Kids in Ancient China (Part 8): Xuanzong (Part 1)

I haven't posted for the series: Kids in Ancient China in a long time. It's about time! There are 10 stories altogether and this is story #8. After I finish all 10 stories, I might write a few more (I enjoy writing these- it's great fun to get into Chinese history). 

Xuanzong

Part 1

A few months ago my grandmother died. This was one of the big moments that changed my life for the good. I’m twenty-one years old and last year and this year have been the best years of my life. My dad came back last year and my uncle started ruling as emperor. Our whole family is different now than it was a year or two ago.

Before I continue, I should tell you about my life before this. I was born in 685 AD and my name is Li Longji. A year before I was born my uncle was going to become the emperor. Some people think that it would be great to be an emperor and rule over all of China. One of those people was my grandmother. She tried to rule through my uncle, but my uncle didn’t want to do what she said. So, a year later he was sent far away and was exiled (which is when someone has to leave their country). Actually, I don’t even think he was around when I was born! 

After he left, my dad was made the emperor, but it didn’t last long. For the first 5 years of my life my dad was the emperor. My grandmother wanted to keep a watchful eye on my dad so she made a rule that none of us could leave the palace. The palace is a great place to live, but when you’re not allowed to leave, it becomes like a big jail. As a kid, I remember spending a lot of time in the gardens so that I could at least feel that I was outside. I loved it when my dad told me stories of “the outside.” My dad was a great story teller and his bedtime stories always made me laugh and smile. 

I remember one story he told me in particular. It was about him and his brother, my uncle. He didn’t talk a lot about my uncle because it was so hard. Growing up, my dad and uncle were close and my dad really missed my uncle when he had to move away. 

“Your uncle and I went for a walk in the hills close by. We knew there were a few apple trees and we had a contest to see who could fill up their basket full of apples first. We were supposed to meet back at the bottom of the hill by the fig tree. There was only one fig tree there and it was huge- it was our favorite tree to climb. 

“It was hard finding apples because they were often high up in the tree, which meant that I either had to use a stick to hit the branches to get the apples down or I had to climb the tree to pick them. I decided to use a stick because it would be faster. I soon realized that my apples weren’t going to be the most pretty apples or the most delicious because when they fell from the tree, they got bruised up. 

“Finally, my basket was full so I raced down the hill to the fig tree. My brother, your uncle, wasn’t there. I waited. Then I ate an apple while I waited to see how it tasted like (and because I was hungry!). I ate another apple. It seemed to be a long time so I started to wonder what happened. Was he done picking apples? Did he somehow fall off the tree if he climbed up to get them? Did something else happen to him? 

“I started walking back to town and saw that the door was open in one of our friend’s home. I thought I’d stop to ask if they had seen my brother. I knocked on the door and then went in. Sure enough! Right there, was my own brother! He was at his friend’s house!”

“ ‘ What are you doing? We were having a race to see who could pick apples the fastest? Have you forgotten? I was getting worried about you! I ate 3 apples already- just waiting around for you!’ I said.

“ ‘Oh, I did pick apples. I picked 3 apples. Then I remembered that my friends here were going to make something sweet with the apples. So I decided to stop by and give them my 3 apples instead. They, in turn, gave me some of their sweet apple whatever this is.’ “ he said.

“I couldn’t believe it! I knew that my brother, your uncle, loves sweets, but this was too much! We were having a contest! We went home with only one basket full of apples- mine! However, I will have to say that the apple whatever it was, was really good! Our friend’s mom put cinnamon with the apples, which changed the flavor of the apples.”

Kids in Ancient China (Part 6): The Fake City Part 4

I realize that I haven't finished posting the rest of this story! I'll post Part 5 and the Epilogue later (in a week or two). There are 10 stories total and we are on story #6 (which is so long, I'm posting it in several parts, hence "Part 4" for this post). 

 Part 4

After this, the four boys tried to find time to meet together and find out what exactly was behind the other building they saw. Now that they knew that it once was where the emperor stayed, they imagined that it must be a super nice place.

“Yes, but this was years ago. Remember, it was when he was our age. That was a long time ago!” Said Chen Min. 

“I would love to see it still,” said Xi Wei.

“Me too,” said Chen Yang. 

“Ok, let’s go.” Said Chen Min.

