Today we drove to Katy, Texas, where we visited the Forbidden Gardens, a park with miniatures of some of the most important sites in China. All of it was built by a Hong Kong billionaire who wanted to teach Americans some of China's history and he began with a miniature Forbidden City as well as one third sized terracotta warriors that mimic the originals near Xi'an, China. One of the most interesting things I saw today was a page with photos of Chinese women and their bound feet. I'd always heard of the custom, but I'd never seen how the feet were actually bound so they would remain tiny. The photos show the horror that this practice inflicted on the upper class Chinese woman prior to the 1949 Chinese Revolution when the Communist Government decided that the centuries old custom was not practical for a communist government where everyone had to work.
Because I forgot my camera on the day we visited the Forbidden Gardens, all of the photos in this album were taken by my frend Helen who kindly allowed me to share them.
