From the outside, the Forbidden City doesn’t look
impressive, it looks like a fortress or a prison due to the high red coloured walls
surrounding the palace. Actually, indeed the walls in the past were there to
protect the Emperors from outside world, or in the case of Pu Yi, The Last
Emperor, the walls isolated or imprisoned him in the Forbidden City (read also
previous blog about Pu Yi).
Coming inside, it is like a completely different world,
large halls, large courtyards, large gates, large space, too large to be a
palace or a prison for an emperor. There are halls after halls connected with
other halls through stairways, gates , bridges and courtyards. It is an
impressive example of city planning that is carried out on a huge scale yet is
balanced, harmonious, graceful, and beautiful.
Chinese people believe in an essential unity between the
universe, humanity, and nature. The Forbidden City, was created according to these
principles of benevolence, harmony, balance and stability. All of these
principles represent the essence and core of Confucian thought.
The design and its layout followed the ideal cosmic order in
Confucian ideology considering the Forbidden City as a ceremonial, ritual and
living space. The lay-out considered that all activities within the city were conducted
in the manner appropriate to the participants’ social and familial roles. All
activities, such as imperial court ceremonies or rituals, would take place in
dedicated palaces depending on the events.
The unforgettable colossal scene from the movie “The Last
Emperor” by Bernardo Bertolucci, the coronation of the 3 year old Emperor Pu
Yi, took place in the Hall of Supreme Harmony. After the imperial seal was
imprinted on the proclamation, wearing a small yellow imperial dragon robe, Pu Yi went out of the hall and looked into the
huge courtyard beyond. Thousands of government officials and palace servants
are arranged in ranks in the courtyard and in the square beyond. To rhythmic
chants and commands, they all kowtow to the new emperor in a series of
prostrations.
The Hall of Supreme Harmony, where the coronation of Pu
Yiand other important ceremonies took
place, is the highest and largest building in the whole city. Behind it is the
Hall of Central Harmony, which is smaller and once served as the lounge for the
emperor ready to hold the ceremony or be enthroned inside the Hall of Supreme
Harmony. Behind this hall is the Hall of Preserving Harmony, it was used for
formal functions too, and where students past various studies and examinations
in the Qing Dynasty.
Keep walking forward from the Hall of Preserving Harmony and
through the Gate of Heavenly Purity, and you will enter the inner court. The
inner court was the family residence of the emperor and was not open to the
officials or civilians of that time.
The three most important palaces are located in the inner
court, named The Palace of Heavenly Purity, The Hall of Union and The Palace of
Earthly Tranquility.
The Palace of Heavenly Purity was built as the emperor's
principal residence, where emperors slept and worked. Beginning in the Emperor Yongzheng
reign, this palace was no longer a residence. The nearby Hall of Mental Cultivation
took over that function. However, it was still a venue for emperors to conduct routine
government business and celebrated major festivals and rituals.
The Palace of Earthly Tranquility is the residence of the
Empress, andshe held ceremonies here on
the major festivals and celebrations receiving tributes. Since the reign of
Emperor Qianlong, the hall was used to keep twenty-five imperial seals, each of
which was designed for a certain purpose. These seals are laid in boxes which
were covered with yellow silk as what they were.
The Hall of Unionsymbolizes the the union of the heaven and the earth which bring peace
forth.
The hall is square in shape with a pyramidal roof. Stored
here are the 25 Imperial Seals of the Qing dynasty, as well as other ceremonial
items, including the clocks that set the official time in the palace.
The impression depicted by the movie “The Last Emperor” by
Bernardo Bertolucci about Pu Yi’s childhood was that of a playful, cute, and innocent
boy, although a bit naughty like any other boy of his age. A three year old boy
who suddenly became the Emperor of China, leaving his parents and siblings to
be isolated within the walls of the Forbidden City, served by the eunuchs loyal
to him. The boy who still liked to play outside was appointed to be the emperor
of this great country. Imagine that!
This impression stuck in my mind until I met Pu Yi for a
conversation at the Salt Tax Palace, his exile in Manchuria. When I met him as
an adult the impression I got about the boy depicted by the movie suddenly disappeared.
