Hello again,
I’m Minh coming from Vietnam. So far I have been in the States for half a year, wow! Time flies so fast, especially when you are always loaded with tons of assignments. I hope to hear that you guys had enjoyed your vacations as much as I did. This past X-mas I had a blast on a San Francisco trip . The city was awesome, very rich in culture. I went to various attractions including the Pier 39, spending the night on the cable car which drove me through hilly roads of SF, visiting many galleries in SF which I found really amusing.

Queuing from 6pm to 9pm to wait for a seat in the Cheesecake Factory, the California Museum of Science and de-Young museum are also a must-go for anyone whose ever been to SF. The weather was so windy but without SNOW! That is what I think made my trip perfect. Even if I’ve never seen snow, to me snow is kind of a hassle that I want to avoid ^_^ After the trip, we went back to Salem, spending some days here and headed to Seattle. Since we just had 2 days in Seattle, we tried to make the trip more “quality” rather than “quantity”. The two trips to Boeing Factory tour and the Seattle Public Library are so far some of the most memorable moments for me since I arrived to the States. The Boeing’s factory located at Everett, WA is where Boeing 747s, 767s, 777s and the new 787 Dreamliner are built. It is the largest building in the world by volume 13.3 million m³ (472 million cu. ft) and covers 398,000 m² (98.3 acres). Actually as far as I can recall the building can host about 50 football matches at once!
If the Boeing factory tour amazed me by its magnitude, the Seattle Public Library leaves an unforgettable impression on me with its architecture. I’m not so into architecture so i cannot give technical comments on this library, but the “Professionalism” and “natural lighting” impressed me. Several discrete floating platforms seemingly wrapped in a large steel net around glass skin were also very characteristic. The library is 363,987 square feet and can hold about 1.45 million books and other materials. It features underground public parking and includes more than 400 computers open to the public. Over 2 million individuals visited the library in the very first year ( according to Wiki). In 2007 , the building was voted #108 on the American institute of Architects list of Americans’ 150 favourite structure in the US.
Ok, I’m kinda wordy, huh? Here are some photos that I love and hope you will enjoy them. See you next month!



























And here is the Seattle Public Library..