Kids in Ancient China: Kang Xi The Emperor (Part 2)

 Here's part 2 of the story about Kang Xi The Emperor:

 Map of Beijing

“Dad, can I go with you today?” Asked the young boy. His dad was working with Karel Slavicek, who was making a map of the city of Beijing. Part of the reason he wanted to go with his dad was to explore and help his dad. The other reason was because he loved his “Uncle Karel,” a man who came from Europe. In Beijing there was a group of people who traveled all the way from Europe. They called themselves Jesuit Missionaries. The little boy loved hearing them tell their stories about their travels, the roads they went on, and about their life before China. Some of them had just come to China and were learning Chinese. These people often told the best stories because they acted  out a lot of their stories since they didn’t always know the right Chinese words.

Uncle Karel had been in China a few years already so his Chinese was good. It wasn’t perfect, but he could have a conversation and tell wonderful stories to the young boy. He started working with his dad and a few other people to make a map of Beijing. The boy’s family was from Beijing and his dad was an architect. That’s why his dad was chosen as one of the people to work on this big map. At first the boy didn’t even know what a map was. He had seen his dad work with paper before, drawing designs for buildings. 

Every time he asked his dad what a map was, his dad would say, “Pretend that you’re a bird and you fly high above the city. What would you see?”  

“I think I would see trees and buildings,” the boy would say.

“Anything else? How about the big palace where the emperor lives. Would you see the water around it and maybe some of the bridges?” Asked the father

“Yes, and I could even look inside the big palace! That’s something that no one ever gets to do! Dad, can I be a bird and fly over the city like this?” He asked.

“No, but you can help me make the map,” said the dad.  

This day was a sunny autumn day. Autumn was the boy’s favorite time or year because it was when all of the Gingko trees and the other trees changed colors. The weather was usually nice too. He asked his dad again if he could go and his dad’s answer was, “Sure, why not. You can help me. Today we need to walk and count how many steps we take to get from one side of the Forbidden City to the other.” 

“You mean that I can go to the Forbidden City with you and Uncle Karel today?” The boy asked excitedly.

“Yes, you can help us. But we need to count our steps, so you can’t distract us!”

“So I can go inside the Forbidden City?” He asked.

“No, of course not! No one ever goes in there! We’re going to walk on the outside part of the big palace, by where the water is and see how big it is.” 

“Then what?” The boy asked.

“Then we go back to Uncle Karel’s house and write it down. He’s really good at drawing, much better than me. I just do the walking and tell him the numbers. He puts it all together in the map,” the dad said.

“How long will it take until you finish the map?” 

“Probably a few more months. We have to measure everything by walking everywhere and counting our steps. Uncle Karel wants the map to show exactly how big and small everything is.”

“Dad, you have the coolest job!” The boy said as he gave his dad a hug.

Kids in Ancient China: Kangxi The Emperor (Part 1)

 Here's another story (or part of a story) for the Kids in Ancient Chinese history collection. It's also a few part story; this is the first part. Enjoy!

Can you imagine becoming emperor at the age of seven? This was Kangxi  (May 5, 1654-December 20, 1722). When he was born, he was called by a different name “Xuanye” but changed his name to show that this was a new life for him. If you were to change your name, what would you change it to? He was the second person to become emperor during the Qing Dynasty. This was an interesting time in China because a completely different people took over China. Some of them didn’t even know Chinese, but they ruled over China! They had the men wear their hair in a “queue.” This is when men have a long braid of hair in the back and then no hair on the top. It must’ve been cold in the winter without hair! Hopefully a lot of the men had good, warm hats to wear! The women’s clothes changed too.  They were now supposed to wear a Qipao, which is a type of dress that had buttons close to the shoulder. For men to have a queue was a big thing. If you were a man who was seen not having the long braid (or not trying to grow one!) You could be put in jail! They wanted to show the people that this was a new China.

What about Kangxi? Why is he so famous? He’s probably one of the most famous emperors in all of Chinese history, which is a  lot to say! China has had many, many emperors. For a country to have over 4,000 years of history, there has to be a lot of emperors! So, how did Kangxi look like? During Kangxi’s time a lot of people came from Europe to China and when they went back, they talked about how China was and about the emperor. From what people have said about him, he was tall. Not really tall, but a little taller than most people around him. He loved exercising and one of his favorite hobbies was hunting. 