They walked around the wall but found no easy way to climb up and over it. Finally, Xi Wei had an idea: “What if we climb up that tree and use that  branch to help us get over the wall.” 

“Hmmm, that might work,” said Chen Min. “Let me try first.”

Chen Min climbed the tree and found that it wasn’t so hard, but he didn’t want Xi Wei or Chen Yang to try it because it was a little difficult. However, he knew that if he said that they were too young to do it, they would be angry about it. Instead, Chen Min decided to just be quiet and not say anything. 

“Chen Min, are you ok?” Asked Chen Yang. 

“What’s going on?” Asked Xi Wei.

It was quiet for a few minutes until Chen Min said, “I’m thinking of a way to get down.” Another few minutes later, there was “thud” as he jumped to the ground. 

“Was that you? Are you ok? What do you see?” Asked Xi Bing.

“Can we come up too?” Asked Xi Wei.

“Yes, I’m ok.” Chen Min answered. He walked around the inside and found two small houses and lots of plants growing. There were places where it looked like there used to be more houses, but were taken down. In their place were rows and rows of plants.  

“Oh, I thought I heard something,” said a girl’s voice. A girl of about seven years old said. Her hair was long and braided in two braids. “Are you all right? Did you climb and jump from that tree?”

“Uh, yes.” Answered Chen Min.

“Wow, did it hurt? That looks like a big jump!” 

“Well, yes, it did hurt a little, but not too much.” However, Chen Min had a bad scrape on his knee. When the girl looked down and saw the blood, she immediately told him to follow her.

“My mom can help you.” The girl said.

“No, I can’t. There are other boys- my friends- waiting outside.” He said.

“Oh, I thought you were alone.”

“No, my little brother and some friends came along. Do you suppose they can come in too?” He asked.

“Yes, yes, of course! But before anything we need to get you some help. Stay here, I’ll have my mom come and help you.” She said. She rushed off saying, “Mom, mom!” 

Within a few minutes she came back with her mom, who had some water and a towel to clean the wound.

“What made you think of jumping from that tree? That’s really high!” The mom asked.

“Well, I, I, I,” Chen Min hesitated. “I really wanted to see what was behind  this wall. I saw the door, but it was locked and I didn’t want to get into trouble.”

“Trouble?” Well, now you’ve gone and hurt yourself. Does your mother know that you’re here?” She asked.

“No. I do have some friends and my little brother outside waiting for me.” He said.

“Oh, well, bring them in. Yan, go and open the door for them.” The mom directed to her daughter.

In a few minutes the rest of the boys were at Chen Min’s side. “Ouch, that looks like that hurts!” Said Chen Yang.

“So, what exactly are you boys doing out here?” The mom asked them.

“We saw this place and heard that it was where Emperor Lin stayed when he came to visit years ago. We wanted to see how it was like.” Said Chen Min.

“This is how it is.” the mom said. “After the emperor left, no one wanted to live here because it’s outside of the city walls. However, my grandparents wanted to live here. They took down some of the buildings so there would be more room to grow vegetables. We sell our vegetables in the city.” The mom explained.

“We saw some tomatoes and other vegetables grown in the forest in between the trees. We thought that’s where all of the vegetables come from that are sold in the city,” said Xi Bing.

“No, most of them come from here. Of course some of them come from the forest. People don’t want to cut down a lot of trees because then it’s more obvious that there’s a city here. The reason we’ve been able to live here so long without any bad guys coming is that it’s hard to find this city. If everyone started cutting down trees to have bigger places to grow vegetables, it would be more easy to find the city.” She told them.

The boys stayed there a good hour or two. Tan Yan, the little girl, showed them all around and told them which vegetables were which. She said that hardly anyone came to visit them and it was great to have new friends. The boys often went to play with her and called her family the “Vegetable family” since they grew so many vegetables. Even Xi Jing, Xi Bing and Xi Wei’s older sister came occasionally with them. 

Kids in Ancient China (Part 6): The Fake City Part 3

   The garden in the woods became one of the boys favorite places to hang out in. They saw the old man a few times and he would tell them stories about when he was a kid. 

“I remember when I was kid, just as old as you older boys are now. There was talk in the town that the emperor was going to come and visit. At the time not a lot of people liked Emperor Ling. The Emperor became emperor when he was 12 years old- just a little older than you older boys are. However, when he grew up everyone found out that he wasn’t the best leader this country has had. 

