How great thou art

IT IS STILL A COMMONLY HELD BELIEF THAT THE GREAT WALL of China is the only man-made structure that can be seen from the moon. It’s a nice thought; no matter then that bleary-eyed astronauts have come to insist on the contrary.

The Great Wall is perhaps the most universal symbol of China, a country replete with "greats", itself the great Middle Kingdom. You haven’t really experienced China if you haven’t climbed the Great Wall, and a visit to Beijing is wasted without a pilgrimage to this true wonder of the world.

I paid my respects on my first trip to China five years ago, and even then–younger and nimbler and with stronger knees–huffed and puffed my way up the wall at Simatai, that portion of the Wall that is supposed to be the most authentic, not overly developed for tourists due to distance (it is 130 kilometers northeast of Beijing). Indeed, portions of the wall were crumbling, there were no souvenir vendors in the watch towers, and if you wanted a certificate to commemorate your climb you had to get it from the dusty and deserted shop at the start-off point below. But the rewards of negotiating the steep and narrow passages were well worth the effort; the 16 watch towers spiking upwards, leading to the perilous Simatai ridge, was breathtakingly majestic.

In Beijing last month for the Holcim Awards for Sustainable Construction, our hosts from Holcim Philippines very kindly arranged a side tour to the Great Wall during a free morning. We headed out for Badaling, the first section of the Wall opened to tourists and the most popular, probably because of the cable car system that takes you up to the tower–you get the breathtaking panoramas without the exertion of the climb. Over 130 million tourists, including 370 foreign leaders, have experienced the Wall at Badaling.

Time constraints made our guide opt instead for the nearer Juyongguan Pass, only 50 kilometers northwest of Beijing, through Changping County, one of Beijing’s most beautiful suburbs that is the site of the 13 Ming tombs. This pass is located in an 18-km. valley and is one of the three great passes of the Great Wall. This portion was built in the Ming Dynasty but has since been renovated. In the middle of the pass is the famed Cloud Platform, a structure of white marble with an arched doorway through which horses and carriages could pass.

From the bus drop-off point the ascent to the watch tower seemed benign enough; a sloping incline to the first landing, then a wide stretch of steps up to the tower and a more formidable climb to a pagoda-like structure. Although tempted to stay down below and snack on late-season peaches and a wide assortment of preserved fruits (generically referred to as champoy) offered by vendors, the challenge of the Wall called to be met. Kayang-kaya, I thought.

I sent my niece Stef and other younger members of the group on ahead, so I could climb at my own pace. The first part was easy, and I reached the promontory hardly out of breath. Then came the long stretch of steps up to the first watch tower, and I figured if I take it nice and slow it would be no problem.

I took it nice and slow, but the uneven steps–some were as high as a foot–took a lot of effort. Fortunately this section of wall was wide enough so I could stop to rest by the side–to admire the view was my official reason–and have other climbers continue on. Many times I wanted to turn back and join those on their way down, but pride–which indeed always comes before and gets in the way of what’s good for you–kept me going.

On one of my breathing stops–gasping is more like it–I looked up to see Stef and Paul O’Callaghan, COO of Holcim Philippines, grinning down at me with cameras at the ready. If I wasn’t so spent I would have raised a fuss; as it were I could only muster a weak wave, my sorry state preserved in digital quality.

But I did make it up to the watch tower; Stef very considerately waited for me there so we could have our picture taken, the expanse of valley laid out below us. I sat down on the ancient stones with no intention of climbing even one more step, as she proceeded on to the next tower.

The descent was relatively easier, but not by much. If I could have rolled or slid down I would have, but the sight of some elderly visitors, several of them with canes, doggedly making their way up the steps, forced me to go down with as much grace as I could manage.

The following days I learned once again that discretion is indeed the better par of valor, as sore muscles made each step I took an agonizing exercise, and all the Bengay in the world could not salve the great pain that was my souvenir of climbing the Great Wall.

No one can really say when the building of the Great Wall began; it is popularly believed to have started as a military fortification against invasion by northern tribes during the early Zhou Dynasty. But it was not until the Qin Dynasty that various sections of wall constructed by different states were connected to form a "great" wall. After Emperor Qin Shi Huang unified the country in 214 BC, he ordered the construction of the wall, which took ten years to finish. The wall was not only a defense for the kingdom, but it also symbolized the power of the emperor.

The present day Great Wall is mainly the remains of the wall from the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). The Ming Wall starts from today’s Heilongjiang province, through Lioaning, Hebei, Inner Mongolia, Shanxi, Shaanxi, Ningxia, to gansu provinces. Its total length reaches over 12,700 li or over 5,000 kilometers.

A great army of manpower, composed of soldiers, prisoners and local people, built the wall out of different materials, from granite blocks to tamped earth. Ranging from 15 to 50 feet high with a base width of up to 30 feet, the construction of the Wall is rich in myth and folklore. Ancient Chinese say each stone stands for one life lost in its construction. One legend that has been spread through folk songs and operas is about the collapse of a section of the wall caused by Meng Jiangnu, who cried bitterly over the death of her husband in the construction of the wall.

Today eight sections of the Wall are open to visitors, but large sections are in ruins. An extensive survey done in 2002 by the China Great Wall Academy reported that less than 30 percent of the wall remains in good condition.

Twice I’ve pitted my strength against the Great Wall, and twice I’ve survived. I’ve promised that my third visit will be via cable car, but who knows? When confronted by the mystery and majesty, the Great Wall of China is really hard to pass up.