A REPÚBLICA POPULAR DA CHINA QUE EU CONHECI - Segunda - 25.05.2026

Added: 2026-05-27

[00:00:29]Hello, my friends. How are you all doing? I hope so.

[00:00:43]It's Professor Legran.

[00:00:46]I'm back at work after being off the air for almost three weeks, right?

[00:00:53]I traveled on May 4th, a Monday. Exactly three weeks, resuming today, the 25th, and it brought many new things. So, I'm opening our week of live streams, and I'll personally try to give a brief summary of just the main tourist attractions we visited. So, I'm not going to talk about institutional contacts here; I'll do a specific program about that later.

[00:01:37]Regarding institutional contacts, these were with the Communist Party, a traditional Chinese medicine health center, and a technology center in the city of Shenzhen.

[00:02:00]So, these three aspects, perhaps I'll dedicate another specific program to discussing them. Today my plan is to talk about the main tourist attractions in China. I brought lots of little things from China.

[00:02:24]One of them that really catches the eye is stamps.

[00:02:30]Personal things they do, you know, with people's names, right? So, you can see my name here, Legione, backwards, and the name in Chinese as well, right? So, here the top part of the stamp has my name in Chinese, it comes in a very cute little box. And this part here is the little cushion, right? The red ink from the stamp, right?

[00:03:05]This is very interesting, isn't it? They use the Chinese stamping system.

[00:03:13]And this one I bought there is the hat worn by officers of the People's Liberation Army of China, right? People's Republic of China, right?

[00:03:34]And this newspaper here that I read daily, I read it online, it's published in English. The Chinese medium doesn't read that newspaper, does he?

[00:03:46]Because he is English, the average Chinese person doesn't speak English.

[00:03:51]And I picked up this printed edition on the plane on the day of my return.

[00:03:59]He's not one, this print edition is an edition, probably a weekly edition, right?

[00:04:12]Well, anyway, uh, it 's a tabloid and it's distributed for free on airplanes. Since I flew with Air China, here on the first page, it depicts Vladimir Putin's visit to the People's Republic of China. During the time we were in China, Donald Trump visited and Vladimir Putin visited.

[00:04:44]So you see what a coincidence. We wanted to visit President Dilma, she went to Moscow during the time we were in Shanghai, but anyway, the email I sent in English to the bank's headquarters, the presidency of the new development bank NDB, I didn't get a reply.

[00:05:09]Well, someone told me that the official request for the meeting didn't reach President Dilma, right?

[00:05:19]Anyway, there was no response and we couldn't meet with her. Would it be possible, we stayed five days in Shanghai, right? She was absent from Shanghai three, right?

[00:05:36]So, it would work, but it 's strange, because when you send an email to a formal institution, you should get a formal response.

[00:05:53]And because I didn't have one email address, I sent two. I transferred to the bank's headquarters in Shanghai, and then to the branch office, the bank's representative office in São Paulo.

[00:06:10]Bricks has an office in every country.

[00:06:13]In Brazil, it's located in São Paulo. And in São Paulo I covered the same material in Portuguese, right? No response at all, right? That's very strange.

[00:06:26]You have to file a formal request, send an official letter to some public office in Brazil; it's an obligation. Even when denying your request, they have to say: "We acknowledge receipt, but it was rejected, there's no availability, etc., etc.", right?

[00:06:46]I simply received silence in response, right?

[00:06:54]And it's not a small delegation. We went to China with 100 people, the same number that we went to the Russian Federation in May of last year.

[00:07:06]Well, I've prepared a text for you here, and I'll try to summarize it as briefly as possible, perhaps in order of magnitude, about the monuments we visited. These monuments, some of them, are visited by more than 20 or 30 million people. There is a year.

[00:07:37]So, everything in China is about huge numbers, right? And I want to start with what is perhaps the greatest wonder and is considered one of the so-called seven wonders of the modern world. It had the wonders of the ancient world that practically no longer exist. So UNESCO held a contest, I don't remember the exact year, to determine which would be the modern wonders, and the Great Wall of China won among those, right?

[00:08:19]So, the Great Wall of China is a thousand-year-old patchwork quilt, right? It was never a one-off construction project, was it? In fact, it was built in waves and it responded to the political crises of each era, right? And we can divide its construction into three major periods, right?

[00:08:44]The early period is the period that historians classify China as the Warring States period, which was between the 6th, sorry, 5th and 3rd centuries BCE. If you want to use "before Christ," that's up to you.

