Oklahoma

Been away from home for a little bit for a business trip. This time work brought me to Oklahoma City in Oklahoma. To my surprise, the weather was extremely mild and apparently, it was the perfect time to visit Oklahoma.

The hotel was right at the downtown Oklahoma City. It was quite pleasing as there is a park next door. Having the sound of bird chirping in the city is a refreshing feeling.

And the cranes raising up in the city contrasts the chirping of birds; the building going up will be a 50+ stories skyscraper.

Even though the hotel I stayed was not brand new, the rooms were very comfortable with very new bed covered by down-filled pillow-top mattress and down-filled pillows.

Food in Oklahoma was also another pleasant surprise. I was not expecting a high quality steak house that serves juicy steaks in all sorts of cuts and preparation styles. Even though it was very expensive, it was good to try it out not knowing when will I have another chance.

Bricktown is one of the entertainment districts in Oklahoma City. It is just right in downtown Oklahoma City. Here is a baseball stadium in Bricktown.

A different entrance of the Ballpark. There are lots of sculpture around the downtown area including Bricktown. Seems like people who live here enjoy culture.

Wall art on brick walls seems to be quite popular in Bricktown.

There is something nice about neon signs and the light it casts on brick buildings. Bricktown has some of the older buildings in Oklahoma City and it is full of characters.

Doesn’t the old white on black signage on brick buildings look very 30′s?  I enjoyed a lot of this retro feel in Bricktown.

Another photo of neon sign and the old style signage on a brick building in Bricktown.

I love underpass like this one.  On top is a railway and underneath is where cars and pedestrians go across.

And the underpass is very well lit so there is no need to worry about suspicious people lurking around.

Hopefully no one ever fall into the waterway after drinking in the pubs and restaurants around the waterway.

And the same waterway in daytime. Isn’t this a lovely place with no congestion whatsoever?

Here are some more photos of Bricktown during daytime. This building looks like an old warehouse, now some of the windows are boarded up.

Oklahoma City is also known for the wind. It is windy pretty much all year long and it can fly a flag of this size. This is the OKC Thunder flag.

What is OKC Thunder? It is the NBA Team of Oklahoma City.

The client actually invited us to the game on the day before we left Oklahoma City. It was my first time watching a NBA basketball game live.

There is the start of the game.

The weather there was sunny and windy, very mild and extremely comfortable. Though I was told that in the summer it gets very hot (100 °F).

Just before we headed back to Vancouver, we visited the Oklahoma City National Memorial.

The tragedy happened on April 19, 1995. You can read about the details here.

The Oklahoma City National Memorial was built to remember the tragedy. There are two dark walls, one on each end of the memorial.

One of the walls marked 9:01, the other marked 9:03. The walls are connected by a man-made water stream. The bombing happened at 9:02 during the day.

There were a lot of casualty including adults and children. These chair like monument symbolized those who were there during the bombing.

If you ever visit Oklahoma City, this is a good place to spend some time to observe the significance of the impact of the tragedy. There is also a museum next door to the Memorial in case you like to learn more about what happened.

Didn’t really have a lot of time to visit the Myriad Botanical Gardens, it looks like a lovely park though.

This looks like an old bus stop to me, don’t you think so?

The downtown of Oklahoma City looks very peaceful even at rush hour. There is just no comparison between this and Vancouver downtown.

There are a lot of public facilities in Oklahoma City, like the Cox Convention Center that hosts a lot of events.

Apart from working and getting to know Oklahoma City, I also got a chance to find the latest gadget…

Related posts:

• Cherry Blossoms at Marpole Part 2
• American Eagle
• Cherry Blossom, the last wave
• Clouds
• iPhone 4 Photography 2
• iPhone 4 Photography 3
• Photo Book by Apple