certain ways.

This man is writing Chinese characters on the pavement with water.  My research suggests that this is done for good luck.  It looks much nicer in the long run than graffiti.

We took a bus from the west entrance of the Temple of Heaven to the Hong Qiao Pearl Market, a market unquestionably aimed to the foreign tourist.

The Pearl Stringers were really quick:

The vendors were amazingly aggressive.