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布达拉宫

the red palace was constructed after the death of the fifth dalai lama. the center of the complicated red palace is the great west hall, which records the great fifth dalai lamas life by its fine murals. the scene of his visit to emperor shunzhi in beijing in 1652 is extraordinarily vivid. it also has finely carved columns and brackets. the hall has four additional chapels. the west chapel houses three gold stupas of the fifth, tenth and twelfth dalai lamas. their mummified and perfumed bodies are well kept in those stupas. among the three, the fifth dalai lamas stupa is the biggest, which is made of sandalwood, wrapped in gold foil and decorated with thousands of diamonds, pearls, agates and others gems. the stupa, with a height of 14.86 meters , spends more than 3,700 kilograms of gold. the north chapel contains statues of sakyamuni, dalai lamas and medicine buddha, and stupas of the eighth, ninth and eleventh dalai lamas. against the wall is tanjur , a most important tibetan buddhist sutra sent to the seventh dalai lama by emperor yongzheng. in the east chapel a two meters high statue of tsong khapa, the founder of gelugpa which is dalai lamas lineage, is enshrined and worshipped. in addition, about 70 famous adepts in tibetan buddhism surround him. the south chapel is where a silver statue of padmasambhava and 8 bronze statues of his reincarnations are enshrined. on the floor above, there is a gallery which has a collection of 698 murals, portraying buddhas, bodhisattvas, dalai lamas and great adepts and narrating jataka stories and significant tibetan historic events. west of the great west hall locates the thirteenth dalai lamas stupa hall. since he was regarded as great as the great fifth, people started to build his stupa after his death in the fall of 1933. taking three years, the stupa is comparable with the great fifths stupa. it is 14 meters in height, coated with a ton of gold foils. in front of it is a mandala made of more than 200,000 pearls and other gems. murals in the hall tell important events in his life, including his visit with emperor guangxu. the highest hall of potala was built in 1690. it used to be the holy shrine of chinese emperors. dalai lamas would come here with his officials and high lamas to show their respects to the central government annually before.