Friday, September 4, 2009

This is Civic Center and Little Saigon...

San Francisco's Civic Center is an area of a few blocks north of the intersection of Market Street and Van Ness Avenue that contains many of the city's largest government and cultural institutions. It has two large plazas (Civic Center Plaza and United Nations Plaza) and a number of buildings in classical architectural style. The Exposition Auditorium is the only remaining building from the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition. The United Nations Charter was signed in the Herbst Theatre here in 1945, leading to the creation of the United Nations. It is also where the 1951 Treaty of San Francisco (the peace treaty that officially ended the Pacific War with the Empire of Japan, which had come to a close in 1945) was signed. It is designated a National Historic Landmark in 1987.

The United Nations Plaza was created in 1975, when the Bay Area Rapid Transit subway was constructed under Market Street. The 2.6-acre (11,000 m2) pedestrian mall was designed by Lawrence Halprin. -Wikipedia


«Take a tour...»

This is a BART ticket...


...you use it to ride one of these all the way to Civic Center.


This is United Nations Plaza. Today is the arts and crafts market. Wednesdays and Sundays are the Farmer's Market.


This is the Asian Art Museum



This is where you read books and think.


This is the remaining exposition auditorium from the Panama-Pacific Exposition in 1915. Now it is a convention center.


This is City Hall


This is Herbst Theater where the United Nations Charter was signed. Now it is a place of performances and lectures


This is a sculpture


This is the opera house


This is the symphony hall


This is the State of California building.


This is where I saw a private screening of Food, Inc. (I had the whole theater to myself.)


This is self explanatory.


This is Little Saigon...

In early 2004, San Francisco officially designated Larkin Street between Eddy and O'Farrell streets as "Little Saigon" (Sài Gòn Nhỏ). Located in the Tenderloin district where 2,000 of the city's 13,000 Vietnamese-American residents live, the two-block stretch is more than 80% Vietnamese-owned. Unlike San Jose, with its larger ethnic Vietnamese population, the ethnic Chinese from Vietnam are well represented in San Francisco due to self-segregation. Banners and directional signs have already been posted. A formal symbolic entrance was erected in July 2008, akin to those for San Francisco's Japantown and Chinatown (albeit smaller). -wikipedia


This is the gateway into Little Saigon


This is the best place to get a Vietnamese sandwich in the city.










This is the place where I ate lunch


This was good and only cost $6.50!


This is why I'm obsessed about food


This is a buddha


...and this is rush hour!

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