The Forbidden City

This past week was spent traveling to different parts of China. Our first stop was Beijing, to which I had been back in 2006. I was excited to go back to the Forbidden City as it was one of my favorite things about China on my last trip. This time around, however, I wanted to find a tour guide rather than wander around aimlessly like last time. We walked from our hostel to the Forbidden City (a 10 minute walk—great location, great hostel) and immediately were approached by a young girl named Sunny who wanted to know if we needed a tour guide! It was much easier than I had expected.

We entered the City (along with thousands of other tourists, all Asian…I think we only saw one western tour group) and I was as impressed as the first time. The Forbidden City was the headquarters of the Ming and Qing dynasties for 800 years. It is surrounded by a giant wall and was off-limits to commoners (hence the name Forbidden City). The first part of the City has massive courtyards and three main buildings—the first is the main building where the emperor “worked”. It ‘s kind of like the Oval Office. The original throne was still in the building, and at all times people’s heads had to be lower than the emperor so they were bent over or on the floor while in the emperor’s presence. An interesting thing about the courtyards is that they have no trees or plants in them—they are all stone. This is so the guards could see everyone and everything and no one could sneak an attack to kill the emperor.

The second large building was where the emperor got dressed and relaxed before moving to the “Oval Office” to conduct business. Our tour guide said it’s the largest closet she’s ever seen. I don’t remember what the third building was used for. All the buildings are built on a level above the courtyards, and have multiple stairways and doorways. Only the emperor was allowed to use the center entrances, the high ranking officials were used allowed to use the entrances directly next to the emperor’s entrance, and lower ranking officials used the outermost entrances. There are large caludrons all over the City, which were used to hold water in case of fire. They were originally gold, but when the Japanese invaded China (I don’t remember when) they scraped the gold off the cauldrons so now they just look like regular metal.

My favorite part of the Forbidden City is the living quarters. Here the massive courtyards and important government buildings are exchanged for hundreds of smaller buildings, alleyways and intimate courtyards. This is where the concubines, their children and their servants lived. It was a city within a city. It was a huge honor to be chosen as a concubine for the emperor, and each year girls from wealthy families were taken into the City for the selection process. Instead of the emperor coming to see them and choose which ones he wanted, a painter came and painted portraits of all the girls then took them to the emperor. This way there was no chance that one of the girls would try to kill the emperor. The life of a concubine was a lonely one, because unless they were one of the favorites they may see the emperor only once in their lifetime. Also, after they had a child that child was taken away from them to be raised by servants. All the servants in the Forbidden City were eunuchs, poor men taken from the streets of Beijing and castrated to make sure there were no improper relations between them and the concubines. Upon arrival into the City, they were castrated and their penises were put in jars. When they died, they were buried with their jar because the Chinese believed that for balance you needed to both enter and exit the world as a whole person (as if a body part in a jar next to you constituted being “whole” again.)

In the living quarters we saw the courtyard where the emperor and his empress lived, complete with original furnishings from the last dynasty. In this area was a room where the emperor could conduct business if he didn’t feel like going to the official building, and the chandelier in the room was a dragon holding a giant pearl in its mouth (both the dragon and pearl are symbols of power). The throne sat underneath this pearl, and it was said that if anyone not from the bloodline overthrew the emperor and sat in the throne the pearl would fall and kill that person. When the Qing dynasty overthrew the Ming (or vice versa, I don’t remember) the new emperor simply scooted the throne back so it wasn’t directly underneath the pearl and thus avoided the possibility of being killed by its falling.

In many of the cultural places in China, you have to step over foot-high thresholds to get into buildings. The Forbidden City is the same. I always wondered why they were so high and I finally learned why! The Chinese believe that to get around spirits hop, and they couldn’t hop high enough to get over the threshold. The same thought process was used in keeping wives in check—women with bound feet were only able to take tiny steps and thus couldn’t get out unless assisted by someone who allowed them to get out. Some of the thresholds in the alleyways were taken down, and this was because the last emperor was only a small boy and he wanted to ride his bike around the living quarters so he had them removed. After exiting the city, we walked through the park behind the City. A giant hill was built here in order to ensure good feng shui (a river was built in front of the City, and this displaced dirt was used to build the “mountain” behind the city. River + mountain = harmony). The hill offers great views of both the Forbidden City and Beijing, and had some pretty pavilions. There were some old people up there stretching and doing yoga, and there was also a tourist trap where you could dress up like an emperor/empress and get your picture taken. Cas and Kyle took full advantage of this, and Cas looked more like Flava Flav than an emperor.

Pictures: One of the tree-less courtyards and a main building of the public part of the City; the group in an alleyway of the living quarters; the emperors atop their empire. Video: The old people stretching.