Throughout history, this vast arena has been a marketplace for political ideals and tragicomedy. When the Army came, students were killed in their tents, still dreaming of democracy. The statue was toppled and the tanks carved tracks into the granite that were still visible ten years later. The square is dominated by the Tiananmen Gate to the north. Chairman Mao peers down from the domed red entrance to the Forbidden City, a giant portrait that has endured two decades of reforms in China.
Many Chinese visitors wear western brand-name clothes.
And yet, the Chairman is still there, casting a smile even more enigmatic than the Mona Lisa's. Not a single Mao suit square pockets and round badges is to be seen. His comrades eagerly clutched the white banisters up there. Slogans enthused and red flags strained in the wind, just as they do today. Within a decade, Mao ordered the square widened to accommodate more of the now supposedly liberated people of China.