When you are a mountain person who thinks beaches are so much fun for no more than three days, climbing the world’s “most visited” mountain is a must. How do you calculate which mountain has the most visitors is up for debate, but Chinese firmly believe their Taishan beats all other mountains by a landslide. Being the most climbed mountain in, for large part of history, the world’s most populous country is certainly a strong argument to contend with. But that is the story for mathematicians…

China is very good in marketing and has many lists of best gardens, temples, cities, food etc. For mountains, there are three classifications:

1. Four sacred mountains of Buddhism – Mount Wutai, Mount Emei, Mount Putuo and Mount Jiuhua
2. Four sacred mountains of Taoism – Qiyun Mountain, Wudang Mountain, Qingcheng Mountain, and Longhu Mountain
3. Five great mountains – Taishan, Songshan, Huashan, Hengshan (in Hunan Province) and Hengshan (in Shanxi Province).

Taishan is the most visited and important of the Five Great Mountains, which are connected to the Confucian doctrine. These mountains are arranged in accordance with five cardinal directions of Chinese geomancy, which also includes centre as the direction. Taishan represents the East, Songshan centre, famous Huashan West and Hengshan represents North and South. These are two different mountains, which are spelled the same but pronounced differently. Five Great Mountains were seen as pillars holding the Heaven and many emperors have climbed these mountains to perform rituals. At Taishan the emperors performed Feng and Shan ritual to heaven and earth. The Feng sacrifice was done at the top of the mountain to honor heaven, while the Shan sacrifice was done at the foot of the mountain to honor earth. Chinese cosmology consisted of three elements:  heaven, earth and people. The word emperor or huangdi contains a character 王, which best illustrates the role of emperor in Chinese cosmology – it is a link (vertical line) between heaven, earth and people (three horizontal lines).

The first emperor to perform this ritual was the Qin Shi Huang– the founder of Chinese empire. After him only six more emperors will perform this ritual. To perform the ritual was a great honour, but also very dangerous, because only the worthiest emperors are allowed to perform it. Weak and corrupt emperors masquerading as good emperors will inherit the wrath of heaven for their insolence. To qualify for performing the rituals, three criteria must be met:

1. China must be united
2. People should live prosperously
3. Heaven will send the emperor an omen expressing its approval.

The other emperors to perform the rituals were Han Wudi, who expanded the borders of China into Tarim Basin and with it created the Silk Road. Emperor Guangwu of the same Han dynasty also performed the ritual successfully. Emperor Gaozong of the Tang Dynasty has scandalized the Confucian elites with his performances of the ritual, not because he was considered not worthy – China was very prosperous and united during his reign – but because he allowed his wife to perform these rituals with him, almost as his equal. The history will remember his wife as Empress Wu Zetian, but that is the story for another day. Confucian scholars were at ease when Emperor Quanzong performed the ritual, since it is believed that Tang Dynasty was at its zenith during his rule. Additional bonus was that his women were nowhere near the ritual. The next emperor to perform the ritual was Song Dynasty emperor Zhenzong, who was widely considered as not worthy to perform this ritual. China was probably the most prosperous during his Song Dynasty, but it was not united. Sixteen northern prefectures, including modern Beijing, were lost to barbarians after the collapse of the previous Tang Dynasty and Song Dynasty never managed to get these prefectures back. The last emperor to perform the ritual was Emperor Qianlong – one of the three great emperors of the Qing – the last imperial dynasty to rule China.

There is one notable emperor missing from the list – Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty, widely regarded as the China’s greatest Emperor. He tried to perform the ritual three times, but failed at every attempt.

I came to Tai’an, a city of over a million, from Beijing. It is a two-hour trip with high speed trains. Tai’an is on the railway line Beijing-Shanghai so plenty of high speed trains are passing through. I stayed in a small single room. I cannot stress enough the word small. Basically, the room was wide as a single bed and you had perhaps half a meter between the door and the bed. So I just had enough space to put my bags on the floor in between the door and the bed. To open the door, I first had to move my bags to the bed. Ah, the joys of backpacking… It was cheap and close to the entrance to the Taishan mountain and that is all that matters.

Hiking to the top of Taishan mountain is climbing stairs, a lot of them, 6300 steps to be more precise. Hiking in China has different meaning than in Europe. The goal of hikers in China is that their feet never touch the earth. So hiking paths will be covered with stone or wood. I am not sure if this makes it easier to climb or not. In any case, online guides said hiking to the top is 4-7 hours, which sounded excessive, since the path is only 10km long. So I decided to start very early, I woke up before 6 am and was at the entrance to the Taishan mountain at 6:30. The best thing about Taishan mountain is that it is open 24 hours. It took me some time to buy the tickets and get to the starting point of the hike. After you have cleared the ticket office building, you will get to an area with a lot of shops and there is still some way to go to the official start of the hike, which is marked by the small gate. You cannot miss the track – just follow the steps.

