Temple of Heaven Beijing
The Temple of Heaven in Beijing, China
The Temple of Heaven is a religious shrine and a house of prayer since 1420. It is a favorite tourist destination because of its beautiful buildings and grounds surrounded by a magnificent park. It is 270 acres in area situated in southeast Beijing which is China’s capital city. It is just near the city’s downtown about three miles and just 25 miles from Beijing International Airport.
Visitors can actually stay near the temple, there are quite few hotels very close to the site, they are Auotel Dayu, Ashar, Jialong Sunny, Ahongtang and the Hot Spring Business Hotel and Double Gappines Courtyard. You can find other luxurious to basic hotels just a walking distance from the temple and its nightly rate range from sixty to one hundred ten dollars and some of these hotels have restaurants that serve both Oriental and Western menus.
The structure you find today is actually a remake of the original because the main structure which is the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvest was burned down in 1889 because it was hit by lightning. Legends have it that the Gods were angry because a caterpillar was about to crawl in the forbidden holy structure and of course it is an act that no one is allowed but only the royalty is allowed to enter the sacred structure. As a result the angry emperor sentence thirty-two dignitaries to be burned to death for allowing the disrespect. Thus the temple continued to be forbidden until 1912 when the emperor’s rule ended and China becomes republic.
When China becomes republic, the temple and grounds were now open to the public as museum and an important relic of Chinese history. Today the site serves as a site for important events like the 2008 International Olympics games hosted by Beijing where it hold the lighting ceremony for the Paralympics torch.
For those who are planning to visit the temple it is open to visitors daily from six in the morning till ten in the evening. They have various entrance fees, averaging to $4.50
It is indeed an amazing thing to discover the several buildings that comprise the temple and it is worth investigating the four sounds that you hear in the temple of heaven. What are these four sounds?
- The echo from the Echo Wall. The famous Echo wall is the circular wall around the Imperial Vault of Heaven, Even if you just whisper you will hear it all clearly on the other side just like when you are speaking in the phone and you can hear clearly the person talking.
- The sound of the dialogue stone. It has that title because the sound can be heard on the stone when speaking from the two side galls (northeastern and northwestern part of the hall).
- Repeating Sounds of the Triple-Sound Stone. From the name itself it connotes the number of times he sound will be repeated. You can check it yourself when you clap your hands once in front of the first stone it will echo the sound once, if you stand before the second stone, the sound echo will be twice and so goes on with the third stone. This is in fact amazing.
- The Heaven’s Center Stone. Shouting allowed in the Heavens Center Stone, you will hear the reverberation of the echo which is due to the refraction of he sound.
top vacation destinations in Asia
top vacation destinations in Asia
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