“By the time he came here, many people didn’t like him because he had the people pay a lot of taxes. He wasted a lot of money and the leaders that worked with him took money from the people. Actually, when he came here no one really wanted him to come because it cost so much money. They made a huge area with walls around it and houses inside of it. You kids might have seen it outside of the city.

‘I remember that he stayed for 3 weeks. My family worked here, in this garden, although at the time there were no walls around it like there are now. We had to give most of the apples we were growing to the emperor and the people with him. My parents hated it, but they didn’t have a choice. Other people that grew vegetables and fruit had to do the same thing- give away a lot of what they grew at that time to the emperor. 

“As a kid, I was excited to see how the emperor looked like. We had never had someone famous come to our town before, so it was a big deal. My friends and I talked about how we thought he would look like. My best friend thought that he would have long hair in a braid and a long beard. I thought he would have short hair and a long beard. However, none of us kids could really get a good view of him that day because the streets were small and there were too many people. 

“A few days later, my parents had to deliver some apples to where the emperor was staying. I went with my dad because I though I would see the emperor. I ended up being very disappointed because it was just one of the servants that opened the door.” 

“I did, however, get a glimpse of the emperor one day when he was walking down the street. This time there weren’t as many people with him so I was able to stand on one side of the street and see them walk by. Emperor Ling looked tired and worn out. He didn’t have a full beard, just a small one and a mustache. His mustache was big- the only thing I remember to this day about him.

“By the end of two weeks the emperor’s visit was boring and none of us liked it. I wasn’t allowed to eat any of the apples from our trees while he was here because “They all have to go to the emperor” as my dad would say. I wondered at how much one person can possibly eat! Then my parents reminded me that it wasn’t just him, but the whole group of people that always traveled with him.

“We were all glad to see the emperor leave after three weeks. Year later, after the emperor died, the whole country changed. People started fighting and groups of bad people went from town to town taking things that didn’t belong to them and hurting people. I’m assuming that’s why your families moved here- to be safe.”

Kids in Ancient China (Part 6): The Fake City Part 2

 Part 2

Shortly after moving in, Xi Jing and her mom were busy making their house feel like home. Although they didn’t have a lot of money, with some creativity and with the belongings they brought with them, it felt like home by the end of the week.

Mr. Xi and the dad in the other family started looking for work and ended up working as carpenters in the same shop. Xi Wei, Xi Bing, Chen Min, and Chen Yang met up every day and started exploring their new city. By the end of the week they knew every little street in the city. 

After they explored the streets of the city, they set about exploring outside of the city.

“Hey, have you noticed that there are no big gardens here? Where do they grow their food?” Xi Bing asked his brother and friends when they were out one day.

“Maybe they are hidden underneath the city,” Xi Wei suggested.

“No, don’t be silly, they have to be here somewhere,” Xi Bing said,

“Our old city had lost of gardens outside of the city. Each family took care of at least one, sometimes 3 or 4 fields,” said Cheng Yang.

“Yes, ours did too,” put in Xi Bing.

“My favorite thing to grow was the tomatoes. It was so fun to pick them off!” Xi Wei said with a smile on his face.

“Yes, I know! We hardly got any tomatoes because you used to pick them off when they were still green!” Said Xi Bing.

“The gardens must be somewhere outside of the city. For a city this size, they must have a lot of gardens- somewhere!” Said Chen Min. 

“Let’s explore!” Xi Wei said excitedly. 

The four boys left the city just after lunch and started walking around the mountain. The mountain was full of trees, which was great for the city: it made it hard for any army to find where the city was! This also meant that the boys had to be careful to remember where they walked so they could find their way back.  

“Let’s do something so we won’t forget out way back. I’m afraid we might get lost,” Xi Bing suggested.

“I know, what if we take this stick here,” Xi Min said as he picked up a stick. “We can make a mark on the trees that we go by so we can find our way back. Or if we find the right rock, we can use that to mark on the trees.”

“That’s super smart! We can take turns marking the trees,” Xi Bing said.

Xi Bing became the unofficial leader of the four of them. They walked about ten minutes until they came across a small patch of spinach growing by some trees. 

“Wow, this is strange. I wouldn’t expect to see spinach here,” Xi Yang commented.

“Look over there,” Xi Wei said as he pointed out to an opening in the trees. There seemed to be things growing in the opening. 