First part of the hike is not very difficult, you are surrounded by forests and steps are organized in 5-10 steps, 10 meters flat formation. So far so good. I was going very early in the morning so it was quite cold, but the trees around you will protect you from the sun even in summer. It took me over an hour to reach the halfway point. You cannot miss it, this is where you fill find hundreds of people because you can get there with a cable car or a bus. There are plenty of shops there selling souvenirs, water, food… whatever you need. However, you will find the same shops all along the hiking path. Taishan is really not like hiking the Alps.

The fun starts soon after the halfway point. The last 1000 (I know it is around 1000 because I counted my misery with every step I took) or so steps become steeper and steeper with no flat sections for you to recuperate. But then you finally make it to the top. I made it to the top in 2:15! I knew that 4-7 hours one-way was unrealistic. I am in pretty good shape and I challenging myself to push myself to the limit: finish the hike more quickly and without taking breaks. I took two short breaks. First just after the half-way point to drink some water and eat an apple and the second break midway through the last 1000 steps. If you are not that fit, add an hour.

The top of the mountain is more or less flat and is full of shops with a few temples and hotels. In fact, it reminds me kirvaj in my home region of Slavonia. All that is missing is ringelspiel.

The temples on the top are well worth visiting. There are some temples on the way to the top, but I skipped those. However, the thing that stroke me the most were the stone inscriptions all over the mountain. These are dedications to the heaven. The most important one is by Emperor Xuanzong.

Temples on the top

It reads like a State of the Union by American Presidents. It is a report to the Heaven of what the Emperor has accomplished. If you think about it, it is exactly the same as the State of the Union speech. In the State of the Union speech, the American presidents reports his accomplishments and plans for the future to the American people, who have given him the mandate to rule. The Emperor reports his accomplishment to the Heaven, who gave him the mandate to rule.

The views from the top are exceptional. Taishan is not a particularly high mountain at 1600 meters. However, it is in truly a towering presence in the flat ground of the North Chinese plains around the Yellow River. Taishan is definitely not the prettiest mountain and Chinese do not congregate here in mass numbers for the views. The mountain has special spiritual and political significance for Chinese history as the place where emperors would walk 6300 steps to make sacrifices to the Heaven for the benefit of his Chinese subjects.

After around 90 minutes of exploring the top of the mountain, it was time to test my knees going down. If your knees are not the proudest part of your body, you can always take the cable car down.

I was down at around 13:30 and there was still one stop to make – Daimiao temple. If you want to be historically accurate, you should first explore the temple since this is where the Emperors would first make offerings to the Earth (shang ritual), before climbing the mountain to perform sacrifices to the Heaven (feng ritual). It opens at 8:30 so it was too late for me. I wanted to start climbing very early in the morning. The temple is of course a fortress complex. The emperors were taking residence there through centuries so security was top priority.

Inside the temple complex you will find many old trees and steles (stone inscriptions), often on the back of a tortoise. Tortoise is one of four great animals of Chinese mythology, which serve as guardians of four directions. These are Azure Dragon of the East, the Vermillion Bird of the South, White Tiger of the East and Black Tortoise of the North.

The temples are made in typical Chinese fashion. After a while, and may I say short while, they all start looking the same. The only difference that I can see is the color of the rooftiles, but the temples here had standard golden color, like most temples. Golden rooftop colors signify that Emperors (sometimes) reside here.

I finished the tour around 14:30. So in total I needed around 8 hours to climb Taishan mountain and see the temple. But OMG my feet hurt. I took a Tai’an panckake for lunch on my way to my hotel and then went straight to bed for a well deserved nap. I has a big plan for tomorrow – visiting the hometowns of arguable the China’s two greatest sages.

Qufu/Zaochang

As a history freak, I have planned this as one of the highlights of my trip around China. Qufu and Zaochang are birthplaces of the two great philosophers of China. Master Kong or Kong Fuzi (Confucius) is the founder of Confucianism and Meng Zi (Mencius) is his most important interpreter. 

Xunzi was the principle philosopher of the Han Dynasty, which roughly corresponded to the time of the Roman Empire in the West. Meng Zi had to wait a bit longer for his place under the spotlight until the Song Dynasty (10th-13th century). While Europe was still captured by the medieval darkness, China has reached its cultural zenith during the Song Dynasty, when three out of four great inventions of ancient China were finalized (printing press, magnetic compass and gunpowder). Perhaps an even greater hymn to Meng Zi was the Song Dynasty’s combination of cultural and economic strength with military weakness. If there was ever a time when Wen (civil) principle triumphed over Wu (military) principle, it was during the Song. The timing was impeccable indeed; China has decided to try out military weakness just in time when certain Genghis Kahn and Kublai Khan will be born on the northern side of the Great Wall.