[00:09:08]So, this was a period when there was a lot of war within China, and there was no unified China. It was fragmented among rival kingdoms, right?

[00:09:24]So they built small walls made of packed earth and gravel, also facing north, but also between these kingdoms, to demarcate territories and eventually contain invasions between neighboring kingdoms.

[00:09:45]Another significant moment is when China ends these wars and unifies under the leadership of its first emperor, Qin Xuang, who ruled between 221 and 206 BCE, therefore in the 2nd century.

[00:10:12]This emperor unified China, and he realized that during that period, the real danger came from the so-called nomadic tribes of Xionnu.

[00:10:27]Xionnu.

[00:10:29]So he ordered the destruction of those inner walls that existed and their connection to the expansion of the northern walls, right? And it was a brutal work based on the forced labor of peasants and soldiers.

[00:10:50]This gave rise to the legend at the time that the wall was then the largest cemetery in the world.

[00:10:59]Finally, the third and last period is the so-called Ming dynasty, which ruled China between 1368 and 174.

[00:11:14]The imposing wall that we know today, made of solid bricks with granite and hewn stone, is what we see in those postcards that travel the world.

[00:11:31]Especially in the most famous sections like Badaling, Mutianio and Simatai, we visited the Mutianio section. It was almost entirely built during the Ming dynasty. They had just driven out the Mongols and were obsessed with creating an insurmountable barrier so that they would never return, right? Well, uh, I started the event very quickly here, without thanking the partner channels that we traditionally do here.

[00:12:22]I apologize, I don't have help from Maria Luía or Artur, so I won't be able to do the live stream and put the messages on the screen. I apologize to our partners, the biggest of whom is Vossa Trabalhadora.

[00:12:42]Then we have Caverna TV, Pão com Ovo, TVM65, Iaras e Pagus, Papo Vermelho and Multipolar TV from Portugal.

[00:12:53]So, I appreciate this partnership. I ask that you subscribe to the channels you are watching, especially mine.

[00:13:02]Our goal is to reach 30,000 subscribers.

[00:13:06]At the end of the live stream, I ask that you make donations, chat, and create stickers. At the end of the live stream, I will display on the screen those who made donations.

[00:13:18]It helps our channel a lot. Finally, if possible, I ask that you become a channel member.

[00:13:25]My channel starts at R$90 per month, you're helping our channel grow a lot, right?

[00:13:35]Okay, if the live stream goes on for more than an hour, I'll make a part two of this program, okay? So, because there are seven handwritten pages, right?

[00:13:53]So, I turned it into text, I digitized it.

[00:13:58]So, I might go over an hour, then I'll do a second part of the program, okay? So, thank you for the donations and for being members. I'm going to go back to the script I prepared especially for you, right, about advanced engineering and architecture, right? This third part of the wall's construction, called the Ming section, is, so to speak, a masterpiece of civil engineering, isn't it? The wall's height varies from 5 to 8 meters and its width at the base is 5 to 6 meters, right?

[00:14:46]There's a slight narrowing of the wall at the top, right? Up there, there's a kind of elevated highway, right?

[00:14:57]Well, the wall was eventually entirely paved with a layer of bricks sealed with a special mortar made from a mixture of rice flour, which gave the structure a certain elasticity that even allowed it to withstand earthquakes, which are very common in China.

[00:15:24]The width was calculated so that five horsemen, that is, along with their horses, or 10 soldiers could march side by side.

[00:15:35]This allowed for the rapid deployment of troops. So, the top of the wall was a highway, right, that allowed for the movement of troops. The wall also had a drainage system to prevent torrential rains coming from the mountains from eroding the wall's structure. That. Engineers during the Ming Dynasty then created integrated gutters and gargoyles that channeled water away, ensuring the wall did not swell with moisture. Look at the phenomenal engineering you've done! And what was the military logistics like?

[00:16:29]For example, there are still 40,000 towers today, right?

[00:16:35]And they are divided into several functions, right? Yes, with very clear tactical functions. The first type of tower is the double-story watchtower.

[00:16:49]They were positioned about two arrow shots apart, 150 to 200 meters.

[00:17:00]The lower floor housed garrisons ranging from 30 to 50 soldiers with stocks of food, water, and weapons to withstand sieges lasting up to several months.

