Library & Movie

On Saturday we took BART to Civic Center and walked around the San Francisco Library. It’s a large, modern building, finished in 1996, with six stories and a huge, light-filled atrium. The children’s room featured a large bulletin board that said, “Year of the Horse” and had two paper horses. It reminded me again of the large Chinese presence here in San Francisco where 21% of the population is Chinese, according to the 2010 census. I think many of these people are immigrants since I hear them speaking Mandarin (could be Cantonese) on the bus and light rail and see them reading books with Chinese characters (as in Chinese letters – although I’m guessing the characters in the stories are also Chinese 🙂 ).
Today – Sunday – we walked a mile and a half to a movie theater and watched The Secret Life of Walter Mitty. I think it had been about two years since we’d seen a movie at a theater, and I had sticker shock when I checked the prices online. I was glad to have found the theater near us since the theater downtown charges more than twice as much for a ticket – $15 as opposed to $7! There weren’t many people in the theater, but I still felt self-conscious when I laughed aloud several times during the film. I would have sobbed at the sweet ending, but I held it together since the kids were with me. I loved the movie.
I’m about 2/3 done with the book, I Am Malala, about the teenage Pakistani girl who was shot by the Taliban and who is an outspoken advocate of girls’ education. She’s an amazing person. The book isn’t just inspirational, but it also gives a good overview of the Swat Valley in Pakistan that is her home and the history of the area and its people.