Accompanied by the first sun rise of the new year, we visited the Alamo and River Walk in San Antonio. The Alamo was home to both Revolutionaries and Royalists during Mexico's ten-year struggle for independence. Construction began on the present site in 1724. The military — Spanish, Rebel, and then Mexican — continued to occupy the Alamo until the Texas Revolution.
The site is less than 300 years old but is called "historical interest". Suddenly, I realized a 5000 years' history had long been neglected by my narrow mind. What a fortune! I hated history classes since I was very young. What a shame to neglect such a fortune... An interesting finding in Alamo was a stone tablet from a Japanese historian. It recorded a historical event in the Alamo. All the words were written in classical Chinese. :)
River Walk is a much more romantic place compared to the Alamo. There are restaurants, shopping centers, bars along the bank. Historically, it didn't look like this in the beginning. City planners struggled over what to do with the river while large debates rang among the people. One man, an architect named Robert H. H. Hugman proposed a plan that would turn the area into a beautiful urban park with apartments, dinning, shopping, boat rides and walk ways lit with old-fashioned street lamps. He wanted it to be just as if one were walking in Venice, Italy. After convincing city officials and business leaders of the financial benefits of his plan, the dream became a reality and River Walk pours nearly $800 million a year into the local economy. What a clever...
The tour guide showed us an amazing view where a tree was growing through the rocks on the wall. It was tall, strong and still growing. Life can be so tough!
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