Visit the Lama Temple in Beijing, China

After seeing the attractions in the Beijing area, let’s go back to the capital. Beijing has many more sites than tourists could see during just one visit. We haven’t yet seen the Park of the Northern Lake, Coal Hills, the Fortress of the Round City, the grave of Mateo Ricci, the Taoist monastery of the Hundred Clouds, the Confucius Temple, the aquarium, the Temple of Earth, the Gallery of Arts, the circus, the – Museum, the Marco Polo Bridge and we could list many more. We should not miss the Llama Temple which stands close to the imperial college. Originally, it was built for Prince Yung Zhang as a palace. At that time, it was common for the palaces of princes who became emperors to be transformed into temples. This is what the prince did who ruled by the name of Qianlong. At the time of the Manchus, Lamaism which is a branch of Buddhism was the official religion. Accordingly, the temple bears the traditional imagine of Buddhist places of prayer. It has five courtyards and five pavilions but what is unusual is that the yellow -- roof otherwise a privilege of the ruler exclusively was not replaced. The inner courtyard can be accessed through an ornamented gate with three arcades. Traditionally, the brass bell was placed here and we can find here the stone plates telling the story of the temple in four languages. In the first room, the statue of maitreya, that is the predicted future Buddha awaits the visitors. The embossments and pictures of the second court represent Tsung Kapa, the founder of Lamaism. In the room of eternal harmony, Buddha can be seen with his 18 disciples. The famous Lamaist flag pictures, the Tankas were placed in the gallery. These can only be seen by monks and researchers. The room of eternal shelter displays three Buddha representations sitting on thrones made of gilded wood. In the fourth room, the monumental statue of Tsung Kapa sits which is one of the biggest statues in the world made of copper. In the fifth room stands the 26 meter high Buddha statue carved from wood for which the wood was donated to the emperor by the Dalai Lama. At the time of the cultural revolution, the communist party tried to limit religious life. This direction however, belongs to the past. China is such an enormous country where even the fourth most widespread religion has 8 million followers. These are Protestants who have 8000 temples and 20000 prayer rooms. The Catholic Church numbers one half less with a little over 4000 churches. The state doesn’t prevent people from practicing the Catholic faith but they do forbid any connections with the Pope or the Vatican. The spread of Islam began in the country in the 7th century. Its 18 million followers can praise Allah in more than 30000 mosques. It’s impossible to estimate the number of Taoists in the country. This religion was completely mixed with the ancient Chinese philosophy and healing. The most widespread religion is Buddhism which came from India in the first century and one independent area of this, Lamaism. Chinese and Tibetan Buddhism are also differentiated. Especially with the uneducated superstitious Chinese, another phenomenon might exist which is called synchronism in which they believe in several religions at the same time. The nightlife and entertainment opportunities define the atmosphere of all cities. Let’s see what Beijing can offer from this point of view. Those who long for some kind of activity before or after dinner can go to a Chinese opera which is completely different from what we’re used to. At any rate, it’s very exotic. The circus may be more – with artists of rural class and we can also find karaoke bars in Beijing based on the Japanese model. Chinese is considered to be one of the best cuisines in the world. Although there’s no big city in the world in which we can't find a Chinese restaurant, we can still find them most authentic dishes in Beijing. The basis of the Chinese cuisine is the many fresh vegetables which are fried in a wok or frying pan so that they remain somewhat crunchy. The vegetables and meat are chopped fine making it easy to eat with chopsticks. They eat pork, beef, and chicken alike but fish and seafood are also very popular. Of course, in a country that has a Pacific coastline of 32000 km and with 5400 islands, this is not too surprising. The rivers, abundant in water and the huge lakes supply the country with fresh water fish. The most important food is rice, of which several types are consumed but noodles follow the rice closely in second place including transparent rice noodles. To season the food, primarily soy sauce and five spices seasoning mix are used. The combination of sweet and sour and spicy sour taste gives the characteristic -- of Chinese food. When we’re in Beijing, we must try the Beijing duck which is a real specialty and it’s only made in certain restaurants. Warm water is poured under the skin of the duck and then they dry it, inflate it with air which separates the skin from the meat. This is how it’s roasted in a uniquely crisp way. The heavenly meat is then sliced, rolled into small pancakes and eaten flavored with soy sauce. Chinese wines aren’t especially good, the beer is though, which have a tradition of many centuries, are much better and the most well known is shing tao.