The Ba Gua is a pattern of trigrams comprising yang (or solid lines) and yin (broken line) surrounding a Taiji ball. The symbolic ball and the trigrams were both developed over 5000 years ago in the Henan Province by the mythical FuXi.

Fuxi is allegedly responsible for starting the first society by regulating family group with names, creating agriculture and farming techniques as well as observing nature to be able to come up with the polar opposites that we know as Yin and Yang. This system has become the foundation of all Chinese culture and philosophy.

Today we visited the place where his community flourished and developed into the Chinese nation. It is now a national monument and contains the place venerated as his tomb.

The tomb is underneath a circular mound with a square which represents earth and heaven.

We lit some insence sticks

The park contained many notable features such as this tree with a prominent knot which looks like an ear. Fuxi is said to have ‘heard’ the secrets of the universe.

These two trees are growing together. They are a Cypress and a Sandalwood which are notoriously hard to combine but which have come together here naturally showing tha humans should not always intervene. We should let nature do its own thing.

Around the park are many trigrams

The BaGua contains a wealth of philosophical concerns which take years to study and the I Ching or Book of Changes is the most well known place to learn them. But in addition the Chinese also use this for fortune telling. As I am learning the I Ching I decided to have a go. Most fortune telling is complex and involves mathematical calculations to result in a hexagram (double the trigrams) and then knowledge to interpret the meaning but here the guy just asked me to select a stick and then a thin card.

Apparently I am a good person who is respected by many (but not all) for the work that I do. The card I selected was the dragon which is the top animal in their heirarchy and represents these abilities to a high level!

Apparently FuXi came up with the concept of a dragon because many different people wanted to join his group from Tibet and Mongolia and the South. Each group brought with them their own sacred animal eg snake, turtle or tiger so FuXi combined all their characteristics into one mythical animal encapturing all strengths.

Dragon had 9 sons and this is the 9th

Around the park were topiary gates and walls.

My favorite was this gate. Called the Taiji Gate. This is the only time that I have seen a gate in China with this name.

And finally these five statues of 800 year old traitors who betrayed their Emperor in the Song Dynasty. People are allowed to slap the faces of the four men and one woman as eternal punishment. We saw one elderly lady wheel herself up them heave herself onto her feet so that she could viciously slap the statues. It is supposed to be a message that you should behave yourself but honestly after 800 years perhaps its time to forgive and forget…