[00:17:15]On the upper floor there were socks for the archers and observation platforms. So, archers were the ones who could shoot the weapon the farthest.

[00:17:31]There were other towers then, which were smoke telegraphs, warning towers, positioned on strategic peaks, and they used wolf dung and sulfur to create black smoke during the day and bonfires during the nights. The code was very precise.

[00:17:57]A column of smoke signified an attack by up to 100 enemies.

[00:18:03]Two columns could mean there would be up to 500 enemies. Three columns of smoke, more than 1000 enemies.

[00:18:15]Within a few hours, therefore, an alert had been issued on the Gob border, the desert region that led to the imperial palace in Beijing.

[00:18:26]Then, one tower would pass to another until, after a few hours, they would reach the imperial palace.

[00:18:38]control, not just isolation.

[00:18:42]In the case of our political sociology, Moralia then had three functions that went beyond the so-called passive shield.

[00:18:56]Initially, it was a flow control and customs facility. She regulated the Silk Road.

[00:19:06]No one could enter or leave with goods— in this case, silk, tea, and porcelain, the main Chinese commodities at the time— without passing through the fortified gates in the city wall, where the state collected taxes that financed the empire itself. The second aspect is population settlement. By clearly defining the boundary between Chinese agricultural civilization and the nomadic world, the centralized state prevented its peasants from evading taxes and military conscription, thus avoiding mingling with the tribes of the Steppe villages. And the last sociological aspect to be highlighted is the paradox of the fall. The final collapse of the wall's security in 164 serves as a timeless lesson in geopolitics. The Ming wall was not breached by catapults or siege weapons. It fell because the Chinese general Vu Sangui, amidst a civil war and an internal peasant revolt, deliberately opened the gates of Chan Shaiguan to the Manchu invasion. So, I'll end here by debunking a very widespread myth, which is that the Great Wall of China can be seen from the Moon or from Earth's highest orbit, isn't that true?

[00:21:13]This is a myth that someone wrote sometime in the early to mid- 20th century.

[00:21:28]To give you an idea, it would be like seeing a strand of hair from 1000 meters away. It's impossible, right?

[00:21:39]So this is a myth that we have to debunk and we can't spread it. That 's not true.

[00:21:52]Well, that was the first big one, and I'm seeing here that this is going to go far.

[00:22:03]Perhaps we'll even have to do two or even three programs, because to talk in detail about the main tourist attractions, what I didn't research— and that was my mistake— I have this data, but I didn't include it in my text, is the number of visitors at each of these points, right? So, but we can obtain this information here for intelligence purposes, but they exceed 10, 20, 30 million, right?

[00:23:03]So, in the case of the Great Wall, I've already mentioned here, uh, let's say it's the most visited single museum in the world, right?

[00:23:16]Yes, and the Chinese government even imposes a limit on daily visits to prevent the structure from deteriorating. Some of them are made of wood, right? The one I visited, I'm not going to pronounce it again here so I don't get it wrong, right? It even has a cable car, doesn't it, for you to go up, but in the last stretch you have to climb stone stairs. I have this prosthesis here in my hip, and now I use a cane, right? I hope to be free of it when I finish physical therapy.

[00:24:01]But the last steps I need to reach there are very narrow; the passage is very narrow.

[00:24:09]It's the same stone staircase that goes up, it's the same staircase that goes down.

[00:24:15]so I can reach the final steps.

[00:24:18]My wife went ahead, but she doesn't have enough strength. Luckily, two or three stronger Chinese men helped me take the final steps. Well, it's about the Great Wall; annual estimates are 16 million visitors. That's no small thing.

[00:24:45]Wow, impressive, isn't it? But I'll give you other numbers later. Let's move on to our second major tourist attraction, which is the so-called Great Terracotta Army, which you've probably heard of, and is probably the second most visited tourist spot in China.

[00:25:14]Which is located in the city of Xi'an, right? Well, this one is visited, it's not the second largest, but it receives 10 million tourists a year, a huge economic engine in Chanchi province.

[00:25:33]This flow has exploded significantly in recent years with the opening of new high-speed lines connecting Beijing to Xi'an in 4:30 hours by train.

[00:25:46]Later I'll talk about this train line that we use, right? So, the man who unified China, as we've already mentioned, Emperor Kim Xuanzang, he was the creator of these statues. It was by his order that this emperor unified China, and he also initiated the great unified construction of the Great Wall, the construction of his monumental Mausoleum.

