Old Summer Palace BJ

Had always wanted to go to the Old Summer Palace, after obviously the bronze heads auction debacle, and seeing Wang Guangyi basing his Venice Biennale work on the historical setting in 2009.

So off we went - since we were already at the 'new' Summer Palace (which is a disaster, so crowded and nothing to see) and the old one is just 10mins away. Once there, we searched and searched and refused to believe the first site we saw - which was really small - was the ruins of the burnt down Old Summer Palace. Indeed there's a much bigger site at the back! (with fewer tourists)

But somehow the images were more 'romantic' in my mind - the foreign invasion, the burn-down, the looting of the now-famous 12 bronze heads at the fountain, etc. The perfect sunset was there today, but perhaps the photos from before were just better for romanticising history.