Sunday, June 14, 2009

No. 2 Check!

Day 459
I was up early and headed right back to Tienanmen Square after some breakfast.

Mao Zedong was China's communist leader. He died in 1976 and a year later went on display. He can only be seen for a few hours in the morning and I had just missed him the day before. Prior to the Olympics last year there was a rather strong movement to bury him in his home town. Some people felt that it was just downright creepy to keep him on display. Thankfully this didn't happen and I got to visit my second dead communist leader. After locking up my things I moved quickly thru the line. When I got into the chamber I didn't have a lot of time to look, the guards really hurried us along. He looked more like a wax figure than a dead man.

When I got done with the mausoleum I went to a never used Cold War bunker. A few tuk tuk drivers kept trying to charge me about $5 to go there, but I knew I was close. Eventually I found a guy who told me that it was closed for the time being. Those tuk tuk drivers were a bunch of wankers.

Instead I hopped in a cab and headed to the weekend market. After some shopping I grabbed a rather yummy lunch before heading back to my hostel. I was surprised to see Alicia there, she had taken a Chinese language Great Wall tour and I hadn't expected her until the evening. We ended up grabbing an early dinner and then chatting with some people at the hostel before calling it an early night.

No comments: