Forbidden City

We got into a rideshare car, called DiDi in China, and headed off to the Forbidden City. On the way there, Buboli explained how we were penetrating different layers of the Beijing rings as the ride continued. There are a total of seven rings surrounding the city with the smallest innermost ring being the Forbidden City itself. These rings are actually roads that completely surround Beijing in increasing diameter as the ring’s number increases. The second wall was actually built along the Ming Dynasty city walls that once protected the capital city of Beijing. As we got closer to the forbidden city, we could actually use these rings to indicate how close we were getting to the Forbidden City.

After talking with Buboli some, I found that the numbering of these is quite confusing. There is no true “1st ring” so the 2nd ring is actually the first looping road that surrounds the center of Beijing. The 6th ring is the final looping road that surrounds Beijing. So technically, the 6th ring is the 5th loop surrounding the city. Similarly confusing, the 7th ring is a highway that circles the city of Beijing but does not do a full loop. So it is colloquially called the 7th ring but it doesn’t have an official ring name like the other ring roads do. This confusion results in a situation where depending on who you ask, Beijing has 5, 6, or 7 rings.

What I’ve learned from all this, is that this scene must have been inspired by Beijingers.
https://youtu.be/se21HBRG_YI?si=TX0_0ajei7CqKXYA

I also learned that these rings can be an indication of socio-economic status. The closer within the rings you live, the longer your family has probably lived in Beijing and the more money your family is likely to have. This is similar to most modern cities where the people who live the most inward of the downtown area seem to be the most affluent. However, having these rings makes it seem a bit more literal because the higher your ring number, the less affluent your family may seem. It may be harder in other cities to really understand the geography based on various neighborhood names, but these rings make it explicitly known how far away you are from the center of Beijing. There is also a system designed to favor original residents called hukou (户口) which is a type of house registration system that gives longer term residents more rights than those that have moved to the city for work or other reasons in recent years. I think this is a similar system to rent-controlled housing within New York City which is designed to prevent the rich from pushing out people who have spent multiple generations living in NYC. No system is perfect though and there will always be people who are excluded and people who are able to take advantage of a system that is meant to help the disadvantaged. I have plenty of opinions on this topic but I’m not sure I have any perfect solutions. I think it is interesting though that these sorts of systems and problems are not isolated to any one country or region. The more I learn about China, the more I see the same sorts of cultural behaviors and systems that exist in America.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hukou

Talking about these 7 rings and socio-economic status reminded me of the song “7 Rings” by Ariana Grande as well 😆 Listening to this now as I write the rest of the journal.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QYh6mYIJG2Y

Another honorable mention is this song which is actually about the rings in Beijing. I don't think I'll be jamming to this one but I thought it was interesting to include https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aobXmIzKosM

As we approached the Forbidden City, I saw so many women dressed up as Imperial style Empresses. It was more rare to see someone dressed as an Emperor, but I did see at least one. It’s hard to express just how many of these women were cosplaying as Empresses. It felt like more than half of the groups exploring the Forbidden City were dressed like this. Having so many people dressed like this made it feel like they were actually part of the Forbidden City’s exhibit. It didn’t feel like a bunch of tourists walking around the Forbidden City, it felt more like the Forbidden City was still in operation today and there just happened to be some modern tourists around as well.

To enter the Forbidden City, we had to purchase a ticket in advance and I also needed to present my passport to the front gate. There were few times where I actually needed to present my passport during the trip, so I was happy I remembered to bring it along with me. When looking through our bags, they stopped me to ask what the fursuit head bag was for. Buboli explained to them in Chinese some things and we were able to make it inside without much fuss. Buboli explained that he told them my fursuit head was a toy and that because cosplaying within the Forbidden City is common, they let it through without much questioning. This is definitely one of the moments where I was so grateful to have Buboli by my side. I would never have attempted to bring my suit to a place like this but with a local’s blessing it was no problem at all. From then on, we went to explore the Forbidden City and take many fursuit photos alongside the many Empresses trying to get their perfect Qing Dynasty pictures.

I didn’t learn much about the Forbidden City itself while we were there, but I don’t think that was totally necessary. Learning about the Chinese dynasties is so difficult because the names sound very similar and it’s hard to keep the order of events and dynasties straight in my head. Maybe if I ever dive more into Chinese history I can try one of the guided tours or something, but I doubt I’ll make the trip a second time unless I travel with a friend. Walking around the city, it made me realize that it truly was the size of a village and that people could live within these walls. In pictures I don’t think the size of the City is conveyed in a way that evokes the same emotional response as seeing it in person. It felt like a place where many people had lived, many people had died, and many important ceremonies had taken place at. If this place were not packed with tourists it would have an eerie feeling that one should not be here. However, since there were so many children, cosplayers, and the like it felt more like a big photoshoot.

As we walked around and took photos, I eventually just kept on the head because it was so much effort to put it away and brush it when I took it out each time. Buboli said there were many people making comments or trying to guess what species of cat I am. I could even overhear some of the people saying the word furry in Chinese because it sounds very similar to the English word for furry, 福瑞 which is pronounced similar to “fu rui”. 福 is fortune and 瑞 is auspicious, so these characters actually show up quite commonly in the various gate titles throughout the Forbidden City too. This led to me getting some photos where in Chinese you can see references to “furry” in the gate names seen in the background. Since this place already felt like a big photoshoot for the people visiting, I didn’t really feel out of place at all while walking around.

The palace is so large that you really could spend an entire day walking around it and still not see everything. I was still a bit jet lagged so even walking from one end to the other left me a bit exhausted. I was so exhausted that later on this day we ended up going to a coffee shop where I had a Vietnamese coffee, put my head bag on the table, and passed out on top of it for a period of time. These first few days were a bit rough because of the time difference but I’m glad that we used the time to its fullest and were able to knock out the Beijing “essentials” during my limited time in China.Read more