The Reflections of Visiting the Great Wall

If you are willing to travel to a place that contains long history and magnificent views, I will recommend you the Great Wall in China undoubtedly. The Great Wall was described as the primary military engineering in the ancient time of China. Obviously, the significant function of the Great Wall is utilized in the wars because it has powerful defense function. The Great Wall was built in Zhou dynasty, and it has the total length of 21196.18 kilometers. It contains a high number of heritages such as wall body of the Great Wall, trenches, individual buildings and so on which are spread over fifteen cities in China. The Great Wall is one of the ten wonders of the world which mainly attributes to its special construction method. The Great Wall just like a long dragon lying on the mountain range from the east of China to the west for protecting the beautiful rivers and mountains of the country. In the ancient time, all of the building materials were moved and constructed by human power. “It provides significant physical evidence of the far-sighted political strategic thinking and mighty military and national defense forces of central empires in ancient China, and is an outstanding example of the superb military architecture, technology and art of ancient China.” (The Great Wall) It is the great result of the intelligent and power of the ancient Chinese people. The main material of the Great Wall is the black brick that is in the same shape and weight. The manufacturing technology of the stone brick carving of the gate tower is complicated that reflects the artisans ingenious artistic talent at that time. The most attractive feature of the Great Wall for me is its military significance. It is not the simple and isolated wall in a line, instead of a complete defense net that tightly connects military strongholds and sally ports together. The memorable experience of visiting the Great Wall in the last summer vacation in Beijing leaves me a profound impression as its beauty views, long history, and interesting stories.

First and foremost, I was drawn into the spectacular landscape I saw standing on the Great Wall. I visited one of the parts of the Great Wall in Beijing that is named Ba Dalin. It results from its long history, magnificent construction and the spectacular view that list the first place in the hundreds of thousands of famous strongholds and cragginess sally ports. Ba Dalin has two separately sally port doors in the east which is named outside town and the west which is called key to the west door. They are all made of bricks with a platform on the top of the hole that connects passageways to the north and south wall. The Great Wall spread along the ridge and was built on the basis of the range of the mountain. The wall height is differed which can contain five horses or ten soldiers running in parallel. The bottom of the wall is the stone foundation; the upside of it is a huge brick. Quadrels pave the top of the wall and the ground. The functions of the wall with crenels and drill holes are to watch and shoot armies from a height and distance. The Great Wall in Ba Dalin part was flourishing in Ming dynasty. What occur to my eyes are mountain range with overlapping and lush trees and blooming and colorful flowers. According to the introduction of the tour guide, I acknowledge that “Juyong Diecui” is one the eight sceneries of Yan Jing and enjoyed a laudatory title of “the world nine frontiers”. It is said that we can enjoy the beauty view on the Great Wall in the four seasons of a year. In spring, it seems that the Great Wall wears a maxi skirt with numerous flower buds. In summer, when we are standing on the Great Wall, it seems we stroll in the mountain sea. In autumn, the mountain sea changes its saffron evening dress that is made of maple leafs. In winter, even though almost all leafs are falling, it changes another silvery dress after snowing. I cannot image how the green world before my eyes turns into another view does. I still know the climate condition of the Great Wall. Ba Dalin is located in the uplift area of the west zone of subsidence of the Yan Mountains. The forest coverage rate is high to ninety-six percent because of the mountainous hills, ravines crossbar. So the climate of the Ba Dalin is delightful and pleasant and has special geography and weather condition. I find that there is a small tower along the wall for every few meters, and it is called the beacon tower. It is the most significant part of the Great Wall and has an important function for defense. I am interested in military affairs and technology, so the information of the beacon tower is attractive to me. The tower was used for transferring war situation through firing torches. The method of transferring is creating smoke in the day and holding the torches at night. This is a technique and effective way to transfer information because the flame is not realized in the daytime while it can be seen in distant in the night. I extremely admire the intelligent of ancient people which contains advanced technology compared with the present. Standing on the top of the Great Wall, the historical blue bricks are treated. The range of mountain stretching and undulating is around the world before my eyes just like a picture in Chinese ink.

Furthermore, the greatness of the Great Wall not only lies in the magnificent constructor but also reflected the sense of history behind it. As the mysterious project strongly appeals me, I received the great number of information about the Great Wall from the internet and the tour guide. The Great Wall was begun to build in Zhou dynasty. Chu State firstly built the “Chu Wall” to defense the invading of other countries and lifted the curtain on building the Great Wall in the period of Chun Qiu. Moreover, then in the period of Zhan Guo, many countries such as Qi, Wei, and Zhao and built their wall for defense in succession. Every country made effort to construct the wall for protecting their land until Qin dynasty that connected the separate wall into a line. It is the first shape of the Great Wall which spreads from Lin Zhao in the west to the east of Liao. It is recorded that First Emperor of Qin employed nearly a million of workforces to construct the Great Wall which was the one twentieth total population in the country. “Around 220 B.C., Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor of a unified China, ordered that earlier fortifications between states be removed and a number of existing walls along the northern border be joined into a single system that would extend for more than 10,000 li (a li is about one-third of a mile) and protect China against attacks from the north.” (The Great Wall of China) In Han Dynasty, the Great Wall was rebuilt for fear of invading of Xiong Nu in the north. At last, the Great Wall we indicate today is from the province of Gan Su in the west to the north side of the Ya Lv River. It is a common sense that there was no advanced vehicle and building implements, all the work were completed by human force. Moreover, the working condition was extremely terrible that were a mountain, cliff, and deep gully. Through the wars in every period of Chinese history, most parts of the Great Wall were destroyed, and some sites were remained until now. The site of Ba Dalin I visited is one of the sites in Beijing. I am interested in its name that contains a particular history. While there are some stories behind its name and on one can be tested. One of the stories indicates that Ba Dalin was concluded by the means of homophonic. Because the location of Ba Dalin was dangerous and precipitous, and the trend of the range of the mountain was complicated, it needed to overcome eight dangerous turns and got over eight mountain ridges. There were eight supervisors died from the difficulty of this project on after another. Moreover, finally, the project was completed through the suggestion of an immortal which named “eight methods of projecting”. So people called this part of the Great Wall “Ba Dalin” through homophonic. Through this fairy story, we can realize how difficult of the greatness project it is.

