Bejing is both a very large and very old city, so there are many different areas of the city that are of varying ages. For example, the center of Beijing is the oldest area of the city. Here, there are a number of older neighborhoods called hutongs (胡同). The Forbidden City is where the Chinese emperor once lived. Now there are several important government buildings in The Forbidden City. Surrounding this center of Beijing are a number of newer areas with large office buildings, skyscrapers, and tall apartments, as well as universities. On the outskirts of the city, there are smaller communities with mostly single to two-story homes nestled closely together. Sometimes it can be difficult to find commonalities between these different areas of Beijing, but one thing I noticed was that brightly colored murals and paintings on buildings and walls were common in all parts of the city.
I was curious about the artwork I was seeing around Beijing and decided to learn more about it. Why was it there? Who painted it? When was it painted? There are many nature scenes and wanted to know why they were painted. The paint covered large stretches of buildings in intricate ways on the ceilings. I was fascinated by how long it must have taken to paint such a large area upside down.
