22 - 9.

22 - 9. THE ROUND HOUSE

The most famous house in Beijing is a 600 years old wooden house. The perfectly round Temple of Heaven lies almost hidden in a big park of low, old cedar-trees. Dark blue tiles, golden dragons and red-lacquered columns. Big but not vast; not a cathedral rising towards heaven, but the edifice the emperor himself needed when once a year carried out the rituals to secure a bountiful harvest. The Chinese appears to me to be utterly pragmatic and the Ming-emperor seems to have been likewise. Chinese tourists from the great country mill around snapping pictures of each other posing in front of the old temple.

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