“This is what they must do,” Xi Yang thought out loud. “They must grow food in openings in the forest like this.”

“But what about the spinach?” Xi Min asked.

“I don’t know,” said Xi Bing. “We’ll have to have a good think about it. Why is there spinach growing way out here?” 

“Well, we’re not that far out of the town. What if someone purposely planted spinach here?” Xi Min suggested.

“Hmmm, now that is an idea,” Xi Wei said with a smile on his face. He liked to smile. 

“Let’s keep walking,” Xi Bing suggested.

The group came across more places where other vegetables like carrots and potatoes were growing in between the trees. Finally, Xi Wei saw some tomatoes growing!

“Di Di, (“little brother”), don’t pull any of those tomatoes! They don’t belong to us! Someone must’ve planted them here. They obviously don’t naturally grow here in the midst of trees like this!” Xi Bing said.

“What if they just plant their vegetables here and there in the forest where they can. So, instead of each person having their own field, they just plant some things where they find room and sunlight to grow their food.” Xi Yang said.

“Yes, that’s probably it. However, we saw fruit in the market and I think it must be hard to grow fruit in the middle of these trees! They wouldn’t get enough sun! Where are the fruit trees?” Xi Bing thought aloud.

“What if they just buy them from other cities and have them sent here?” Xi Wei said excitedly. “Ohh, a good, juicy apple sounds great about now!”

“Yes, you’re right, Di Di. We should start heading back,” Xi Bing said.

“Can we come out here again tomorrow?” Xi Wei asked. He always loved exploring and adventure.

“Well, we still haven’t figured out where they’re growing all the fruit yet, so I think we should explore some more tomorrow,” Xi Bing said. They followed the trees with the marks back to the city.

The next day they went out again, marking the trees as they went. Xi Wei got this job because he enjoyed it so much! They walked a different direction and ended up climbing more up the mountain. They came across a wall. 

“What do you think this is? It doesn’t look like a city. Can it be another city so close by?” Xi Yang asked. 

“No, I don’t think so. It doesn’t make sense,” Xi Bing answered. 

“Quick, hide. There’s someone coming,” Xi Wei said.

Although they didn’t know why they should be hiding, but their instincts told them to hide. They each hid behind a tree. Sure enough, they saw a man walking by and disappear behind the wall. 

“There must be something there. Why else would he go there?” Chen Min asked.

“Let’s check it out!” Xi Wei said.

The four boys slowly walked to the wall. Oddly enough, this wall was just as big as the wall that surrounded the city. However, the more they walked around it, the more they thought that it couldn’t be a city because it was so quiet. Finally, they found the door. It was a simple wooden door that was closed, but not locked. 

“Di Di, wait,” Xi Bing said to his brother as he was about to open the door. “Remember, we just saw the guy go this way, probably inside! Let’s wait a few minutes.”

The few minutes seemed to go at a snail’s pace, but finally they agreed  that was it was ok to go in. They were surprised when they opened the door to find fruit trees! There was one or two small buildings, but inside the walls were rows, and rows of fruit trees. 

“This is where they grow their fruit,” Chen Min said. 

“Yes, look at those apples!” Xi Wei said.

“Di Di, they are not our apples and they aren’t ripe!” Xi Bing told his brother.

“Ok, fine,” Xi Wei said. 

They walked around for a few minutes until they heard a voice.

“Hey, what are you kids doing here?” Said a man’s voice. 

Fear seized them. 

‘What do we do?” Chen Yang said.

“It’s ok. I don’t think we’ll be in trouble. Let’s just try and be friendly,” said Xi Bing.

“I’ve never met you kids before. Do you live in the city?” The old man asked. “Well, you’d have to live in the city because there are no other towns that close. You might be from families that are moving to the town.” He started to say to himself. “There are so many new faces and I don’t particularly care to get to know any of them.” 

After a minute of silence, Xi Bing said, “Yes, we are. We are from the city.”

“Did you just move here? What families are you from?” He asked.

“Yes, we did just move here,” Xi Bing answered. The four boys took turns introducing themselves. 

“What exactly is this place?” Xi Wei asked.

“It’s a garden, of course,” the old man answered.

“But why are there walls around it and why is it so far from the city?” Chen Yang asked.