[00:26:29]So, it began when he ascended the throne of the Chinese state in the year 246 BCE.

[00:26:41]He was only 13 years old and it took him 40 years to complete.

[00:26:53]It is estimated that more than 700,000 workers and artisans labored during this period on the mausoleum that I visited. It's a huge museum, isn't it?

[00:27:14]Emperor Qin Xiuang had a geopolitical objective.

[00:27:17]He was obsessed with immortality.

[00:27:22]Because he had conquered and militarily subjugated the other six rival kingdoms, he feared the vengeance of his enemies' spirits after his death.

[00:27:37]Therefore, this army of clay or terracotta was buried along with him in the eastern part of his tomb, precisely to act as a spiritual military shield protecting the emperor in the afterlife.

[00:27:59]The accidental discovery... no one ever knew of the existence of this terracotta army, of statues, right?

[00:28:10]It happened in 1974.

[00:28:15]Unlike the Great Wall, which was always visible, the Terracotta Army remained completely forgotten and invisible on Earth for over 2200 years.

[00:28:37]It was only discovered accidentally in March 1974.

[00:28:46]When a group of local farmers led by Yang Zifa, Zifa and Z I F A were digging a water well near Mount Li.

[00:29:03]Instead of water, they found fragments of terracotta and bronze arrowheads, paving the way for the greatest archaeological discovery of the 20th century in the world, and not just in China.

[00:29:23]Anatomy of the complex, its structure and its numbers.

[00:29:30]The excavated complex is mainly divided into three large pits open to the public that reproduce the actual organization of an army from the King dynasty.

[00:29:48]There are three large moats. Moat number one, which is the main moat I visited, is the largest of them all, covered by an immense structure that resembles an airplane hangar.

[00:30:06]It contains the main infantry force arranged in battle rows 4 m deep, with over 6,000 soldiers and dozens of horses. I hit it, I took lots of photos. If I manage to publish a book about this visit to China with the help of other people who were in the delegation, I'll have dozens of photos about it, right? We'll have it on a photo map, right?

[00:30:41]The second ditch functions as the rapid intervention force or the so-called mobile guard, which contains archers standing or kneeling.

[00:30:56]It also contains cavalry units and wooden war chariots that have deteriorated, leaving only the marks and clay horses. Then, over time, it was lost.

[00:31:12]And finally, pit three is the military command post, a smaller space that houses the high-ranking officials, generals, and strategists, simulating the headquarters that coordinated the actions of Emperor Kin's spiritual army.

[00:31:38]Incredible technical and archaeological details.

[00:31:42]Unique faces, customized mass production.

[00:31:50]What impresses us sociologists and our colleagues in art history the most is that no two faces are alike.

[00:32:04]The bodies and limbs were molded en masse, using local clay molds, but the heads were individually finished by hand by artisans—one for young soldiers, one for old soldiers, one for mustaches, one for beards, one for different hairstyles, and one for ethnic features representing the diverse peoples that made up the Qin empire of the newly unified China.

[00:32:49]The gray illusion. Today we see the warriors in the earthy gray color of baked clay, but originally they were fully painted in vibrant colors: red, blue, green, yellow, and purple.

[00:33:09]Unfortunately, the paint used, which had an organic lacquer base, peels off and evaporates upon contact with dry air a few minutes after being excavated.

[00:33:24]Therefore, the Chinese government keeps much of the site buried, awaiting advances in chemical preservation technologies, which are real weapons. The warriors did not carry clay weapons, but rather real weapons made of bronze and iron: swords, spears, crossbows, and arrows.

[00:33:53]Many of these swords were found sharp and shiny because they received an early technological treatment of chrome plating, which prevented corrosion for two millennia.

[00:34:14]Here's my sociological analysis, right?

[00:34:18]Before the Qin dynasty, in Chinese religious tradition, there was royal human sacrifice.

[00:34:26]When a king died, his concubines, servants, and guards were killed and buried with him. Replacing real people with perfect terracotta replicas.

[00:34:41]Kim Shi Huang oversaw a significant cultural transition, but maintained the logic of the totalitarian state: the use of the energy and labor of an entire society for the glorification and protection of the ruler's centralized authority.

[00:35:04]So, there you have my final sociological analysis of the great terracotta army.

[00:35:18]We're almost 40 minutes into the live stream. I commented on two episodes, two fantastic tourist attractions in China. Maybe there's just enough time to make one more. Just a reminder that I asked you to subscribe and share. I had forgotten to use this term.