Moreover, when mentioning the Great Wall, we cannot curb the interesting to the impressing and touching stories about it. The reason that I describe them as impressing and touching because they all present the stories about separation and death which are the forever topic of human life especially in that period. One of the most well-known stories is Meng Jiangnu Crying Princes, which is one of the four folk legends about love. This legend took place in the north of He Bei at the foot of the Great Wall. A long time ago, Meng Iiangnu had been finished the sewing and mending; she had a walk in the garden for a rest. A large number of lotuses were in full bloom, and the water of the pond was in dark green in where the fish freely swam. Suddenly, a pair of butterfly which fell on the top of the lotuses appealed the eye of Meng. So she was willing to catch them but her fan fell into the water as her overexertion. Meng were a little angry and decided to pick up her fan. At this time, she heard the sound of somebody behind her; she turned back and saw a young man standing under the tree which was exhausted. Meng did not know how to deal with this situation and search help from her parents. Her father was outraged for his breaking into their garden and asked him who is him and why he was here. The young man admitted his error, asked for punishment and explained the reason of why he was here. His name is Fan Xiliang and was good at reciting classical articles. He was not willing to be employed by the government of Qin to build the Great Wall, so he escaped. At that time, the men who reached the age must be employed without personal willing and spent their force or even rest of life in building this project. Fan Xiliang was so hungry and thirsty that broke into the Meng’s garden for the rest. Meng Jiangnu was fall in love with this young man because he was intelligent, politely and veracity. Moreover, her father felt pity for this young man and decided to allow him stay at their home in hiding. Moreover, then Meng Jiangnu explained her attitude toward this young man and her father agreed with her daughter. While this honest young man was afraid that his experience would involve Meng Jiangnu and rejected this idea. However, the decision of Meng Jiangnu was firm, and no one can change. So they got married on a selected day according to the local custom.

No one would predict that the local government arrested Fan Xiliang after three days of marriage as the report of a villain who had been forced Meng Jiangnu to be his wife and rejected strongly by her at last. So the villain bore a grudge against the Meng’s and then he grasped an opportunity to revenge. Army arrested Fan and Meng Jiangnu was so missing her husband that could not eat and drink. When the winter came, Meng Jiangnu was worried about her husband, who did not have enough food and cotton-padded clothes. She was preparing to make and sew some clothes for her husband and decided to send to him in person. She had to tramp over hill and dale and could not pay for enough food to eat and place to rest. Finally, she came to the foot of the Great Wall, but she had to ask for help one by one because there were a larger number of workers there. One of the workers who knew her husband told her that Fan Xiliang died from working overload and was buried in the wall. Meng Jiangnu could not accept this condition that the skeleton of her dead husband was buried in the wall. The more she thought like this, the more sorrowful she was. She cried for nearly ten days and nights near the wall that buried her husband. Suddenly, the land was shocked, and the stones were moved. The Great Wall collapsed for eight hundred meters, and the skeleton of Fan Xiliang was discovered. This news was shocked the First Emperor of Qin; he was so angry that was eager to kill this woman. However, he was attracted by the beauty of this woman and decided to marry her as his concubine. Meng Jiangnu provided three requirements for the First Empire of Qin. The first one was to build a bridge that is ten miles long and ten miles wide. The second was to construct a magnificent tomb for Fan Xiliang. The third is that First Empire of Qin must devout worship her husband in front of the tomb. First Empire of Qin accepted these requirements without a doubt. A few days later, the bridge and tomb were built completely, and First Empire of Qin was honored the commitment. However, Meng Jiangnu stated her miserable and painful with tears and directly refused the First Empire of Qin. At last, Meng Jiangnu jumped into the river with the skeleton of her husband. “The story of “Meng Jiangnu” was created, due to people’s hatred toward Emperor Qin shihuang. It reflects the grievances ancient people had about tyranny as well as the praise of unyielding women.” (Koshoibekova) This is a story that spreads in China for a long time. It not only praises the loyal and steadfast of Meng Jiangnu for her husband but also reflects the huge expend in building this greatness project. Countless common people pay all their attention or even life for it.

On one will overlook the Great Wall when we are mentioning China. It is the significant represent of this nation because it reflects the powerful nation spirit. When I am standing on the top of the Great Wall, I could not help myself attracting by the beautiful views seen on it. I also cannot image how Chinese people constructed this magnificent building. Every brick presents a person who expends their lives just like Fan Xiliang for the Great Wall. “Chinese slaves place their stones, Breaking muscles and bones. Defending its territory, it shines in pitiful glory. This wall stands tall, to defend those who befall. Those dark days have passed, and now united at last.” (Damien Wong) I can easily to find poetries depicting the Great Wall and just like what write in them, the Great Wall is standing there for protecting this nation and represents her spirit.