Huntington Library&Newport Beach(1/17&1/18)

1/17
Yesterday we went to The Huntington Library. It isn't like the libraries you usually see, it's more like a rare book and manuscript library, it has approx. 6.5 million manuscripts and more than a million rare books in it's collection. There were a lot of old books and manuscripts, a few of which date back to around 1275. There were also a lot of scientific texts, most of which were either original manuscripts or first edition copies, from Newton, Galileo, Pasteur, Hooke, Tesla, Edison and so on, it was so cool to see all these books there. BTW, we went there with my aunt, she is currently doing research there so we didn't have to pay the admissions fee, which was 20 bucks per person.

1/18
Today we went to Newport Beach, a city in Orange County. We went to the beach there, rode bikes there, and went to a mall afterwards. The weather was great, typical south California weather, and felt more like summer than Winter. We had dinner at Jonathan& Tim's house, pizza, and watched a NFL game. It was brutal, two guys had a full speed,head-on collision, literally, and one of them had to be sent out on a stretcher. It was crazy, football really is a crazily dangerous sport.

Universal Studios(1/16)

Yesterday, I went to Universal Studios with three of my cousins, Jonathan, Timothy, and Michael. Same as Disneyland, I haven't been there since I was maybe 2 or 3, so it might as well be my first time there, too. We got there around noon, went on a couple of the attractions, and then went on the studio tour, which was my favorite part. The studio tour featured a lot of cool special effects(water, fire, earthquakes, explosions.....), it basically used a lot of stuff that is used in filming movies, and although I felt that I had sat on the "wet" side of the show(JAWS, the flood in the subway station) and constantly got sprayed by water, it was still a great experience. BTW, Waterworld is great too, if you go there, you have to see it, just remember not to get to the show late or sit in the front unless you want to get wet.
I enjoyed it over all, and I think that I actually like Universal Studios better than Disneyland.
(I'll write about today's trip to The Huntington Library tomorrow.)

Disneyland

Disneyland, one of the biggest attractions in LA, if not the world, is where we went yesterday. The last time I went there was when I was a few years old so I don't really remember anything about it, so it might as well be my first time there. The park wasn't too crowded since we went on a Wednesday so we didn't have to wait "too long" in line, 10~20 minutes at most. Since I'm too old to appreciate most of the kids' stuff and I don't like roller coasters, it was only OK for me, but if you're either a kid, feel like a kid or enjoy rides, Disneyland is a place you definitely have to visit, it is, after all, a part of American culture.
In the evening, we saw the show"Fantasmic" there, it was good, they made the whole presentation quite nicely. It was quite a pity that it was hard to take pictures of it since it was so dark.
My little sister enjoyed it quite well, she is 6(What 6-year-old wouldn't?), except for Space Mountain, which was too dark, fast, and scary for her. My cousins also enjoyed it a lot(I guess.), we basically tagged along with my sister. Overall, it was a nice day.

LA

We arrived at LA last Wednesday and have been staying at one of my uncle's house(I have two uncles who are in LA). It's really hot here, in the 20s, especially since we just came from Toronto, which is freezing at below zero.
I've basically been having no life for the last week or so, playing computer games, reading novels, and going out occasionally, not much of a life. I did go to fellowship with one of my cousins(I have four here in LA), Timothy, it was nice, we went to Applebee's for dinner afterwards with some of the people at the church and got home at a little after midnight.
I've ordered books, music& computer games from eBay and have them sent here, so I've been getting all those and been happy about it:), since it isn't often that my parents let me buy books and the last time they let me buy computer games was a few years ago. Some still haven't arrived yet and I hope I can get them before I leave LA.
I haven't visited any of the "major attraction" here but I'll be starting tomorrow with Disneyland, there'll be five of us, me, my little sister, Michael, Timothy, and Jonathan(Three of my cousins), so it'll be four guys looking after a hyperactive little girl. I also believe we'll be going to Universal Studios on Friday.

Conclusion of NY trip

The NY trip went quite well, we visited 4 museums and two sight-seeing spots, spent hours waiting in line, stood waiting in the snow, ran to beat the blockading of streets on New-Years eve and much more. All in all, it was a very enjoyable trip, the family we lived with, the pastor from our church, was nice, though the younger of their two daughter fell ill on the Thursday. Later, I followed suit, getting sick myself, but that doesn't reduce how good the trip was.

Conclusion: NYC is definitely a city worth visiting, and I believe I'll visit it again(and again and again....) if I get a chance, there are museums that need to be seen, lines to stand in, you get what I mean.

Dec. 31(Grand Central Station,UN&MoMA)

The first stop we went to today was Grand Central Terminal, seeing it really made me know why I heard people criticize the demolition of Penn Station. It's really quite magnificent, the extent to which they build their train stations is quite something.

UN, we didn't really see a lot of it since we didn't take the tour.

MoMA(Museum of Modern Arts) was quite something, too. We saw a lot of famous paintings, like Matisse's The Dance, Picasso's Three Musicians& Les Demoiselles d'Avignon , Monet's Water Lilies triptych , Rousseau's The Sleeping Gypsy, some of Dali's, Miro's and van Gogh's. We didn't see van Gogh's The Starry Night, which was one of the paintings I wanted to see, it was in a special exhibition. But it was still nice, seeing all these artwork that you usually see in textbooks.

Dec. 30( Guggenheim Museum, The Met)

Since we slept late on the 29th, everyone slept late and we left late. We got to the Guggenheim Museum at just after noon, and "evaded" another long line because we had the "City Pass". I don't know about the artwork inside , but the building is really something, Frank Lloyd Wright was the designer. I've heard of it before and the architecture really isn't something to miss.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art was, as almost everyplace we've been to, crowded. I guess I'll have to come at least another time, the Met isn't something you can finish in a day, don't even think of it. The museum is huge, I guess it really lives up to it's name, they have a huge collection of artwork and even someone who isn't into art, like me, can recognize the value of a museum like this. They have a great collection of Egyptian artifacts including a small Egyptian temple. I've already talked about how I'm "mildly" interested, you can guess that I took a lot of pictures.

For dinner, we met up with my cousin who's working in the fashion industry here in NYC. She came with her boyfriend and we ate at a "pricey" restaurant (An average of 20+ USD). It tasted well and cost a lot.