The Start of Something New

Yijing Lu

  While the train was approaching Philadelphia, the old song The Start of Something New was playing in my earphone, and the view of skyscrapers was coming into my eyes. It was my first trip in America for me since I arrived here, which made me extremely excited and curious. And I consider that this trip, as a new beginning, is the key that opens my colorful new life abroad.

  After looking around in a part of the city, I noticed that, unlike my hometown, Philadelphia has its own style which can not be described clearly with single words or phrase. Here comes something new to me I found out when I exploring the city:

The Appearance of the Center City

  In my mind, the center of the city should be a business district, which is full of shopping malls and markets of various sorts and is noisy and crowded. However, in the center of Philadelphia, there are libraries, galleries, museums and the Swann Memorial Fountain donated to honor the society’s founder in 1924, which makes the city seems solemn and peaceful and covered with the atmosphere of history and culture.

  At the north of the fountain square, there is a library where we had a special experience of reading with listening to a whisper, which made me cognize more charm of reading and words. And at the south of the square, that is Moore College of Art and Design, where exhibited art works about sculptures, paintings, jewelry designs, photographs and interior designs. We visited the gallery of that college and enjoy every piece of artworks there. The most impressive exhibition was a wall of fabric works, and my favorite one of so many works was a fabric flower, which was made vividly with rags of different patterns.

  All in all, at the weekend, the appearance of the central city is that people come to the center city, not for shopping within a mass of crowd, but to relax themselves by sitting on the grassland, playing with their children around the fountain, reading their favorite novel in the library, roaming in the gallery, visiting the museum and enjoying a free day within the blooming flowers.

The Constructions in the City

  When we went upstairs from the septa station, we could see skyscrapers and at a glance. I noticed the outer walls of many buildings were covered with mirrors, or the every entire windows of the building were designed as mirrors. This scene made me surprised and confused because, in my hometown, huge mirrors on the outer walls of buildings are consider as the main cause of light pollution. By walking around the area of skyscrapers and observing carefully, I noticed that the buildings along with the streets are so tall that leaded to the illusion that the streets seem narrow. Therefore, I come up with a guess that the designs of mirrors are used to reflect the views which can widen the field of vision of the streets. And, there is another possibly reason that, undoubtedly, mirrors never failed to make these building modern and fashionable!

  To me, the mirror-covered buildings are amazing, so I choose the pictures of one of them, which reflect the cloudy sky completely, which even made itself almost invisible with the background of the sky.

  On the other side, it was easy for us to realize that there are still many historical constructions here, including the library and the fountain I mentioned before. And, that is why I think Philadelphia is charming and absorbing. It contains constructions from different layers of times, and combines them into entire scenery of the city without any abruptness.

Conclusion

  Every city has its only styles—they may historic, artistic, modern or cultural. But there are still a number of differences between the cities that are shares the similar styles. Moreover, most of the cities have more than one style, such as Philadelphia. Thus, every city has its own uniqueness, and I have to admit that the uniqueness of Philadelphia attracts me a lot!