"Fu Wang Ge, or Hall of Wishes Fulfilled"


Even the Communists in China get it:

Anyone who has visited Beijing in the last few years knows that the Forbidden City, the ancient home of China’s emperors, is in the midst of a total restoration. Plans call for work to be completed by 2020, in time to celebrate the 600th anniversary of the imperial compound...

Mr. Jin said the renovation program, which began in earnest in 2002, was focused on finishing the largest public buildings before the Olympics and would restore the entire complex by the 2020 deadline. He said almost 2,000 construction workers and craftsmen were involved.

“I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say that the whole world is watching,” he said. “We can’t make any mistakes.”

The craftsmen and workers doing the renovation are Chinese, but Mr. Jin said foreign conservationists were providing advice on certain projects. Preservationists with the Italian government are consulting on the work at the Hall of Supreme Harmony.

Mr. Jin said the arrangement with the World Monuments Fund was the first major collaboration involving an American conservation group and the Forbidden City. The partnership began in 2003, when the fund committed $3.3 million to restoring the building known as Qianlong’s Lodge of Retirement.

Last March a broader $15 million agreement, which included $5 million from the Chinese side, was announced to restore all 24 buildings and the elaborate outdoor courtyards of the entire Qianlong Garden.

The restoration is a matter of both civic and national pride, as well as a good investment, as well as a demonstration of an appreciation of history--unfortunately, it seems as if stripmall America, or at least those who are comfortable with such monstrosities, can't be bothered when it comes to OUR national heritage.

Don't get me wrong--restoration of the Gulf Coast and New Orleans will require a lot more work and be a hell of a lot costlier than restoration of the Forbidden City...but the United States is a hell of a lot RICHER than the PRC. Yet, we've got a combination of things contributing to the inertia: an administration too interested in destruction instead of creation, a contingent of the lazy, who insist upon throwing their hands up in the air both when it comes to restoring a cultural masterpiece AND a literal economic engine (while turning a blind eye to, ahem, this administration's robbing of the national treasury in order to prop up their favorite corporations)...and perhaps the largest groop, those who really don't know what happened--and don't understand the degree to which the government has abandoned its responsibility (and the degree to which the private insurance companies cynically shirked theirs).

I never thought I'd be envious of the PRC for ANYTHING, much less demonstrating a degree of far-sightedness lacking in this administration (which, by the way, is busily ensuring that your kids and grandkids will be in hock to the same PRC). Hell, I can only imagine how Team Bush would handle restoration of the Forbidden City...well, imagine it with the help of photoshop:

I'm sure they'd call this "Mission Accomplished."