The Lama Temple, Wan Fu JIng Night Market and Bowling Part 2!

Finally a day off, to explore the city.  I was pretty much beside myself considering that we have been working our tails off.  Just about everyone has been working 15-17 hour days, so a day to do what I wanted was a real treat.  I called John DiTecco, my canadian friend from Toronto and we made plans to go out and about in the city.   He took the subway over to my hotel and we met up in front and headed out.  We had decided upon a few itineraries for the day.  1. The Lama Temple, Wanfujing and then Bowling.  2. The Art district in Beijing, or 3. The dirt market, an antique market that is outdoors.   None of the options were bad ones but I decided that The Lama Temple sounded very enlightening so John and I headed out.  We boarded the subway near my hotel, line 1, and started chatting about out upcoming trip to Tibet.  Chatty Kathy, also known as John, was already out of it from his whirlwind night prior, and was chatting up a storm and neglected to pay attention to the train stops.  So, after about 4 stops too many he finally realized we had missed our transfer.  We got off the train at Shihui East, and headed back the opposite way, and this time I made sure to remind John to pay attention.  We reached our transfer, got on and then John realized he had sent us the wrong way on the circle line....Gahhhhh...that is the last time I will let a Canadian lead the way in Beijing.  We spent an extra hour on the train than necessary.  But the good news was that I was able to continue my habit of sleeping everywhere in Beijing.  I have now fallen asleep on the subway, in a cab, on the floor of my work room, in the airport, and maybe several other places.  Julia has it all documented.   At this point I am napping and John is standing, presumably paying attention to our next stop, The Lama Temple, and this Chinese guy standing directly in front of me keeps watching me and simultaneously playing with his fan which is folded up in his hands.  It was actually rather creepy to both John and I , luckily we were very close to our destination. We finally de-boarded the train, this time in the exact place we were supposed to be.  We rounded the corner of the train station and immediately I was hit with the smell of burning incense.  It was a mixture of sandalwood, and burning wood, and it was coming from the various street shops selling incense to take into the Lama Temple.

We walked approximately 400 meters ahead according to the sign and we were at the gate to the Temple.  You could see it looming over the gate, in all it's beauty.  The detail, immaculate; the architecture unmistakeable.  

The Hall of Harmony and Peace is the main building of the temple was the first building we walked into. It houses three bronze statues of the Buddhas of the Three Ages, the statue of the Buddha of the Present is in the center, it is flanked by the statue of the Buddha of the Past and the Buddha of the Future. Along the sides of the hall, were statues of 18 Arhats.  There was also a mural in the hallway.

Unfortunately I was not allowed to burn incense or film in the hall....at least that is what the sign said.  I think they meant that I was not allowed to take photos inside the buildings.  

The next Hall we wandered into was The Hall of Everlasting Protection which served as Emperor Yongzheng's living quarters as a prince and the place where his coffin was placed after his death. Today, a statue of the healing Buddha sits in this hall. 

The final hall we wandered into was the The Pavilion of Ten Thousand Happinesses which houses a Guiness World Record Holder.  It contains a 26m tall statue of the Maitreyu Buddha carved from a single piece of White

 Sandalwood. Large enough to be certified by Guiness. 

 

At this point, there was an announcement made that the Temple would be closing at 4:30, in two minutes.  So we made our way back to the main entrance and headed off to the tea shop.  I had spotted a tea shop on the way in and was interested in perhaps purchasing some for back home.  We walked into the tea shop and were typical North Americans, we touched everything, moved everything, all the while the store worker followed us around kindly replacing everything we had moved.  We asked at the counter what the best tea was but they did not understand.  So John motioned in his best attempt at sign language, and I think there was a misunderstanding.  She took us over to a box of tea that was clearly for weight loss....so I think she thought we were looking for weight reduction tea.  We decided that was not the tea for us and instead bought some jasmine tea, jasmine flowers, green tea and oolong tea.  We left the shop full of tea and headed for the street market and on to our next destination, Wan Fu JIng Street Market.  You have to understand though, with John there is no direct travel...he is a self professed wanderer.  As I may have indicated before, you have to keep on task.   This time we were able to navigate the subway effectively and arrived at Wan Fu Jing in a timely fashion.  Wan Fu Jing is a street night market with all kinds of goodies to eat....goodies if you enjoy Sea Horse on a stick, or scorpion, or starfish.

It is essentially an episode of Fear Factor.  I was brave enough to try Scorpion, Octopus, and Sea Horse, we also ate some wrap with sprouts, some vegetable wrap, fried bananas and drank banana bubbling/smoking tea.

I was not brave enough to try some of the more exotic dishes like Pigs Heart, or Lamb intestines.  

We left the market in a cab, stuffed full of crazy foods and headed back to my hotel to meet with David regarding our upcoming trip plans.  After some debate and John repeatedly screaming "We have to figure out how to get out of TIbet" as if we were already there and stuck, we decided upon a flight to Chengdu.  Simple, easy and we will then be in the middle of China and have access to just about anything we want to see.  Feeling accomplished with ourselves and with the advice of Max, we headed to Johns hotel for another night of bowling madness.  

THis round of bowling league was had two lanes, with eight participants and several other onlookers.  In the background was old school backstreet boys which we sang rather loudly too.  They even requested that we sing another round of it later in the night.  All in all a really great and fun day.