Confucius’ teaching is primarily humanist – he believes in the ability of people to be good and take control of their lives through their own efforts. Even though he is portrayed as an ultimate status quo advocate, Confucius did differentiate between legality and morality and has provided philosophical ground for what we might call today “conscientious objection”; I can and will disobey the laws because if I think they are immoral. In this way he has carved out a special sphere for the person to organize their own values and life in accordance with their own beliefs. This has put him on a direct collision with the legalist school, who argued that the only way to maintain peace and prosperity in society is to have strict laws that everyone has to follow. Good is what the law says and evil is disobeying the law.

Confucius’ ideas have been developed into different directions by his disciples. Two of the most interesting ones are Xunzi and Meng Zi. Xunzi is considered a rationalist and pragmatist who has tried to found middle ground between legalism and Confucianism. Humans are inherently bad, but they can be cultivated into a good person through external forces – through laws and education. Meng Zi has gone, on the other hand, in the other direction. He is an idealist and believes people are inherently good and all they need to cultivate themselves into a moral person is within them. Good government does not rule through war or cruel force but by the moral power and good character of the ruler, who sets up a good example for people to follow. People do not need the state to punish them with harsh laws. In fact, he sees violence and force as a sign of a failure. Successful societies implement corrective actions against “fallen” persons through exemplary behavior and education, not through brute force.

My exploration of the historical sights of the two great Confucian sages started in Qufu, where you can visit the Temple of Confucius, his family home and make a pilgrimage to his tomb in his clan’s graveyard.

Though it is possible to do this trip from Beijing (2:30 hours away), I reached Qufu from Tai’an, my legs barely recovered from 6300 steps to the summit of Taishan mountain the day before. 6300 steps one way, may I say. It might be easier going down, but it is even more painful for the knees. The train was 20 minutes and I called Didi (Chinese Uber) to the Confucius Temple and Mansion. These two complexes are right next to each other. The graveyard is further away, but at the ticket office, say you want to buy tickets for all three sights. They also sell audio guides in Chinese. So those of you that speak Chinese can be happy. No English audio guides.

First thing that you notice about the Temple of Confucius is that it is built like a fortress. It is surrounded by a high wall with towers and gates. The complex includes many buildings, stone carvings (steles), often on top of a turtle, and many trees. Some of these trees are 1000 years old. In a notable Chinese tradition, even if the tree is dead, they will keep the trunk and decorate it. The main building in the complex is Dacheng Hall, where a statue of a sitting Master Kong is waiting to receive your prayers and gifts. He seems to be fond of fruit, especially apples, but money is also appreciated. As a sign of keeping up with the times, WeChat and Alipay (mobile phone payment apps) offerings are accepted. The temple has been renovated many times and at the moment its roof tiles are golden yellow. This is the favorite color of the Qing Dynasty – the last imperial dynasty of China (17th – 20th century) – so I imagine it was rebuilt during this period. But I have no idea because there was no audio guide in English.

Right next to the Temple complex is the Kong clan mansion. Chinese have traditionally lived in extended family units (clans) and as Master Kong has come from an aristocratic family – his family home is quite a large complex surrounded by walls. I must say that Kong Mansion was far more interesting than the Temple. After a while, all these temples look the same. If you expected an English tour or audio guide, you will be bitterly disappointed again. Kong Mansion complex has a rectangular shape – it is not very wide but it is quite long. Unlike temple complexes, most buildings are made of brick (temples tend to be dominated by wood). The color of the façade is white, while roof tiles, which are mostly in bright colors in temples are here in “boring” grey. There is beauty in boring, dare I say. Sometimes I feel those temples look like paintings from a children’s paint book; too many colors! The white and grey background only makes those few columns and doors painted in bright red stand out better.

The most important buildings like the Principal Hall – where the clan’s leader was receiving envoys from the Emperor and has handled the family’s economic and political affairs – are in the first part of the complex. The far end of the complex is reserved for beautiful gardens. I have visited the complex in spring, when most trees and flowers were in full blossom. Chinese people take their gardens very seriously and Kong clan was no exception. They have created an artificial hill with limestone. Sometimes these stones were carried for hundreds of kilometers or even thousands when quirky emperors decided to play gardeners. In front of the hill is an artificial pond. The water has the olive oil color. I suspect it was more blueish in the clan’s heyday.

