Started the day with a walk round Tiananmen Square. Somehow not so imposing a space as I expected - it may be the largest open public square in the world but the buildings in its middle break it up.
Entered the Forbidden City through the Gate of Heavenly Peace, under Mao's portrait. This is somehow more impressive as successive squares lead you into the more intimate parts of the imperial palace.
From there we drove out to the Summer Palace, with its marble boat.
The palace is overlooked by a Buddhist Temple.After a short boat trip across Kunming Lake we watched two old men flying kites by the 17 Arch Bridge.
Back in Beijing we were taken to a "Tea Ceremony" - for which read glorified sales pitch for exhorbitantly priced blocks of China Tea. Our reward for this was to see the nearby Birds Nest Olympic stadium and to witness a street vendor being hassled by police - apparently for trying to pass of his grade C fake Rolex watches as grade A fakes and pricing accordingly. The Chinese attitude to passing off, plagiarism and copyright in a nutshell!
Back in Beijing we were taken to a "Tea Ceremony" - for which read glorified sales pitch for exhorbitantly priced blocks of China Tea. Our reward for this was to see the nearby Birds Nest Olympic stadium and to witness a street vendor being hassled by police - apparently for trying to pass of his grade C fake Rolex watches as grade A fakes and pricing accordingly. The Chinese attitude to passing off, plagiarism and copyright in a nutshell!
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