Muta Pagoda

The Muta Pagoda, aka Pagoda of Fogong Temple, is one of the oldest wooden buildings in the world, having been built in 1056 during the Liao Dynasty. It is also about to collapse.

Let's back up a sec. Here's the admiral with our knowledgeable and wonderful guide, "Miller". If the tower doesn't look straight, that's because it isn't. It's leaning and twisted, falling down.

We forget exactly, but we're pretty sure the lovely statue is Guanyin, the Bodhisattva of compassion. You're seen her with 1000 arms and 11 faces, but sometimes she's normal.

The gate, complete with incense burner boasting industrial-grade joss-sticks. They are not bottle rockets!

Inside we have Budai, aka The Laughing Buddha. It may look kitschy, but it's very old kitsch.

The bell tower.

Things are looking up! At close range the age begins to show. What's amazing though is the fact that it has stood here for 1,000 years and many, many earthquakes, with no fasteners other than wooden pegs, just interlocking brackets, like Lincoln Logs.

The signs are exclamations of various emperors about the tower. One calls it a "sky ripper".

How did they build it? Our guide said that when they finished a story, they would construct an earthen ramp to the next level.

What's inside? Why Buddhas, of course! This one is attended by various Bodhisattvas. The really big Buddha, on the ground floor, is 10m (33') high and would have made a great photo-op, but there were the usual "no photo" signs and a steely-eyed guard.

The tower is completely open to the elements, as well as two zillion birds living in and among the brackets.

The biggest peril the tower has faced came during the 1930s invasion when the Chinese used it as an observation post and the Japanese attacked. It is riddled with bullet holes.

On the left side you can see how one of the beams has become crushed as the tower twists and leans.

Leans badly.

If you wonder about tort liability or some other stupid Western concept, understand that if you fall through a broken manhole cover on the street, it's not government negligence but bad karma on your part. Don't come here thinking you can sue anyone or anything for any reason. This is not a Chinese notion, but a Buddhist one.

Nowadays you can only visit the bottom two levels. The stairs are very steep and held together with pegs.

The view is rather uninspiring. The gray thing looks like a mini prison, but we were told it was a mausoleum for People's Liberation Army soldiers. This is unusual as nowadays most people are cremated to save real estate.

We didn't want to forget sharing what we learned about health care in the PRC. It's not free, or even socialized. We were told that if you didn't work for the government that you had to pay through the nose. In order to be admitted to a hospital, you had to put up 3000 yuan as a deposit. When that retainer was used up, you had to pony up another 3 grand ($450) or find yourself on the street. Medicine in China is not cheap, nor is it a "right". In other words, 'no free lunch'.

Socialist bleakness.

But things that roll aren't bleak. This is a really cool softtop bike-truck.

Capt Hub was totally smitten by these little 3-wheeled, 4-passenger cars, especially when our guide said they cost a mere 3000 or about $450, new. The hubster really wanted to buy one, but the admiral said no, it wouldn't fit in the overhead bin on the airliner. Darn, she can be such a bring-down sometimes.

They're just so cute! And people thought VWs were pregnant roller skates.

Writer Paul Theroux wrote a very entertaining travel book called Riding the Red Rooster. If you're interested in train travel through China, this is a humorous and entertaining, albeit 20 year-old (ironically, ancient by current Chinese standards), adventure penned by a very famous author. We were sad to end OUR short journey through this magnificent country. We had a fabulous time and it's one of many memorable journeys that we have made vagabonding throughout the world. This is just a smidgen of the thousands of photos we shot. We hope you have enjoyed them as much as we loved taking them.

Our next adventure will be the Wats of Siem Riep (Angkor Wat, etc) in Cambodia....stay tuned.......