On Tuesday, March 11, 2008, we began our operation (or, daisakusen) by embarking into our first unknown territory -- the Engineering Quad.Dodging dangerous bicycles outside Cubberley, and avoiding all tourists and (pretending to not act like one at the same time) as we crossed the Main Quad, the world of the engineers soon awaited us.
We must give kudos to Angel's high school and college classmate Chi for suggesting to meet for lun
ch at the Bytes Cafe in the David Packard Electrical Engineering Building. Next door to the Packard Building is his good ol' buddy, the Hewlett Teaching Center.Bytes Cafe is a small restaurant on the first level of the Packard Building, which serves soups, salads, pizzas, and sandwiches. Of course, being the semi-vegetarian, Angel ordered the Boca burger with portobello mushrooms.
If you can't tell from Angel's expression, it looked and tasted really good!
After lunch, besides parting with Chi who had to go to class, we decided to take a parting shot with the two Engineering Buildings named after two famous engineers who collaborated together to create wonders in the technology world.We decided to pay tribute to these leaders in technology....by whipping out Melissa's camera.
And so here it is:
Melissa in front of Hewlett Teaching Center, and Angel in front of Packard Electrical Engineering Building.
As you can tell, we were definitely not engineering school students.
Across the street stood Gates Computer Science building and a beautiful fountain (Angel likes fountains).
Our next stop before heading back to familiar territory was the Hoover Tower, whose presence looms high above all other Stanford buildings in its vicinity.
Since Stanford students can visit the observatory for free (and we like free stuff), we joined the tourists into the small elevator up fourteen flights to the top of the world...or rather, the top of the observation deck. There, the view was gorgeous.
There's CERAS, Meyer Library and a little bit of Cubberley!
There's the football field and other athletic facilities. And we see the Main Quad.
View of Encina Hall, Schwab Center, and the other dorms.
The blue in the fountain in front of Memorial Auditorium was just too beautiful for words!
Up in the observatory was also the carillion, played by a music professor once a week. The sad thing is, we never heard the music playing...either because we were in class or we were off campus. But the instrument looked really cool!
Cool bells, don't you think?
Within Hoover Tower is several floors of libraries which archive millions of documents and prized possessions.
On the first floor were two rooms that had cultural artifacts and historical documents which belonged to Herbert Hoover and his wife. His wife studied Chinese characters and collected Belgium lace and Chinese blue-and-white porcelain. YAY for studying Chinese!
Our final destination on this trip included visiting a Herbert Hoover Memorial Plaza located adjacent to the Hoover Tower. The coolest monument was the sundial, which was very accurate!
Until next time!
