We saw two important sites today: the Temple of Heaven and the Lama Temple. But on the way to Wangfujing metro station, we were waylaid by the world’s biggest Lego shop and were enthralled by some of the gigantic figures made entirely of millions of pieces of Lego.
We got the No.1 line to Dongmen and then the No.5 line to Tiantanhuangmen (I think, need to check) and crossed the main road into the Temple Park. The Temple of Heaven was constructed in 1420 as the place where emperors of the Ming and Qing dynasties could pray to the God of Heaven and offer sacrifices for bumper crops and favourable rain. Most of the structures seen today were built during the Qing Dynasty in accordance with the layout built by Emperor Jiajing of the Ming Dynasty They include the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests, the Circular Mound Altar, the Imperial Vault of Heaven and the Abstinence Palace, which served as a palace for the emperors during the period of abstinence before the rituals. There is also the Danbi (Red Stairway) Bridge, the Long Corridor (which we walked along), the Seven-Star Stones and the Nine-Dragon Cypress.
The main feature is the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests on top of a mound. It was built in 1420 by Emperor Yongle and reconstructed by Jiajing in 1535 It is covered in blue, yellow and green tiles representing Heaven, Earth and the Mortal World, and was designated by Jiajing as the “Great Hall for Offering Sacrifices”. It was renamed the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests by Emperor Qianling in (1751) and the old tiles were replaced by azure glazed tiles. The hall is supported by immense pillars symbolising the four seasons, the 12 months of the year, the 12 time divisions of day and night and all the constellations.
We returned to the station and took Line 5 to Lama Temple station where a long walk was needed to find the way in. It is an active temple with large numbers of people waving joss sticks about and praying to various images of Buddhas including the big fat “Laughing Buddha” We were templed-out by this time, but one site worth seeing was the 18-metre tall Buddha carved from a single piece of sandal wood. Feeling utterly exhausted we went back to the hotel
Lama Temple
Giant Buddha
Image of elephant projected into street
