The Glamorous Stone-built Dragon
Shun Him Yau, Group 3: Non-Fiction, SKH Lam Woo Memorial Secondary School
ow invaluable has the Great Wall been? It has been toiling to guarantee the safety of Chinese in the
past, and to contribute to the tourism of China in this time and age. This elongated dragon, with the
length of over thousands kilometres, flies across an array of picturesque terrain of winding mountain
chains, grassy-green plains, astonishing and astounding river valleys. If there had not been this sturdy
and stalwart fortification, lives of Chinese in the past would have undoubtedly been in peril.
This dragon first showed its intriguing body during the Qin Dynasty for defensive purpose. With the
relatively backward technology at that time, it was completely unbelievable for such a tremendous construction
to be built. Therefore, it was also the symbol of civilization of the Chinese People. Despite the grandeur of the
Great Wall, it costed millions of lives and the following dynasties like the Han and Ming Dynasty also made
their own contribution to this majestic building.
From then until now, innumerable numbers of people have been considering the Great Wall as a kind of
honour, a kind of glory, a kind of eminence owing to its prodigious scale and efficacy in protecting China from
the annexation of other powers. Nevertheless, have you, dear readers, ever thought about what the Great Wall is
made of? Common answers are “bricks”, “cement”. Instead, I would like to say it was built with hundreds of
thousands of priceless lives and infinite tears, including fathers of uncountable families, sons of the old as well
as heartthrobs of damsels. We can imagine, how depressed and desperate we would feel if we lost our family
members or sweethearts. There was even a tale that a young girl cried in front of the Great Wall, where the body
of her husband was buried. Eventually, she even broke the part of the stony Great Wall with her hysterical cry.
Despite the fact that it seems impossible, it indirectly arouses our attention to this tragedy and reminds the
current ruler and ruling party not to recommit the same error again. Not only should people contemplate this
mistake, but a total review of people’s lives and development should also be carried out.
With the running of the wheel of time, this elongated dragon has been declining in terms of length.
According to the historical records of China, the length of the Great Wall has plunged from over six thousand
kilometres to now no more than three thousand. This disastrous destruction mainly composes of misbehaviour
of tourists, human exploitation and a lack of deterrent penalty and maintenance.
Browsing the Internet, it is not difficult to see photos about tourists eating, sleeping and disposing of
rubbish on the Great Wall. Some even report that there have been tourists discharging their excreta while
visiting this landmark. Not only do these activities spoil the breathtaking scenery, but they also encourage
uncivilized behaviour to be done which may ultimately ruin this memorable and historically-valuable
architecture.
Apart from that, human exploitation has also deteriorated the problem. Not only citizens but officials make
use of the chance to make money by committing extraction, animal raising and various kinds of developments.
Extraction first requires people to destroy the surface or even the main body of the Great Wall before minerals
or substances can be acquired. Animal raising and developments also compelled people to completely devastate
the Great Wall as a boundless area of land is needed for ranches and developments. All of these directly and
severely cause wear and tear to the Great Wall.
Furthermore, the central government has also been neglecting the Great Wall, which further worsens the
problem. Without constant monitoring, checking and maintenance, any destruction will not be able to be
discovered and repaired. Additionally, due to natural factors like weathering and acid rain, the Great Wall is
inevitably corroded and some buildings and soil may become loose. Since there is a lack of monitoring and
repairing, the Great Wall is now disappearing at a rapid rate.
The fabrication of the Great Wall has costed an inestimable amount of money as well as lives. As a saying
goes, “Let bygones be bygones”. Consequently the lives lost cannot be retrieved. What we should and could do
is to try our best to preserve and conserve the painstaking effort they paid, which is the Great Wall, so that their
effort can be utilised.
On the contrary, you may then doubt, how can we save the seriously wounded Great Wall? There are a
couple of ways to cure the present problems.
First of all, education can be set up to restrict the damage caused by tourists. Educational talks can be
offered to tourists before they visit historical sites like the Great Wall. Tourists should be taught about what
should and what should not be done during their journey so littering and destruction of buildings are not allowed.
H
Winner