Off course, his childhood history is only a beautiful memory of his past which
is a small part of his dramatic life.
His face pale, looked tired dan didn’t like to talk. He had
a fixed stare behind his black-framed glasses. When we were introduced, he
responded with a friendly nod. But his smile lasted only a second.
I opened the conversation:
“Surely you still
remember that day when you were picked-up from your home by the palace
officials at 3 years old to be carried to the Palace.”
Pu Yi:
“On the evening of 13th November 1908, without
any advance notice, a procession of eunuchs and guardsmen led by the palace
chamberlain left the Forbidden City for our home to inform my father that they were taking away his three-year-old
son Pu Yi to be the new emperor. I screamed and resisted as the officials
ordered the eunuch attendants to pick me up. My parents said nothing when they
learned that they were losing their son. As I cried, screaming that I did not
want to leave my parents, I was forced into a palanquin that took me back to
the Forbidden City. My nanny Wang Wen-Chao was the only person to go with me,
and she calmed me down by allowing him to suckle one of her breasts; this was
the only reason she was taken along.”
I said:
“And then how was the your coronation ceremony to be the
Emperor on 2nd December 1908?”
Pu Yi:
“The ceremony was
very long and tiresome, it was moreover a very cold day, so when they carried
me into the Hall of Supreme Harmony and put me up on the high and enormous
throne I could bear it no longer. My father who was kneeling below the throne
and supporting me, told me not to fidget, but I struggled and cried, “I don’t
like it here. I want to go home.” My father grew so desperate that he was
puring with sweat. As the officials went on kowtowing me my cries grew louder
and louder. My father tried to sooth me by saying, “Don’t cry, don’t cry; it’ll
be soon finished, it’ll be soon finished.”
When the ceremony was over the officials ask each other
surreptiously, “How could he say ‘It’ll be soon finshed’? What does it mean,
his saying that he wanted to go home?” All these discussions took place in a
very gloomy atmosphere as if these words had been a bad omen.Some books said that these words were
prophetic as within three years the Qing dynasty was in fact “finished” and the
boy who wanted to go home did go home, and claimed that the officials had a
presentiment of this.”
I said:
“ And then how was the situation of your abdication from
throne?”
Pu Yi:
“ After making a very
poor show as emperor for three years I made a very poor show of abdicating. One
incident of those last days stands out clearly in my mind. My foster
motherEmpress Lung Yu was sitting on a
paltform in the Mind Nurture Palace wiping her tears with a handkerchief while
a fat old man knelt on a red cushion before her, tears rolling down his face. I
was sitting to the right of my foster mother feeling rather bewildered and
wondering why the two adults were crying. There was nobody in the room besides
us three and it was very quite; the fat man was sniffing loudly while he talked
and I could not understand what he was saying. If what I had been told is
right, this was the occasion on which General Yuan Shi Kay directly brought up
the question of abdication and to end the Qing dyansty.”
I said:
“On the 12th of February 9012 your forster mother
formally proclaimed your abdication as the Empreror of China, and then China
became a Repubic, and you were exclied in the Forbidden City. How did you
feel?”
Pu Yi:
“It was this tiny world where I was to spent the most absurd
childhood possible until I was driven out by the National Army in 1924. I
called it absurd because at a time when China was called a republic and when
time that mankind had advanced into the 20th century I was still
living the life of an emperor, breathing the dust of the 19th
century.
Whenever I think of my childhood my head fills with a yellow
mist. The glaced tiles were yellow, my sedna-chair was yellow, my chair
cushions were yellow, the lining of my hats and clothes were yellow, the girdle
round my waist was yellow, the dishes and bowls from which I ate and drank were
yellow, the padded cover of the rice-gruel sauce pan, the material in which by
books were covered, the window curtains, the bridle of my horse.. everything
was yellow. This color, the so called “briliant yellow”, was used exclusively
by the imperial household and made me feel from my earliest years that I was
unique and had a “heavenly” nature different from that of everybody else.
