Category: Places

San Francisco: Adventures in Japantown and Baker Beach

“The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco” – Mark Twain

This cliched quote by my favorite author kept echoing in my head during my stay. I got out of the car after my interesting journey south from Humboldt and Redwood land, through Sonoma and Marin and finally across the nighttime Golden Gate. I closed the car door and immediately found my black jacket to shelter myself from the P.M. winds. I then thought that the coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco. After being reminded of this, I scrambled to put my jacket on and then lift up and secure my bulky backpack, and was ready take on this city for the next few days.

I did enjoy the somewhat hot sun during the following daytime hours that was contrasted by the heavy and inconsistent breezes. We took a walk from North Beach to Japantown on my birthday, up and down many intense hills that were lined with flowers and colored concrete structures. We were obviously from out of town, because we did not know the secret routes to avoid such intense leg workout.

Japantown was quite interesting, I’ve never seen a mall that only had Japanese stores and restaurants.

I have also never seen such lovely looking plastic food.

And Keanu Reeves apparently liked it!

Another highlight was going to Baker Beach, a few days later. We walked through Chinatown in the almost-warm weather one day, past all of the crowded produce stores with buckets of Bok Choi and some other mystery vegetables not labeled in English, in our almost-beach clothing, to catch a bus to a northwestern corner of the city. The bus took us to new territories of San Francisco, driving past avenues that had a very high concentration of supermarkets and coffee shops all next to one another, in the greater area of the two to three-storied pastel urban residential structures.

Baker Beach had some interesting black-tinted brown sand, with bay waves splashing against it, and lots of dogs running around. This particular spot also had an excellent view of the Golden Gate Bridge, which at the beginning of the day appeared a strong red, but as we stayed until sunset, gradually turned into a maroonish color that was splashed with gold where the descending sun hit it.

The sunset landing over the Pacific Ocean was definitely something else, many different colors contrasting and complementing one another, turning the bridge and the distant rock formations and the hills of Marin county into misty, almost-illusional faded outlines. Though all the aesthetic scenery was overwhelming to the visual perspective, a huge part of the experience was the shivering winds and cool air that constantly harassed the physical comfort.

Humboldt County

Finally arrived, after our epic journey in the Honda Accord, to a place that was new to me but that I’ve heard of and visualized so many times: Arcata, Humboldt County, California.

First drove through, saw the many one-story and some two-story houses, and plants by the sidewalks blowing around and branches whipping against the oncoming ocean breeze. The center of the town was a main square surrounded on each side with little boutiques, cafes and bars. I heard this description in the past and now it came to life in front of my deranged eyes.

Our friend took us down to the beach, which had the wonderful Pacific rock formations that we had to climb down to really appreciate this ocean view.

We enjoyed sitting on the driftwood and being able to enjoy the not-too-hot weather after hours and hours of sitting in the car. We hiked up through the jagged rock edges and of course our shoes got filled with sand, all the while enjoying the interesting scenery of woods and rocks and shore.

We hiked through the uphill forest and saw dense vegetation complemented by thick slugs wrapped around shrubs. Walked through more diverse geological formations and more carved-out, shady forest trails to get to a very windy area in order to watch the extreme winds crash strong waves against the upstanding sea rocks.

Our second day there was all about the plants, indoors and outdoors. We hiked through the local Redwood park, which was a strange contradiction of old and new. There were insanely wide Redwood trunks that had obviously been logged, and then relatively new Redwoods growing strong all around them, tall but not as thick nor as mighty as their reduced ancestors.

The hike ended up leading us to Humboldt State University, where we explored the campus’ science facilities. This college apparently has a very advanced science program, since there is a huge greenhouse themed after the flora of different climates, whether jungle or desert or temperate.

This self-contained and pre-planned ecosystem was an interesting island within the midst of many different natural areas that surround in its few-mile radius. Different smells and textures from locations around the globe were brought together in this department’s laboratory. It was a pleasant surprise to me to bump into a mini flower conservatory in the middle of such a place.

Driving to Cali

For this year’s birthday, I took a trip down to Northern California, amongst new frontiers. I’ve seen the entrance into this part of the country driving south via I-5, through excessively trashy Redding, California, to extremely impressive Mount Shasta. This time, we took a new route that will always stand out to me.