[00:35:41]Share this in your groups.

[00:35:54]I came back with this cough, it's not exactly the flu, is it? So you have to expectorate, expectorate a lot.

[00:36:08]This week I will be addressing two typical health problems of an elderly gentleman who is an adultescent, someone who refuses to grow old.

[00:36:22]Who would guess that I'm 70 years old, right? I'll do it later. My wife says, "You're not 70 yet, you'll make it." Well, I'm going to do it this December, but I have a 20% hearing loss, so I'll have to use hearing aids, right? Because I'm missing out on a lot in these conversations.

[00:36:50]My wife sometimes has to speak three times for me to understand, or else she has to come and stand right in front of me, you know? That's not good, is it?

[00:37:02]And the other thing is that I already had a recommendation to have surgery for an inguinal hernia, but I decided to do it after my trip to China.

[00:37:13]So I walked with a lot of pain, nothing to do with the hip surgery I had, right?

[00:37:20]This one doesn't hurt. So this inguinal hernia here was causing a sharp, stabbing pain in my leg, in my thigh.

[00:37:28]This is my Samsung watch; it has a pedometer.

[00:37:35]I'm in control, right? My goal is 5,000 to 6,000 steps every day. I've never walked any further than that. In China, we spent 17 nights, 18 days there, and one day I took 12,000 steps. That's a lot for someone who's had hip surgery; I have a prosthesis in both my hip and femur, right? I broke something and have a hernia that needs surgery, right?

[00:38:06]So, I was in a lot of pain, I took strong painkillers, but everything turned out alright and I did n't complain. Nobody knew about it, and I'm only talking about it now, you know? So, complaining later is fine. The annoying thing is complaining all the time live on air, right? Nobody knew about it, except my wife, who heard a lot of complaints, right? But that's still a complaint. All I was saying was that I was in pain, right? Well, many people who missed this trip shouldn't be asking to go again now. I'm evaluating, I'm going to take stock.

[00:38:51]Since we already have the know-how, technology, a tourism agency specializing in the Silk Road, etc., we're considering that it doesn't need to be a group of 100, maybe 50, right? Going back to China now in November, after the elections, right?

[00:39:12]So let's see. Lula might win the first round because he has no real opponent, right? In sports terminology, it's called W, right? It has no rival.

[00:39:31]Okay, let's go back here. I think I'll see if I can get them to talk about maybe three, so I'll have to do a second part. So I'll schedule part two for next Monday, right?

[00:39:53]From our same title, right? The People's Republic of China as I knew it, part two, right? It's OK.

[00:40:16]The third tourist spot we visited was the so-called Forbidden City, which is no longer a Forbidden City; it's now a separate museum, but here's a correction. When I talked about the Great Wall of China, I said it's a unique museum, right?

[00:41:00]The Great Wall of China is visited by 16 million people, right?

[00:41:09]That number is the sum of the visits to the three most famous spots, and they limit it to 60,000 people per day, right? Well, the Forbidden City is 20 million, right? and it is called the most visited single museum in the world. It's open, right?

[00:41:39]So, as I said, we're passing this on; the information is limited to 80,000, and you have to pay to get in. Like when you're traveling with a large group, tour operators usually buy tickets for the entire group, so you don't even realize it, but you paid for that in the package, right?

[00:42:03]And so all of that is made of wood, right? So, to prevent degradation, they limit the number of visitors, right? So, let's go. So far we've had three donations and one new member.

[00:42:26]If you can, at the very end, I'll put it on the screen here, you can make a donation to help the channel. The channel will experience a drop in revenue, although it won't be a significant one. $500, or R$2,500, doesn't even cover the cards and expenses, the subscriptions, and the transcriptions that I... So, this month there will be a sharp drop because I went 20 days without doing the show, right?

[00:42:57]So, if you can make a donation, we're almost at 200 live viewers, right?

[00:43:03]So, since it 's perhaps not a very relevant topic, the audience isn't large, but if everyone gives 1, 2, or 3 reais, it helps a lot, right?

[00:43:18]Yeah, it's showing up on the screen too, it has my Pix number. Anyone who wants to send a donation via Pix, I would greatly appreciate it. I'm going to try to publish two books this year, one about my trip to Iran, which I 'm trying to get funding for; the book is quite far along in its development.