I said:
“ That was probably why you got angry when you saw him
wearing a robe with yellow inner lining, the color of Qing Dynasty, in the
palace.”
Pu Yi:
“He thought the color was apricot. I said that the color was
the imperial bright yellow. My brother then apologized ‘Yes Sir.. Yes Sir…’ and
stood away from me with his hands on his sides. I said ‘The color is bright
color, you have no right to wear it.’ ….. ‘Yes Sir…..’ he answered. With the
‘Yes Sir…” he answered me like how my servants answer me. The sound ‘Yes Sir..’
has disappeared for long time and sounds funny if I think about it.”
I said:
“A sweet memory but also bitter for you. But your chilhood wasn’t
always funny and innocent as depicted in the movie ‘The Last Emperor’, I heard
that since childhood you like to order flogging your eunuchs, is that true?”
Pu Yi:
“Wherever I went, grown men would kneel down in a ritual
kowtow, averting their eyes until I passed. The Emperor was Divine. I could not
be remonstrated with, or punished.Flogging
eunuchs was part of my daily routine. My cruelty and love of wielding power
were already too firmly set for persuasion to have any effect on me.
But no account of my childhood would be complete without
mentioning the eunuchs. They waited on me when I ate, dressed and slept; they
accompanied me on my walks and to my lessons; they told me stories; and had
rewards and beatings from me, but they never left my presence. They were my
slaves; and they were my earliest teachers.”
I said:
“ But till you are an adult you treat the eunuchs as you
like. You don’t trust them dan consider all of them are thieves. You
obsessively went over the account books for signs of fraud. You also
drastically cut back on the food allocated for your staff, who suffered from
hunger.”
Pu Yi:
“They are basically all thieves, everyone, from the highest
to the lowest. I found that by the end of my wedding ceremony, the pearls and
jade in the empress's crown had been stolen. Locks were broken, areas
ransacked, and on 27 June 1923, a fire destroyed the area around the Palace of
Established Happiness. I suspected that the arson were caused by the eunuchs as
they tried to cover up the extent of their theft.
I heard that all the
time the eunuchs smuggled treasures out of the palace and sold them in antique
shops. I ordered an audit of the palace's collections. But before it began, the
fire consumed the place.”
I said:
“Your wife, Empress Wan Rong, Western educated, is known as
a woman who loved to go out dancing, play tennis, wear western clothes and
make-up, listen to jazz music, play
piano , ride horses, read debauch foreign novels, write petty verses, and to
socialize with her friends.”
Pu Yi:
“ I admit that I also like to buy Western goods, especially
Wrigley's chewing gum, Bayer aspirin, cars, gramophone and movies. I like the
new technology of cinema, I was so delighted with the movies, especially Harold
Lloyd films, that I had a film projector installed in the Forbidden City
despite the opposition of the eunuchs who disliked foreign technology in the
Forbidden City.
Wanrong liked to go shopping with her friends, to the
Central Plains, strolling the streets,
to Shunde Shihlin Ji to drink, eat,also
to Asgard saloon which had popular hair style, to the theatre to see a Mei
Lanfang's "Shi Ming". She was spending money like water like she was
still the empress.”
I said:
“But people say that Wan Rong complained that her life as an
"empress" was extremely dull as the rules for an empress forbade her
from going out dancing as she wanted, instead forcing her to spend her days in
traditional rituals that she found to be meaningless, all the more so as China was
a republic and her title of empress was symbolic only. Then she began to smoke
opium during the exile period. Is it true?”
Pu Yi:
“I encouraged her to
do so as I found her more ‘manageable’ when she was in an opium daze. My arriage
to Wanrong began to fall apart as they spent more and more time apart, meeting
only at mealtimes.”
I said:
“In your autobigography “From Emperor to Citizen”you said that one time her brother introduced
her to a Japanese military officer. She subsequently had an affair with the
man. And in 1935 you found out that she was when she was close to giving birth.
How did you feel?”
