Feb 27 - Nate The Great Wall Climber

We awoke at 6AM today, as we were getting picked up by a tour guide at 7, and were warned not to be late. I'm tired. I went to bed around midnight, so unless the fatigue and sleep deprivation has affected my math skills, that's 3 hours sleep in the last 2 nights. Sheesh! If I had known that the tour guide was going to be a full hour late, I could have slept in until 7. That would work out to 5 hours I think. Either that or the battery on my calculator needs charging.

We booked an English tour, so I was expecting to see a bus-load of bright-eyed, bushy-tailed foreigners. If I was lucky, I might see another Canadian so we could talk canoes or compare sasquatch sighting stories. But no, as usual I was the only whitey in the group. I'm used to this feeling, but then the tour guide started off on her schpeal, in Chinese, with no English translation! What gives?!? Luckily, my wife translated the important stuff for me, like "That's the tree where Emperor So and So hung himself." You know, a real feel-good story. When the bus stopped for a bathroom break, my wife and I confronted the guide. We were under the impression that it was an English tour. We paid an extra 20 Yuan for English, now I want my English! And put a little English on that with a side of English. My wife demanded we be reimbursed 40 Yuan, and the guide offered 20, witha promise to speak English from now on. It's not what we paid for, but I guess it's better than nothing. "Wait," she says. "Please don't tell the others how much you paid." Because we booked online, we saved about 100 Yuan each. Now wait a minute. Why the hell should we lie for her? We had to haggle the English out of her! Oh well, let's just get on with the tour. I've got a wall to climb!

Before the Great Wall, we were going to visit the burial site of the 13 Emperors of the Ming Dynasty. You'd think it would be depressing, but let me tell ya, these guys have pretty graves. I don't think they made off to badly. The archaeologists found tons of gold, silver, jade, and of course the remains of several dozen concubines aka hookers who were buried alive with the emperors. There was one emperor though, who was kind of a ladies man. He was more into drinking Crystoll with his bitches that leading the nation and all that "official" jazz. So, he abolished the dead hooker burials for all future emperors. Looks like they'll be lonely in the afterlife. I hope they at least brought a book to read or something!

We putted around the burial site some more, looking at the craftsmanship and all that. There are these tree trunks holding up one of the buildings that are as round as Michael moore and as tall as Godzilla. They even kept their original colour after all these years. That was cool. My dad would be into this. He's always bragging about his stash of "teak" - a highly valuable type of lumber. Most people buy RRSP's to help save for retirement. Not the old man. A stack of rare lumber is more up his alley. Even the bricks at the burial site had an interesting story. The name of the brick maker is stamped on every single brick surrounding the temple. If the emperor saw that the bricks were crumbling, or just weren't up to snuff as far as bricks go, he'd have the guy offed! If it was me, I'd just tell him to hit the bricks and never return. Get outta town Bricky!

We left the burial site, and on the way out, the tour guide told me that pretty much everything we saw today was a duplicate. The original site was destroyed by American and British soldiers in the 1800's. Way to spoil the party guys! I guess it was competing with Disneyland and Eurodisney back then. You mess with Disney, you'd better duck, Donald.

Next up, we went to a Jade factory. You know, the jewellry, It's kind of green, but not as dark as sapphire. The tour guide at the factory didn't speak English, so I just wandered around and touched stuff. Again, it turned out that I was at the mall. Everything in the factory was for sale, and they were "Craaaazy about low prices!" Well, I guess I'm crazy too, for not taking advantage of factory prices. I don't know, I'm just not a jewelry kinda guy. Heck, I take my wedding ring off sometimes, and No it's not for that reason. What a dirty mind you have, dirty mind. I guess I just didn't set out today thinking "Boy I'd like to buy a green bracelet today! Any ideas?"

We ate a delicious lunch and then it was time for the moment of truth - The Great Wall of China. Here's an interesting little tidbit for ya: At the time of the Wall's construction, it took 100,000 workers to slap the whole thing together. At the time, this was 1/5 the population of China. And unlike Ikea furniture, it didn't come with those funny instructions that show cartoon people stubbing their toes and looking bewildered, then finally calling in for assistance. These guys were hard core, and lots of them died in the process. There are hundreds of bodies buried beneath the stones of the Great Wall. How would you like to spend your entire afterlife letting people walk all over you?

We had roughly 2 hours to be back at the parking lot, and I had my sights set on the highest point of this section of Wall. It looked like a steep climg, but heck, I've climbed the Grouse Grind back in Vancouver enough times to make this look like child's play. My wife was not quite as pumped. I felt kinda bad for leaving her behind, but she said "Go ahead" and I was off to the races. I made it to the top, bought my "I climbed the Great Wall" T-Shirt and I was loving it. I closed my eyes and pictured the early days, with all the sentrys in their shiny armour, watching the hills for Mongol intruders. They must have been in immaculate physical condition, just from climbing this staircase every day. I was sweating from the climb, but just imagine climbing 40 or 50 flights of stairs wearing a suit of plate mail and carrying a 10 foot spear with you. That's what I call endurance. Whoever got posted to the Badaling entrance of the Great Wall must have been truly made of steel.

I stopped a few times, snapping pictures both for myself and anyone else who asked. Heck, I'm a good sport. I even wore my Vancouver Canucks T-Shirt today just so I could have my picture taken wearing the Canucks logo on the Great Wall of China. Hopefully that picture will end up at a bus stop somewhere in Vancouver and some kid will draw a mustache on me or write "I like Men" in a bubble next to my head. Ahhh to be famous.

I made it back to the bus on time, running down the last section with my wife, who I met halfway down. At least she tried. I gotta give her that. Plus, she made an error in footwear judgement. Here's a tip for anyone climbing the Great Wall: Wear comfortable shoes! My wife was wearing her winter boots, but she was leap years ahead of one wingnut I saw wearing stilleto heels. Honestly, you might as well go barefoot. I don't care if it's haute cou-ture, but high heels is foot tor-ture, to be sure.

I ended my little visit off by doing my part and vandalizing a sacred piece of Chinese history. i carved my name into one of the bricks on the Great Wall. It reads "N. Stafford - Canada - 2008" Can I get in trouble for that? Naah, as long as that brick doesn't crumble, the Emperor won't come looking for me. I think I'm in the clear.