The Great Wall of China

The highlight of our Tuesday was the trip north to the Great Wall of China, or the Long Wall of China as it is known by the Chinese. We drove for two hours northwest, stopped for some mandarin cuisine on the way and finally made it to the site. It was cold and rainy, and I only had a t-shirt and shorts. The wall is ancient, and being in it gave me a different perspective of the age of this world. It was mentioned that the first wall was built 2000 years ago, just as Christ was teaching to the scribes and pharisees at the temple. That wall was partially destroyed and rebuilt in the 1400s. What we see today is the reminiscence of the wall, once a symbol of power of a great empire. They built it as a protection from the Mongolians, and used a million workers to do it. Its details are worthy of their fine Chinese architecture, even though we were in the middle of nowhere, high up in the mountain. It extended itself 6000 miles, although it is nowadays broken up into different sections divided by ruins. How I wished to have seen it in its prime, a sight even bigger that the magnificent view I experienced on our rainy day. I would have wondered as I did that day, the struggle that man will go through to defend and protect themselves from their enemies. Such protection will not last forever, as it did not. At the bottom of this great monument of the Chinese supremacy in knowledge and power in the past, stood in a peculiar row a set of local merchandisers, in their poverty, selling whatever they could to feed their own empty stomachs. I got two statues of dragons for about a fifth of what they first asked for. Bargaining is a cultural experience on it's own in China. I chose the smallest lady to buy it from. Standing on the wall on the highest peak available, I thought to myself about how we build our own spiritual defenses, sometimes long and tall and magnificent, only to see it crumble if we are not careful about it. I could almost see the enemy coming on one side, with his army as numerous as the trees that stood on the north side of the wall. Zeal in keeping it is as important as the strength in building it. The Great Wall of China is truly great, and I stood in it. I touched its bricks and walked through the shrubs and weeds that now cover the place. What a place it was.