Culture: Libraries

I have always been a book worm.  The most memorable moment of my first trip to New York was my mother taking me to Barnes & Noble.  She left me there for a couple of hours while she went shopping and told me not to leave the bookstore.  I was 12 years old and I hardly heard her leave.  The library was my favourite place at school and Mr Berube the librarian my favourite person.  I learnt most of my big life lessons from reading.  In the last couple of years though my reading patterns have changed.  Due to the shocking lack of good bookstores in Hong Kong I have started reading on a Kindle.  It is starting to worry me that I can foresee a future where there will only be e-books.  That my children, if ever I have any, will not know the smell of a book store or a library.  I came across these pictures of beautiful libraries from around the world, and I really hope that these are not a dying breed of buildings.