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Tuesday 2005-09-20 - Beijing, China
Morning Activities
Many Chinese get up early in the morning and go outside for some gentle exercise. One favorite place in Beijing is the Tiantan Park with the Temple of Heaven, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1998. Although the main temple is closed at the moment and in scaffolding for restoration, we get up early to go to the park for some people-watching. It proves to be quite an experience, well worth getting up early for.
The huge park itself is an oasis in the big city, with many trees and a chorus of chirping cicadas almost masking the music of the singing birds. Although the park itself, laid out in a formal geometrical style, and the buildings within it are quite interesting, it’s the people that really take our interest. People do all kinds of exercises such as Tai Chi (often with a teacher) but also other types of exercise, all gentle, such as a kind of dance with fans, or marching in figures with pompoms and fans as if it’ a band of cheerleaders — except most in the group are actually middle aged… We also see a group being taught western style dancing. Most of these activities are accompanied by music coming from loudspeakers placed at regular intervals but some (such as the cheerleader group) have live music.
Then there are all kinds of ball games, like badminton, or kicking around a kind of feather ball (people kick it at each other and it should stay in the air as long as possible, apparently). There’s also a ball game with a soft ball ans a round racket with which the ball is caught and thrown back (not hit) all in one fluid movement. Other people do stretching exercises, or walk backwards a long way, using a marble strip in the pavement as a guide.
Harmony is important for the Chinese, and one way or another all this is about harmony; exercise can become a kind of meditation, but we see other forms as well: some people are practicing calligraphy writing with big brushes and water on the pavement; I also note a man flying a kite, accompanied by soft music. His mind is clearly far away, too, and he doesn’t notice us watching. Even a choir is using the park for their practice sessions, accompanied by an accordionist.