Pu Yi:
“My feelings at that time were hard to describe, I was angry
but did not want the Japanese man to know. All I could do was express this
anger against her in person.“
I said:
“In the original edition of the autobiography, you wrte that
after Wan Rong gave birth o a baby girl, you told her that his brother had
adopted the child and insisted she make monthly payments for his upkeep. How
did Wan Rong feel that time?”
Pu Yi:
“'Until her death,
she kept having the same dream, in which her child was living next to her.
After the end of the war and our separation, her opium addiction worsened and
her body became weaker. She died of illness in 1946.”
I said:
“And how is her baby girl?”
Pu Yi:
“The baby actually died shortly after birth………”
This is an imaginary interview in memory of Pu Yi, The Last
Emperor.
Source: Authobiography “From Emperor to Citizen”, South
China Morning Post, Wikipedia.
The Minnie Oh! Minnie! show in Tokyo
Disneyland is a high energy show containing Latin songs and dancing. Minnie
Mouse is the star in this colorful performance along with Donald, Goofy, Chip
& Dale, and of course, Mickey Mouse.
The show offers songs in English, Japanese
& Spanish. There are two lead singers that move the show along, and it also
features incredible dancers in wonderful costumes. Some costumes consist of
feathers, wings, bright colors, and it is really impressive. Characters come
down from the stage too, to help make it more fun.
All the performers join in the fun and
dance along, leading to a hot Latin finale at the Theatre Orleans. The show
ends with the Characters striking a pose as the curtains fall.
Tokyo Disneyland was the first Disney park
to be built outside the United States, and it opened in 1983. The park was constructed in the same style as
Disneyland in California and Magic Kingdom in Florida.
The park has seven themed areas: the World
Bazaar; the four traditional Disney lands: Adventureland, Westernland,
Fantasyland and Tomorrowland; and two mini-lands: Critter Country and Mickey's
Toontown.
The Latin Quarter of Paris is an area in
the 5th and the 6th arrondissements of Paris. It is situated on the left bank
of the Seine, around the Sorbonne. Known for its student life, lively
atmosphere, and bistros, the Latin Quarter is the home to a number of higher
education establishments besides the Sorbonne university itself.
In spite of its adaptation and the loss
of its former identity, the many streets in Latin Quarter surrounding what was the student and
intellectual center continues to attract tourists and Parisians.
The area gets its name from the Latin
language, which was widely spoken in and around the University during the
Middle Ages, after the twelfth century philosopher Pierre Abélard and his
students took up residence there. The
church St Nicolas du Chardonnet, located here,
still performs the traditional Latin mass untill today (read also the
article ‘Paris, at St Nicolas du Chardonnet’ in this blogspot).
Students still frequent the area,
although not speaking Latin. The world
famous university of Sorbonne enrolls about 24,000 students in 20 departments
specializing in arts, humanities and languages, divided in 12 campuses in
Paris. Seven of the campuses are situated in the Latin Quarter, including the historic
Sorbonne university building and three in the Marais, Malesherbes and
Clignancourt. Paris-Sorbonne also houses France's prestigious communication and
journalism school, CELSA, located in the Parisian suburb of Neuilly-sur-Seine.
The history of Latin Quarter paralysed
by demonstration is now half a century old. May 1968 is still regarded as the
biggest upheaval to have hit modern French society, and it has forever recast
the tree-lined boulevards of Paris’s fifth arrondissement as the embodiment of
France’s famous spirit of rebellion.
The volatile period of civil unrest in
France during May 1968 was punctuated by demonstrations and massive general
strikes as well as the occupation of universities and factories across France.
At the height of its fervor, it brought the entire economy of France to a
virtual halt.
The unrest began with a series of
student occupation protests against capitalism, consumerism, American
imperialism and traditional institutions, values and order. The protests
spurred an artistic movement, with songs, imaginative graffiti, posters, and
slogans.
The well known philosopher Jean-Paul
Sartre roused students, nurses, doctors and teachers into a frenzy of protest
from his crudely constructed pulpit under the oak trees of the Boulevard Saint
Jacques, demonstrators lobbed cobblestones over barricades by the elegant
arches of the Sorbonne, and the noise of rioting echoed through the Pantheon.
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