“We’ve lived in this area a long time. In the last ten or fifteen years there have been many new families, like yours, that have moved to our town, which means that we have to be careful and make sure that we can protect ourselves. Having food to eat is one of the most important things, so we made a wall around this garden to make it a little harder for bad people to come in and take the food.”

Chinese Magazine

 It's almost spring...or feels like it should be! The Spring edition of the Learning Chinese in America magazine is out. You can find it here. 

Here's the description: 

This is our first issue of the year: Spring 2025. This magazine is meant to help families who are learning or trying to keep up their Chinese while they live in America. In this issue we’ll learn continue learning about ancient Chinese history, a famous Chinese poem about the sound of the birds, and finish a famous story (the fox and the crow, part 1). There are also several Chinese characters to learn, a story entirely in Chinese characters, and an interview about someone who lived in Xi’an, China. The animal we’re talking about this time is the ladybugs and the food we’re looking at is eggs (Chinese style).

Sources

 I thought it might be worthwhile to mention some of the sources I've used for the Chinese books I've written. When I started to research and write Storybook of China (and later books), I used about 4-5 books together as well as some online sources:

A Storied History of China, compiled by Lu Qianfei, 1988, Tourism Education Press, printed in Beijing, China. This book has lots of details, some maps and pictures, and stories. This book would be super hard to find; I found it when I lived in China and it's no longer in print. 

A Short History of The Chinese People by L. Carrington Goodrich, 1963 by Harper and Row. Something that was interesting about this book is that the Terra Cotta soldiers (the clay soldiers that were buried underground close to Xi'an, China) weren't discovered yet so they are not in this book. 

Chinese History Stories, Volume I and Volume II. Volume one is Stories From The Zhou Dynasty and volume two is Stories From The Imperial Era. These are a few stories from a different book that have been translated into English by Renee Ting. Published 2009 by Shen's Books. These books are also really hard to find and out of print (as far as I know). They are based on a Chinese book (also Volume I and Volume II). My husband helped me track down and find one of the Chinese books for this (中国历史故事). There's a 下 and a 上 part of it (Part 1 and Part 2).  We were only able to find the 下 part. The Chinese books were published in 2007. They have a lot more than the English versions.

There's another series of Chinese history books in Chinese that I had back in China but weren't able to bring them with me when we moved.

Wikipedia was also one of my sources. 

Something to keep in mind is that over history, several emperors tried to burn all the history scrolls to make it seem like their dynasty was the first one. They wanted to, essentially, wipe out all of Chinese history to that point. There's one school of thought that says that most of ancient Chinese history (before the Xin Dynasty, the same dynasty that put together the Great Wall, unified the country, and made the Terra Cotta clay army) is different than what people are taught today. Also, many of the stories from ancient China have been passed down through oral retellings so it's sometimes hard to tell how accurate they are. In modern Chinese history sometimes people want to emphasize some parts while completely ignoring or purposely forgetting other parts. 

My books about China are available here. 

Mooncakes

 I've made homemade moon skin mooncakes a few years now and wanted to bring the moon skin press with me from China. Last week I got to use it! I made a big batch of mooncakes (coconut, vanilla, and chocolate fillings- they're a bit untraditional but nice)...the probably was that everyone liked them so much (especially the kids) that I had to make them 2 more times! 

Shanghai

 We went to Shanghai for a few days to renew the kids' passports and had a few other things to do. We did some sightseeing though: Saturday we went to Ignatius Catholic Church which was built in the early 1900s. They had some gorgeous stained glass windows! Today we went to a water village, but it was really hot and humid. We didn't think Shanghai would be so hot this time of year and can imagine how hot and humid it gets in the summer.

A Historic Park (and more tulips!)

Yesterday we met up with another family to go to a park together. This park has some buildings from the Tang Dynasty (roughly 600-900 AD), a small lake, and this time of year tulips! The first time I went to this park, I didn't know they would have tulips and it was a pleasant surprise. It was about 10 years ago. 10 years later...the park is still there, but it's changed significantly. I didn't know if there would be tulips or not and I was glad to see them still there this time of year. 

Year 3 for Learning Characters

 I just finished year 3 for learning Chinese characters using the Charlotte Mason method. The first year has 3 stories, the 2nd year had another 3 stories, and the 3rd year had 10 stories. Each story adds to the vocabulary that was learned before. All 3 books are available Lulu.com. (look for Rachel Bubb ebooks). The drawings are from the stories from book 3. Each story has 1 drawing.