Forbidden City

We spent the better part of yesterday hiking around inside the Forbidden City (that's the entrance with yours truly standing in front of it) which is actually an enormous network of temples, palaces, and sprawling stone courtyards that everyone except the Emporer's family and servants were forbidden from entering for a couple hundred years. It was really amazing inside. Although the entire place is self-contained it literally is an entire city. There were dozens of temples, alley ways, and hidden rooms all containing ancient sculptures, weapons, and other works of art. A river full of coy fish and trash bags wound through the grounds under stone bridges and there was a huge garden area in the back with sculpted river stone and huge old trees everywhere (that's where the picture of Beau doing his best to look like a douche bag American was taken).

We did find a lot of interesting stuff in the various temples turned tourist traps. An equatorial gilded golden thing with the Earth, Moon, and Sun all in their respective celestial positions that was made in the 1400s. A big statue of a Drurtle which apparently isn't just a mis-pronounced Jewish kid's toy in China. A huge collection of medieval armor from Spain. It was definitely sweet.

Finally we left the Fobidden City, completely exhausted, and made our way back to the hostel. Along the way we were accosted by several different groups of Chinese girls, one of which tried to entice us with seasame balls (?). They all invited us to go to bars and restuarants but we'd learned our lesson from our little 300 dollar tea party the day before and politely declined. Not to mention the questionable red areas around most of these chicks mouths; "It's just a cold sore, I swear." should be required English for most of these girls.

Today we're going to be making out way to the Sun Temple and preparing ourselves for going to the Shaolin Temple tomorrow (by which I mean not drinking). Hope everything's going well back in the States.