China’s Great Wall
China 2007
The Great Wall resembles a dragon as it snakes over the ridgeline of the mountains north of Beijing. The watch towers which look like little square chimneys dotting the top of the mountains served as garrisons for soldiers who were stationed on the wall. When an invader, often they were Mongols, was sighted, the soldiers lit fires on the top of the towers sending signals to other garrisons.
In addition to their military duties the soldiers, with the help of convicts, had to build sections of the wall. The wall itself averages 30 feet high with the ramparts adding another 12 feet. A fall from these heights could be fatal. More than 400,000 people died building the wall and they were buried in the wall itself. This section of the wall was rebuilt by the Ming Dynasty and is the most substantial work being constructed of stone and brick.
My friends and I had the idea that we’d find the perfect viewpoint as we walked in the heat and smog, but we never did or if we did we passed it by. At least we had the wall pretty much to ourselves. There were few tourists and they were Chinese. Many of them carried white parasols which I later turned to red in Photoshop. I tried to give this one the look of an old Chinese print by adding texture and a dirty gold overlay.