The Kong graveyard is 1.3 km north but worry not. As soon as you exit the temple & mansion complex there will be a dozen or so electric bicycle rickshaws waiting for you. The price was 1.2 euros. The old man taking me accepts only cash or WeChat. I have no cash and WeChat mostly does not work – it requires you to have a mainland Chinese bank account, so I pay everything with Alipay. But worry not, when he took me to the entrance of the Kong clan graveyard, there was a woman selling souvenirs so I paid her 1.2 euros through Alipay, and she gave my driver cash. She even managed to sell me a small book about the Confucius Temple and Mansion for 3 euros. So, I guess everyone got something out of this transaction. If you need to pay with WeChat, because the seller does not accept Alipay, just ask someone with Alipay and pay them. They will pay for you through WeChat or cash to your seller.

If you had any doubts about how important the Kong clan was, their graveyard will set you straight. You probably guessed it by now – it is protected by a wall with towers and gates. The graveyard is unlike European graveyards. It is a forest with tombstones sticking out of the ground around the forest. There are no rows of stones or tombs like in Europe – it seems pretty chaotic. The exception is the Master Kong’s tomb which is built as an earthen small hill with a large stone monument in front. There is also an “altar” for people to make offerings to the great sage – apples are again a hit fruit.

After spending years preparing for this trip and reading about the history and culture of China, being in front of the single most important person in Chinese history was truly an emotional experience. I would argue that this is the single most important grave in human history. The fact that the Chinese know where their great philosopher who died in 479 BCE is buried is in itself an astonishing achievement. It is a testament to a culture that appreciates its history and venerates its elders. Muslims have no idea where Prophet Muhammed is buried, while Christians apparently think that the worst convicted criminals deserving of the ultimate punishment of cruxifiction (and this what Jesus was to Roman and Jewish elites) will be buried inside the city walls, in the city centre, 5 minutes walk from the Temple of Herod where Jahve stood when he created the world. If you don’t believe me, use google maps to locate the Church of the Holy Sepulcar where Jesus’ “grave” is, and then google Biblical descriptions of his grave being outside of the city walls. Dahhhhhhh!

In total, I have spend around 3 hours exploring these sights and it was time to leave Confucius and his Kong clan behind. Just a 40-minute taxi ride (around 5 euros) away lays the Temple and Mansion of Master Kong’s greatest interpreter – Meng Zi. The temple complexes are very similar – the complex has rectangular shape protected by walls (but this time not massive city walls with guard towers), the main building is roughly in the centre, stone monuments with inscriptions are spread across the complex… One noticeable difference is that the Temple of Mencius is in much worse shape, even though it is much younger. The paint on the wood is very pale and wooden elements of the building have visible cracks. The complex is in desperate need of some renovation. I am becoming an expert in Chinese roof tiles and could not help noticing the main temples had green roof tiles. This is the first time I have seen green roof tiles on important buildings. As Meng Zi was the King of Philosophy for the Song Dynasty, it is no surprise that the Temple was built during the Song Dynasty in 1037.

Meng clan’s mansion is smaller and less grandiose than Kong clan’s. However, it compensates for these shortcomings with English descriptions of the buildings. I could actually learn something about the organization of the clan family life. Some of the striking things was that they had a school inside the complex for the clan’s children. Western style public education provided by the government came very late to China. Until the 20th century, education of children was the responsibility of the extended family unit. Unmarried women lived in separate quarters, while the best accommodation was reserved for the clan members who have distinguished themselves by their success in the examination system. Examination system is sometimes called the fifth great invention of ancient China. One thousand years ago, China was the champion of meritocracy. Its system for selecting the public servants who will run the Empire in Emperor’s name was based not on family origin and connections, but on success in anonymous test examinations.

After about 90 minutes of exploring these complexes, it was time to take a taxi back to Qufu railway station. On my way back, I have realized I made a beginners error – never assume anything! When I checked for tickets from Tai’an to Qufu in the morning – there were plenty of trains going every half an hour. Then I checked the evening trains from Tai’an to Nanjing, my next destination, which is a train that passes through Qufu, and again there were many trains going every half an hour. But I never checked trains from Qufu to Tai’an in mid-day. There was a 3 hour gap from 2-5pm with no trains. Luckily for me, I still managed to get back to Tai’an, pick up my stuff in the hostel and get in time for my 7:30 pm train to Nanjing.

All in all, it was a wonderful day of Chinese philosophy and history, but I could not notice that there is a reason why there are no audio guides in English – there are no non-Chinese people there. I did not see a single non-Asian person for the whole day. I find it incredible! Confucius is a founder of a religion and the dominant figure in an entire civilization, and yet so few Westerners who congregate in Beijing find time and interest to take a 2:30 hour train for a day tour to the pinnacle of Chinese intellectual achievements. Shame…