in 1900s, an alliance of 8, with france and england being the forerunners, marched into beijing. and with them came such destruction on a grand scale. The beautiful summer palace, filled with endless rows of chinese roses, beautiful architecture, all the hundreds of years of history and culture, destroyed within a few nights. Palaces and gardens, culture and hard work, the blood of the chinese splattered all over the flowers which never lived to see another day.

Quoting from Victor Hugo, as he describes the incident. "'Two robbers breaking into a museum, devastating, looting and burning, leaving laughing hand-in-hand with their bags full of treasures; one of the robbers is called France and the other Britain"

In the summer palace was a grand fountain, surrounded by the bronze head statues of the 12 animals of the zodiac, as they gaze into every direction, at the women who played lightly on the ancient chinese instruments and smiled behind their fans, as the men walked around with scrolls and talked of poetry and arts.

that fateful few nights, the heads were severed from its body, the fountain, and disappeared forever along with the hands that bloodied the city of Beijing that night.

Years later, the statues surfaced. The Mouse and the Rabbit. Just like the French looted China brutally back in 1900s, they are now selling the looted good to make even more money, off something which does not even belong to them. 28000000 Euros, every single bill, every single coin, covered with blood and sin.

the hypocrits Berge and some press member stated, "address the human rights problem in XiZang (or as some of you may know as Tibet) and we'll return it."

what a bargain.

the statues themselves are the VERY PROOF of your atrocities, your brutality, your LACK OF HUMAN RIGHTS back in 1900s, and now, you use the proof of your lack of HUMAN RIGHTS and your lack of HUMANITY to blackmail us about the HUMAN RIGHTS problems?!

i can't define HYPOCRISY better myself.

if the statues were alive, oh what stories they'd tell. what bloody tears they'd shed, for those sleepless nights when fires raged throughout Beijing. What sadness they'd sing of, now that they've become mere items of making money for the very people who broke their head from their body, who proudly talked of human rights when they gave none to the chinese people.

i cry typing this journal. there is no shame in this. i cry, for the injustice of it all. feel free not to respond to this if it makes you uncomfortable, for if you have reached this far in the article, then my job is done.

*******split***********

following is the original content of the letter from Victor Hugo to Captain Butler, who was in the expendition of the full-scale atrocity.

"You ask my opinion, Sir, about the China expedition. You consider this expedition to be honourable and glorious, and you have the kindness to attach some consideration to my feelings; according to you, the China expedition, carried out jointly under the flags of Queen Victoria and the Emperor Napoleon, is a glory to be shared between France and England, and you wish to know how much approval I feel I can give to this English and French victory.

Since you wish to know my opinion, here it is:
There was, in a corner of the world, a wonder of the world; this wonder was called the Summer Palace. Art has two principles, the Idea, which produces European art, and the Chimera, which produces oriental art. The Summer Palace was to chimerical art what the Parthenon is to ideal art. All that can be begotten of the imagination of an almost extra-human people was there. It was not a single, unique work like the Parthenon. It was a kind of enormous model of the chimera, if the chimera can have a model. Imagine some inexpressible construction, something like a lunar building, and you will have the Summer Palace. Build a dream with marble, jade, bronze and porcelain, frame it with cedar wood, cover it with precious stones, drape it with silk, make it here a sanctuary, there a harem, elsewhere a citadel, put gods there, and monsters, varnish it, enamel it, gild it, paint it, have architects who are poets build the thousand and one dreams of the thousand and one nights, add gardens, basins, gushing water and foam, swans, ibis, peacocks, suppose in a word a sort of dazzling cavern of human fantasy with the face of a temple and palace, such was this building. The slow work of generations had been necessary to create it. This edifice, as enormous as a city, had been built by the centuries, for whom? For the peoples. For the work of time belongs to man. Artists, poets and philosophers knew the Summer Palace; Voltaire talks of it. People spoke of the Parthenon in Greece, the pyramids in Egypt, the Coliseum in Rome, Notre-Dame in Paris, the Summer Palace in the Orient. If people did not see it they imagined it. It was a kind of tremendous unknown masterpiece, glimpsed from the distance in a kind of twilight, like a silhouette of the civilization of Asia on the horizon of the civilization of Europe.

This wonder has disappeared.
One day two bandits entered the Summer Palace. One plundered, the other burned. Victory can be a thieving woman, or so it seems. The devastation of the Summer Palace was accomplished by the two victors acting jointly. Mixed up in all this is the name of Elgin, which inevitably calls to mind the Parthenon. What was done to the Parthenon was done to the Summer Palace, more thoroughly and better, so that nothing of it should be left. All the treasures of all our cathedrals put together could not equal this formidable and splendid museum of the Orient. It contained not only masterpieces of art, but masses of jewelry. What a great exploit, what a windfall! One of the two victors filled his pockets; when the other saw this he filled his coffers. And back they came to Europe, arm in arm, laughing away. Such is the story of the two bandits.

We Europeans are the civilized ones, and for us the Chinese are the barbarians. This is what civilization has done to barbarism.

Before history, one of the two bandits will be called France; the other will be called England. But I protest, and I thank you for giving me the opportunity! the crimes of those who lead are not the fault of those who are led; Governments are sometimes bandits, peoples never.

The French empire has pocketed half of this victory, and today with a kind of proprietorial naivety it displays the splendid bric-a-brac of the Summer Palace. I hope that a day will come when France, delivered and cleansed, will return this booty to despoiled China.

Meanwhile, there is a theft and two thieves.
I take note.
This, Sir, is how much approval I give to the China expedition.”

*******split************8
here follows the original French text.

Un jour, deux bandits sont entrés dans le Palais d'été. L'un a pillé, l'autre a incendié. La victoire peut être une voleuse, à ce qu'il paraît. Une dévastation en grand du Palais d'été s'est faite de compte à demi entre les deux vainqueurs. On voit mêlé à tout cela le nom d'Elgin, qui a la propriété fatale de rappeler le Parthénon. Ce qu'on avait fait au Parthénon, on l'a fait au Palais d'été, plus complètement et mieux, de manière à ne rien laisser. Tous les trésors de toutes nos cathédrales réunies n'égaleraient pas ce splendide et formidable musée de l'orient. Il n'y avait pas seulement là des chefs-d'œuvre d'art, il y avait un entassement d'orfèvreries. Grand exploit, bonne aubaine. L'un des deux vainqueurs a empli ses poches, ce que voyant, l'autre a empli ses coffres ; et l'on est revenu en Europe, bras dessus, bras dessous, en riant. Telle est l'histoire des deux bandits.

Nous, Européens, nous sommes les civilisés, et pour nous, les Chinois sont les barbares. Voila ce que la civilisation a fait à la barbarie.

Devant l'histoire, l'un des deux bandits s'appellera la France, l'autre s'appellera l'Angleterre. Mais je proteste, et je vous remercie de m'en donner l'occasion ; les crimes de ceux qui mènent ne sont pas la faute de ceux qui sont menés ; les gouvernements sont quelquefois des bandits, les peuples jamais.

L'empire français a empoché la moitié de cette victoire et il étale aujourd'hui avec une sorte de naïveté de propriétaire, le splendide bric-à-brac du Palais d'été.

J'espère qu'un jour viendra où la France, délivrée et nettoyée, renverra ce butin à la Chine spoliée.