Mao Groupies Flock to Tiananmen Square
Where: Beijing Field Trip: Mao Groupies Flock to Tiananmen,
Beijing,
China
With the 60th anniversary of China becoming a communist republic approaching October 1, Claire Duffett took a jaunt around the country for the month of September, starting with Beijing. Nowhere does old and new China collide than in its Capital, and for the next five days, we'll share with you the most up-to-date tidbits on what to see and do, and how many yuan it will set you back.
Tiananmen Square. For most in the West, it evokes images of a peace-loving student offering a daisy to oncoming tanks. For Chinese, at least outwardly, it’s a combo of Trafalgar Square and the Lincoln Memorial.
Every morning, thousands of pilgrims line up, white carnations in hand, to see the body of Chairman Mao Tse Tung, which lies in preservation in a mausoleum in the center of the cement-tile square, the largest of its kind in the world. The atmosphere is austere though a bit frantic, with armed police monitoring the seemingly-endless line and kicking out cutters.
Once inside, flowers surround a giant, white seated statue of the communist leader, hence the Lincoln Memorial similarity. Then, the river of people are led into a room where the preserved (or perhaps wax replacement, some people say) lay in a glass coffin, his body resembling any creepy, made-up, bloated version of a human shell that you see at a wake, complete with obvious hair plugs. Only this one is decades-old and viewed by masses daily.
After coming from Cambodia, we marveled at how the victors of history are remembered differently than the losers. Millions in China died during the Great Leap Forward, yet Mao remains lionized, while Pol Pot, the Khmer Rouge’s leader, died in obscurity while under house arrest by his own men in the jungle. And in terms of reputation, things really didn't turn out how Hitler envisioned. Some despots have all the luck.
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