Beijing---Travel In China

Beijing (Hanyu Pinyin: Beijing, Wade-Giles: Pei-ching; Postal System Pinyin: Peking), is the capital city of the People's Republic of China. It is one of the 4 municipalities of the People's Republic of China, which have a provincial-level status. The municipality governs 10 districts and 8 counties.

Names
Beijing literally means "northern capital" (as opposed to Nanjing, meaning "southern capital" and Tonkin and Tokyo, both of which mean "eastern capital"). Beijing is sometimes referred to as Peking. The term originated with French missionaries four hundred years ago, and corresponds to an archaic pronunciation which does not take into account a 'k' to 'j' sound shift in Mandarin that occurred during the Qing dynasty.

In China, the city has had many names. Between 1928 and 1949, it was known as Beiping (Wade-Giles Peip'ing) or "Northern Peace". The name was changed because jing means "capital" and the Kuomintang government in Nanjing wanted to emphasize that Beijing was not the capital of China, and Beijing's warlord government was not legitimate. From 1937 to 1945, Beijing was occupied by the Japanese.

The name was changed back by the Communist Party of China in 1949 in part to emphasize that Beijing was the capital of China. The government of the Republic of China on Taiwan has not formally recognized the name change, and during the 1950s and 1960s it was common for Beijing to be called Peiping on Taiwan. Today, almost everyone in Taiwan, including the ROC government, uses the term Beijing, although there some maps of China from Taiwan still use the old name along with pre-1949 provincial boundaries.

The GDP per capita was ¥24077 (ca. US$2910) per capita, ranked no. 41 among all 659 Chinese cities.

History
The metropolitan area of Beijing has been settled in the first millennium BC and the capital of Kingdom Yan was established there, and named it Ji. Ji has often been claimed as the beginning of Beijing; but in reality the city has been abandoned no later than the 6th century AD. The exact location of Ji remains unknown despite much effort in the recent decades to identify the site.
During the great Tang and Song dynasties, only townships existed in this area. Numerous ancient poets came here to mourn the lost city, as testified by their surviving compositions.

By the early 10th century, Kingdom Liao set up a "secondary capital" in the city proper, and called it Nanjing ("the Southern Capital").

The Jin Dynasty that annexed Liao and ruled northern China built its capital there, called Zhongdu, or "the Central Capital".

The Mongol force burned Zhongdu to the ground in 1215 AD and rebuilt its own "Grand Capital" to the north of the Jin capital in 1267 AD, which is the true beginning of contemporary Beijing. Apparently, Kublai Khan, who wanted to become a Chinese emperor, established his capital in Beijing instead of more traditional sites in central China because Beijing is closer to his power base in Mongolia. The decision of the Khan greatly enhanced the status of the city that had been situated in the northern fringe of China proper.

In 1403 AD, the 3rd Ming emperor Zhu Li, who had just grabbed the throne by killing his brother after a bloody civil war and moved the capital from southern China to his own power base in the north, renamed the city Beijing , or "Northern Capital".

The Forbidden City was constructed soon after that (1406-1420 AD), followed by Temple to the Heaven (1420 AD), and numerous other construction projects. Tian-An-Men, which has become a state symbol of the PRC in modern time, was burned down twice during Ming Dynasty and the final reconstruction was carried out in 1651 AD

Tourism
Famous landmarks around Beijing include:

Forbidden City
Tiananmen Square, site of the Tiananmen Square protests of 1919, 1975, 1989
The Great Wall
The Temple of Heaven
The Summer Palace
Ruins of the Old Summer Palace
Gulou - The Drum Tower
Peking Man Site at Zhoukoudian (World Heritage Site)

Famous Theatres of Beijing include:
Zheng Yici Peking Opera Theatre

Beijing, capital of the People's Republic of China, is the nation's political, economic, cultural, educational and international trade and communication center. Located in northern China, close to the port city of Tianjin and partially surrounded by Hebei Province, Beijing also serves as the most important transportation hub and port of entry in China.

Beijing, one of the six ancient cities in China, has been the heart and soul of politics and society throughout its long history and consequently there is an unparalleled wealth of discovery to delight and intrigue travelers as they explore Beijing's ancient past and exciting modern development. Now it has become one of the most popular tourist destinations in the world, with about 140 million Chinese tourists and 4.4 million international visitors in a year.