We went to the Putuo Zongcheng Temple this morning, otherwise known as the mini Potala, although the complex is really a pastiche of Tibetan and Chinese architecture. The two styles obviously clash, but that was the point. The Emperor Qianlong built the Putuo Zongcheng Temple to accommodate visits by the Dalai Lama of Tibet. However, Emperor Qianlong wanted to make it quite clear that he was in charge by slapping Chinese elements on top of the austere and simple Tibetan building. I hope that the point was made, because I’m not certain that the building works as an organic whole.
After that, we went to the Xumi Fushou Temple. This temple was built to house the Panchen Lama and suffers from the same schizogenic nature. Once again, the Emperor wanted the religious leader to know who was in charge by adding Chinese architecture elements to a copy of the Zhashilunpu monastery in Tibet.
We had a small detour going back to Beijing. The brand new highway was shut down due to a serious crash. Instead, we took a country road for some distance before we could get back on the highway. There were some fierce potholes along the way, but our bus driver was undeterred by them. There were several occasions when I found myself airborne.
