Archive for April 8th, 2009

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China Travel – Xingcheng City Wall

Wednesday, April 8th, 2009

The Xingcheng City Wall is located in Xingcheng City in the southwest of Liaoning Province.

The Xingchen Ancient City is the best-preserved city in China. It was built in 1430 during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) and rebuilt in 1781 during the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911).

With its back to the mountains and close to the sea, the grand ancient city is square in shape with each side measuring about 880 meters. The city, which covers an area of about 600,000 square meters, has gates on all four sides with platforms. The city wall is 10.1 meters high, 6.3 meters wide at the base and 4.5 meters wide near the top. The outer wall was built using black bricks, while the inner side is made of ashlars. There were originally four gate towers on all sides, but only the south and west towers remain. Four, small, defensive towns outside the gates have all been demolished to some extent.

The Xingcheng Ancient City is a famous historical and cultural site. Renowned General Yuan Chonghuan of the Ming Dynasty once garrisoned there and drove off Qing troops several times. It is a northern flatland city typical of the Ming and Qing dynasties. Old cities of such arrangements are rarely seen in present China.

(Source: chinaculture.org)

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Beijing Olympic – Lee breaks 12-arrow record, primed to win gold

Wednesday, April 8th, 2009

With the crowd chanting his name after each arrow, No. 10 seed Lee Chang-hwan of the Republic of Korea (ROK) shot a near perfect score of 117 out of 120 to set a 12-arrow Olympic record in the Men’s Individual Elimination rounds at the Olympic Green Archery Field on Wednesday.

Lee and his teammate Im Dong-hyun, along with three of the top four seeded archers, Juan Rene Serrano of Mexico, Viktor Ruban of Ukraine and Park Kyung-mo (ROK), advanced as expected to the 1/8 Elimination Round.

Other archers who qualified for the top 16 include Alan Wills of Great Britain and Victor Wunderle of the United States.

In an exciting match that came down to the very last arrow, Wills, the No. 21 seed, took out the reigning Olympic champion Marco Galiazzo of Italy, in the 1/16 Elimination round, 110-109.

Wunderle, the Individual silver medalist at the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games, kept the USA’s hopes alive for an Individual medal when he defeated Ilario Di Buo’ of Italy in a two-arrow shoot-off following a 108-108 tie. Both Di Buo’ and Wunderle shot a nine on the first arrow, but it was Wunderle who conquered with a 10 to Di Buo’s eight on the second arrow.

In the biggest upset of the day, No. 2 seed Mangal Singh Champia of India failed to advance to the top 16. Champia lost to No. 31 seed Bair Badenov of Russia, 109-108, but Badenov did not win his next match.

Before the Men’s Individual Elimination Rounds began on Wednesday, the Olympic Record was 115. Although it was Lee who broke the record, three other archers, Serrano, Park, and Jacek Proc of Poland shot 116s in their Elimination matches.

The Olympic record broken Wednesday was set 12 years ago at the Altanta 1996 Olympic Games by Oh Kyo-moon (ROK). Oh is in Beijing as the head coach of the Australian Archery team.

The Men’s 1/8 Elimination matches begin at 10:30 on Friday, August 15 at the Olympic Green Archery Field.

(Source: en.beijing2008.cn)

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Chinese Culture – Literary Inquisition

Wednesday, April 8th, 2009

Literary inquisition refers to an unjust charge that rulers in the past used to persecute intellectuals. The emperor and his entourage deliberately excerpted words and sentences from poems and articles to make up crimes to charge against the writers. The serious offender and even his family members and relatives would be killed for the crime.

Ming (1368-1644) Emperor Taizu, Zhu Yuanzhang, was an emperor born in an ordinary family, and did not have much education. After ascending the throne, he became very insidious, ferocious, suspicious and bloodthirsty. He went in a big way the literary inquisition, and beheaded many people just for characters that pricked his secret troubles.

The Qing rulers who were highly sensitive against any kind of anti-Manchu feelings on the side of Han Chinese scholar officials also carried out many literary inquisitions. They tried to ensure the correct legitimation of their rulership by ruthless “literary inquisitions”. They had earlier works censored and writers imprisoned for suspected critical references to the Qing Dynasty. From Emperor Kangxi to Qianlong, there were more than 10 cases of literary inquisition, and a large number of people were killed.

（Source: chinaculture.org）

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