Kangxi was a busy man! It’s often said that he went to sleep very late because he was always reading about how the country was doing and about different parts of the country. He was the first emperor to learn how to play a musical instrument that wasn’t from China. He learned to play the harpsichord, which is a type of piano. Do you think they made the harpsichord in China or brought it with them from Europe. If they brought it with them, it must’ve been a lot of work! This was before there were cars and moving trucks. Let’s read about a few other things this famous emperor did in his lifetime:

An old habit....

 In China it's often hard to get small change; even more so now that most people use their cell phones to pay for things instead of using cash. It seems that the whole country instinctively knows about the lack of small change because they do it everywhere. It's hard to break small change. Even though it's been two years now since I moved, yesterday this habit came back. I went to the used book store by the library and bought a few things that were $6. I didn't have a $5 and a $1 so I gave her a $10 and a $1. That way she could give me back a $5. In China, this would be super normal. They wouldn't want a $10 because they'd have to give you back four $1s. They'd much rather prefer a $10 and a $1 so they just give you a $5. However, I'm not in China anymore and the lady looked at me with a confused look: why did I pay $11 instead of just $10? It really threw her off! She gave me back 5 $1 bills. 

From the beach

 We've had lots of amazing sunsets lately and some super low ("minus") tides so I wanted to post you a few pictures. They're not all from the same beach and a few are from a look-out over the oecan 2 blocks away. If I see a good sunset, I often try to drive over there or walk there to get some pictures. We're trying to soak in the beach before we move back to Asia in the summer (a different part than where we lived before).

Kids in Ancient China: ZhengHe (Part 2)

This is the second part of the story of ZhengHe. There's a park that has a huge statue of him on a boat with water spraying up on the boat to make it look like water. 

 Part 2

Thankfully, I made it through those two weeks of training. They were two of the hardest weeks of my life! However, those of us that made it through became great friends and worked together like a team on the ship. We started walking to the place where the ship was, in another city that was by the sea. It took us a good few weeks to get there.

Once we got there, many of us said “Wow” because this was the first time we had ever seen such a big ship! It was huge! It had four decks and could have  up to three hundred people on the ship at any time, but usually it had two hundred to two hundred fifty people. 

We sang songs and talked a lot while we did our chores and jobs on the ship. One thing we talked about was ourselves, our families, and our leader: Zhenghe. It was at this time that I heard more about his story. He was born as Ma He to a Muslim family who lived in Yunnan and had one older brother and four sisters! I remember thinking how fun his childhood must’ve been having such a big family! I myself only had one brother and one sister. 

Later he moved to Nanjing where he worked for the Prince of Yan. It seems that he enjoyed his time working for the Prince. It was during this time that he was able to go to school and learn a lot about a lot of different things. They say that if he had stayed in Yunnan, he might not have ever had the chance to have a good education like he got in Nanjing. Nanjing was the capital of China at the time. He also was called Sanbao at the time, which had something to do with three jewels, a Buddhist name. When I heard this, I thought, “Wow, this guy has had three different names in his life? Mahe, Sanbao, and Zhenghe.” It made me glad that I only had one name!

When I first started working on the ship, it was the second time that Zhenghe went on a big trip. This time were were going South, maybe even to go around to where a place called India was. All of us were excited because this was the first time many of us had ever left Yunnan or our country before. It took us what seemed like a long time to get there, but we weren’t alone. There were about fifty other ships going with us. Ours was one of the biggest ships and Zhenghe himself was on our ship. When we finally got to the first place we were going to, I was surprised to walk around and see people that I couldn’t understand. Their language, clothes, and food were all so different! We ended up going to a lot of places that first trip I went on. Since then, I’ve been on at least two other trips.

The last trip we went on we saw a lot of people with dark skin color. Their clothes were beautiful and colorful and the animals we saw were crazy! We saw an animal that looked like a white horse with black stripes on it. They said this animal was called a Zebra. We also saw an  animal with a really long neck and spots on it, which I’m told is a Giraffe. We brought back some of these with us to China and everyone thought that these animals were great. They, like me before this, had never see any animals like them before!