[00:43:38]And I'm starting to do the editing, the revision of the second reading. I've already written the first chapter of a book that's practically finished, called Women Philosophers in Ancient Greece, right?

[00:43:59]If I'm not mistaken, there were 20 or 30 that I mentioned that you don't even know their names, but they existed, but they were erased from history by patriarchy, right?

[00:44:12]And I'll see if I can edit that book by the end of the year. It even has a cover already, right? Yes, that's my commitment, right? And if you could help me by buying one of my books, right? My last published book is this one here, right?

[00:44:32]Reflections on the multipolarity of the world.

[00:44:36]I ordered it to run 1000 times, right? So far we 've sold 400 copies, so we still have plenty of them in stock, right? It's OK? Here in the banner, you can find the address: www.aparteeditora.com.br.

[00:44:56]Here, Patrício traveled with me.

[00:45:00]Thanks. No, Patricia. Oh, Patricia, she even lent me my selfie stick. Patricia, I went to buy a new one here today, right?

[00:45:16]R$ 90, right?

[00:45:19]I went, I had a handsome guy, more or less this size, right? Then when I entered the museum of the revolution, it's called the military museum of the revolution, I'll talk about that later.

[00:45:33]São aí is different from São Paulo; it's also a tourist spot, right?

[00:45:40]It was in my bag, they took it, right? You ca n't bring that in. I don't know the reason, because I filmed it with my cell phone, right? If you're filming with your cell phone, film with a selfie stick. Then they labeled it and gave me a stub, right? Then I left, I took the left-handed one with me. The next day I was leaving Beijing and heading to Shanghai.

[00:46:05]What was I supposed to do then? I was going to take a taxi, to avoid missing the bullet train.

[00:46:16]Then I gave the ticket to the guide, and she said, "Oh, if you want to get a selfie stick as a gift, go to the pick-up point and keep it, okay?

[00:46:28]Patricia lent it to me. Well, let's go to the third monument we visited, the Forbidden City. It was called the Forbidden City because people couldn't set foot inside, and today it 's no longer forbidden because, starting on October 1st, 1949, a revolution took place, a popular revolution, and it became the people's property.

[00:47:11]That was the seat of the empire, right, of China, right?

[00:47:18]Well, the cosmic planning and axial symmetry for the imperial architects meant the palace wasn't just a dwelling, but the earthly reflection of the celestial order, the spatial alignment. The entire complex was meticulously planned along a north-south axis of 7.5 km or Beijing.

[00:47:58]The emperor's throne was positioned exactly on this line.

[00:48:05]As the emperor was called, quote, " son of heaven," his residence needed to be perfectly aligned with the polar star, the immovable center of the sky.

[00:48:22]The geometry of power. The complex is a gigantic rectangle of 72 hectares, 720,000 m², surrounded by a 10-meter- high wall and a 52-meter-wide moat.

[00:48:50]Those entering through the south gates faced a succession of increasingly imposing courtyards designed to make the visitor or foreign ambassador feel minuscule before the immensity of the state.

[00:49:12]And we walked all of that on foot. That was one of those days where I took 12,000 steps, right?

[00:49:18]That means about 7 or 8 km of walking. For me, it was a real sacrifice, wasn't it?

[00:49:34]The structure of the AL, the outer courtyard and the inner courtyard.

[00:49:41]The city is forbidden, it's very clearly divided into two zones: functional and sociological. So, my perspective is always sociological.

[00:49:55]The outer courtyard, where the public power resides, comprises the southern section of the palace.

[00:50:05]The great events took place there; it was the stage for the great rituals of the state, such as imperial weddings and the proclamation of laws. And, of course, the emperor's grand banquets were a must.

[00:50:28]It's dominated by three great halls, the largest and most imposing being the Hall of Supreme Harmony, in Chinese Tairredian, where the dragon throne stood to reinforce the solemn character and prevent any ambush attempts.

[00:50:59]There isn't a single tree planted in all the immense stone courtyards of this area.

[00:51:07]The inner courtyard, where private life takes place, comprises the northern section of the complex.

[00:51:17]There stood the official residence of the emperor, along with the empress, their numerous concubines and consorts, and thousands of eunuchs, the only men authorized to spend the night there. They weren't exactly virile men, were they?

[00:51:44]Active.

[00:51:45]It's an immense labyrinth of smaller palaces, libraries, and a dazzling imperial garden in the background.

