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The Nine-Dragon Cypress Tree at the Temple of Heaven in Beijing is a popular tree. This is not a host of the tree itself but of the crowd around the tree. Just what exactly they are doing I cannot say.

This is a Chinese juniper (Juniperus chinensis) of over 500 years old. Straight, robust and in a grotesque shape, the trunk is covered all over with spiral grooves which twist up vertically along as if nine coiling dragons were wreathing up into the sky, and hence the name of “the Nine-Dragon Juniper”.