I’ve been told that we’re going on another big trip in a few months. Generally, each of these trips takes from a few months to over a year. They’re saying that this trip might even take up to two years and that there might be more than one hundred ships coming with us! I wonder if I’ll be on the same ship as Zhenghe again or a different one. Sometimes I’m on the same ship, the big ship, and sometimes I’m on a smaller one. I like to be on the big ship because it’s more exciting. The big ship is always the first ship to go and being on the same ship as Zhenghe is really cool. 

Epilogue: Although the story about this sailor isn’t true, Zhenghe was a real person and one of the great explorers China has ever had. Zhenghe (1371-1433 or 1435) took seven trips to different countries to explore, trade, and let more of the world know about China. It’s said that when he took his first trip, there were thousands of sailors and up to three hundred ships! He was supposed to bring back treasures for the Emperor. These trips were such a big deal that they started a special school in Nanjing for people to learn other languages to go on the ships and work as translators once they got to the other countries on the ships. Zhenghe died on his seventh and last trip of unknown causes. He never made it back to China. 

Daffodils and the Beach

 We went hiking with another family today that said they knew a place with daffodils that overlooks the ocean. It was beautiful and then we had a gorgeous sunset. The kids and I are tired out from a long hike but it was great exercise and well worth it! 

Kids in Ancient China: Zheng He (Part 1)

Here's another story in our Kids in Ancient China series. This is Part 1

 Finally Being a Sailor: Zheng He

Part 1

Oh, hello there! What brings you to this ship? Oh, you want to learn about Zhenghe? You’re asking me if I know him? Well, just because I’m a sailor that has worked on ships many times before, doesn’t mean that I personally know Zhenghe. Let me tell you what I know about him, and a little about myself. 

I guess first off I should tell you my name. I am Xu Bing. I’m now almost thirty years old and have been a sailor just about fifteen years. I was a young lad like yourself when I first stepped on a big ship like this. Ok, it wasn’t a huge ship like this. My first time onto ship was actually a fishing boat. I live in Yunnan and there’s a big lake where we go fishing. Yunnan? What is Yunnan? It’s a place- a province. It’s in the Southwestern part of China. Actually Zhenghe is from this part of the country as well, but we’ll get to his story in a little bit.

Growing up, I didn’t live close to water. Once a year we would take a big trip and walk for four days up a few mountains to see my distant relatives for a holiday. This was always my favorite time of the year because having such a big trip is always exciting for kids. My distant family lived close to a lake where  sometimes I would see a small boat. My family wouldn’t let me go on the boat as a kid because they said it was too dangerous. I was fascinated with the water and being able to go on top of it on a boat. Although some of my cousins who lived by the lake knew how to swim, I didn’t learn. I wish I did, because it’s always very great to learn to swim.

When I was fifteen my dad told me that I should start a job. I asked if I could go on a big boat to work there. After all, I heard that some people had jobs where they worked on big boats. I had never seen a big boat, a ship, before, but I really wanted to see and work on one! He said maybe I could work on a small fishing boat for a few years and see if I liked that first. That’s what I did. I had to move back to where my distant relatives lived to do it because that’s where they knew some fishermen who would let me work with them.

After a few months, some people came through the village talking about a guy named Zhenghe, who was called Ma He at the time. He  was going through a few villages in our part of the country (Yunnan) looking for people who would work on a big boat with him. When I heard this, I got so excited! I left my fishing job and my relatives to go to the place where everyone was supposed to go who wanted to work on the ship. When I got there, I was surprised because we weren’t by the ship at all! There was no water and no boat! How were we going to work on a boat when there wasn’t one?

It turned out that Zhenghe wanted all of his men to have two weeks of training to make sure they were strong before they went on the ship. If you couldn’t make it through these two weeks, then you weren’t allowed to work on the ship. Zhenghe led part of the training. I remember seeing him for the first time.  He was very tall and strong. His teeth were really white and his cheeks were very high. His nose was small but his eyes looked like they had lots of stories to tell. His voice was loud, which made me think, “Does he always talk like this?” There were about two hundred of us training for those two weeks, broken up in small groups of ten.