[00:52:01]The myth of 9999/4... and there's a very famous folklore legend in China that the Forbidden City has exactly 9999/4... and the logic of the myth... In Chinese cosmology, the number nine is the maximum imperial number, associated with the dragon and longevity.

[00:52:35]And The number 10,000, which is van W a N, represents infinity and absolute perfection, reserved exclusively for the celestial palace of the Jade Emperor, God.

[00:52:53]Since the earthly ruler could not equal the divinity, he ordered the construction of half a room smaller.

[00:53:03]In classical Chinese architecture, 1/4 Jean does not mean a room enclosed by walls, but rather a quadrangular space delimited by four pillars.

[00:53:21]A rigorous census conducted by the museum revealed that the complex today has 9,371 of these spaces, distributed across approximately 1,200 buildings.

[00:53:37]The symbolic half-room is often associated with the west wing of the royal library, intentionally built more narrowly.

[00:53:57]Symbolism, symbolism in the details and colors.

[00:54:04]Everything in the Forbidden City is a visual code of hierarchy and protection.

[00:54:10]Yellow and red. Almost all roofs use glazed yellow tiles, the color that represented the earth, the center, and the exclusivity of the imperial family.

[00:54:26]The walls are painted ochre red, symbolizing stability and good fortune.

[00:54:33]The only major exception is the royal library, which has a black roof. The text refers to the element of water in the theory of the five elements, functioning as a mystical amulet to protect books from fire.

[00:54:53]The statuettes on the roof, the roofs have corners and rows of small mythical creatures, lions, dragons, and phoenixes.

[00:55:11]The greater the importance of the hall, the more statues the architectural structure had. The Supreme Harmony Hall is the only one in all of ancient China authorized to have the maximum number of 10 statuettes on the summit.

[00:55:31]We saw this and I photographed these 10 statuettes, right?

[00:55:37]The underground security.

[00:55:41]To prevent assassins or rebels from digging tunnels under the walls to enter the inner courtyard.

[00:55:50]The floors of the main courtyards were laid with 15 crossed layers of special bricks, making the subsoil impenetrable.

[00:56:04]My sociological analysis of this isolation, in quotes, the name Forbidden City, Zijincheng, Zincheng, carries the character, which means purple, in reference to the polar star, indicating that the palace was the pivot of the universe. However, this total isolation ended up becoming the Chinese monarchy's own trap. By ensconced behind thick walls surrounded by a bureaucracy of eunuchs who controlled the flow of information, the last emperors of the Ming and King dynasties completely lost contact with material reality, the poverty of the countryside, and external technological transformations, which paved the way for the collapse of the imperial system.

[00:57:21]So, I'll end here, next Monday I'll open again. We'll talk about the Temple of Heaven, the Temple of the God of the city of Shanghai, Tiger Hill, and I'll close with the famous bullet trains. I'm wondering if I'll also talk about the museums I visited, the National Museum, the Museum of the Revolution, and the institutional meetings I had. So, if I do all that, maybe I'll have to do three programs, no problem. I'll do parts one, two, and three, right? So, next Monday, get ready for a new contact with me.

[00:58:24]Well, Patricia here, look, Museum of Art of the FEN and Your library, oh. Cool.

[00:58:32]Well, as I promised, we had Gabriel Santa Rosa making a donation today, Judite became a member, Aninha is always present, sending donations.

[00:58:55]My great friend went with me to Iran and now he's back with me to China. He always sends a donation. Thank you, Gavlinsk.

[00:59:04]Hamilton also sent a donation. And my dear friend Patrícia, I saw her putting on lipstick at one point, vain and beautiful as she is, without a mirror, right? Women have that ability. They put on lipstick, nothing smudges, nothing at all. It's a matter of practice, right, Patrícia? That's it.

[00:59:29]So, I apologize, I didn't have any support today from my friends, Artur and Luía, so dozens of messages on the screen couldn't be displayed. So it was just in the chat, okay? That's it, folks. I'm going to work a little more, prepare tomorrow's 12:47 live stream. Tomorrow we'll have Jamile, right? Dr. Jamile returns tomorrow.

[00:59:58]Thank you for That's all. Just now, Alexandre made a donation.

[01:00:10]Alexandre Manica, they donate to my channel regularly. Thank you so much!

[01:00:16]A hug. I'm going to end the broadcast here, okay? Thank you for everything. A kiss to everyone. Bye, everyone. Have a good week.