I’ve had a pretty enjoyable trip so far through Asia. I’ve already talked about the lesson we can learn from Japan, so today I’ll show you some stuff that I saw in and around Beijing. China’s capital city is quite a bit larger than most other cities. Our tour guide — Jenny Kwan (no, not that Jenny Kwan) — told us that you could fit 16 Hong Kongs inside of Beijing’s city limits.

The first stop on our tour was the Great Wall of China. I’m not entirely sure which particular section we visited, because my Cantonese isn’t the best (Jenny spoke mostly in Cantonese). Whatever the case, we scaled a section of the Great Wall and there were several sections that were quite vertical. A big stone staircase, if you will, interspersed with towers where the soldiers could oversee the battlefield and warn of intruders.

Remember, this is only one section of the Great Wall. The stone structure extends for miles in every direction, making it the only man-made structure that can be seen from space. Having withstood all sorts of attacks, erosion, weathering, and so forth, you’ve got to admit that the Great Wall of China has some rather brilliant construction. Maybe it’s all the dead people that were, ahem, integrated into it.

To give you a better sense of what it’s like to visit the Great Wall, here is a short video that I took after ascending a portion of the stone staircase. With thin air and uneven steps, it’s not the most pleasant stroll. The cold mountain breeze didn’t help either.