My friend in Humboldt told my boyfriend and I of a girl who was driving down from Portland to Arcata, California. We found out that she bought a car, and was driving her old Rodeo truck and her new 1983 Honda Accord southward and westward, to where we wanted to be. We at first went along the familiar way down the greenery and mountainous territory of Oregon, from the clustered traffic jams on suspended freeway ramps, to get out of Portland during rush hour, through boring Salem and then through youthful Eugene. We stopped in Eugene, and then got back on the road and enjoyed the steep inclines and declines that this sprawl-less little city exhibits when it goes straight from the compact college town to lush rural and forested areas.

Strange rest areas came about southward, with little pregnant, mewing cats and passing-through people going to relieve themselves or stretch, checking you out to guess your story while you observe them to think of why they are in such a strange place on this freeway in the middle of nowhere. Driving down through exits I hardly recognized and hill formations I vaguely knew that I became impressed by in the past; it was so interesting to travel by car again. Trapped in the city I usually am, bound by my bicycle and Trimet transit services, put off by flat tires or expired transfers. My boyfriend and I switched off driving sessions, accelerating and decelerating, hitting the brakes and the gas, and changing CDs.

Pass on through California through new territory, and get that friendly inter-state inspection of police officers asking if you have any fruits, vegetables or produce in your vehicle.

Magically, once you cross the Oregon-California border, all of the clouds go away and the sun starts shining!

Through new mountains, new pine trees and new rock formations that resemble Oregon but are highlighted differently by the obvious sunshine. Trying to decide if this territory actually looks different from back home or if my perspective has become tainted by the drab, constant overcast. Forward through the Redwood Forests, not sure if I’ve ever seen a Redwood in the past, but now sure that I do see them passing by on the left and right of my vision out of the simple white station wagon.

Down to the coast, through Crescent City, meet the 101 Pacific Highway and continue on. See the sunny and sandy and windy ocean beaches full of humans and leashless dogs that no one really tells you about, or what a foreigner would initially think of California to be like. Keep the window cracked a little, keep the CD selection diverse, follow the girl in the Rodeo truck in front of us to finish our temporary western odyssey.

Visiting the Capital

Today I went to Salem, Oregon, to get a few documents notarized. This journey started out by us taking the MAX Light Rail to the Greyhound station downtown and waiting in a long line of tired people, before they let us know that there were no reservations under either of our names even though my boyfriend had booked the ticket the previous night.

So we then walked to Powell’s Books and sat in the cafe and managed to luckily find a rideshare off craigslist. It was fortunate that I brought my laptop! We sat there for a while and read and zoned out a bit and drank some Jasmine tea. All the while I was trying to figure out my way of getting to Arcata, CA, next week, and possibly extending my flight back here from New York, neither of which I’ve successfully completed yet.

The ride was not bad. The rest of the people were going to Eugene. I’m familiarizing myself a little more each time with I-5 South, passing places like Tigard and Lake Oswego, which were in the past a bunch of unassociated names. The driver was nice, she passed the exit of her town, Canby, and told us how she grew up on a farm there, and how Canby is just a bunch of churches, fast food places and a few gas stations. We drove through the plains of farmlands and passed random exit signs.

When we finally got to the outskirts of Salem, we talked about how it resembled so many outskirts of American cities we have seen in the past and will see in the future. The men in the car talked about their hiking trips in the woods of Montana or North Carolina, and having shock after entrance upon these anywhere locations in the USA.

It was raining heavily when we were dropped off by Capital Street. We walked by the buildings labeled by their respective bureaucracies, whether they were transportation, taxes, and finally to human services or whatever it was called. We had a productive time of walking down the dim, marble halls, finding the office and finally getting our documents stamped and signed and sealed with a gold Oregon state sticker. We then got to wait at a bus stop outside this building and stare at the Oregon state capital building, which I’ve passed on the Greyhound bus before. A bunch of school children who were on a field trip there were exiting the capital and boarding the yellow school buses, and they did not seem too interested.

We took an express bus from Salem to the Wilsonville Transit Center, where we got on a WES commuter train. I had never even seen one of these trains before, let alone ride one. We passed through some rural areas which were either green and vast or recently developed with ugly suburban houses that all looked the same. On we rode to the Beaverton Transit Center, where we hopped on the MAX, and rode it to downtown Portland, over the bridge, past the Rose Quarter Convention Center and finally to the 6 bus. This whole ride was about 2.5 hours.

It was reassuring to come back to Portland with our documents finally officialized. I hope I will not ever return to Salem again.

Wintery Times in Poland

When I think of my trip to Krakow and Lesser Poland, the main emotion I retain from that short time is being freezing.

I remember taking an overnight bus from Prague with my class/dorm mates, being woken up by the border patrol authorities, and then getting there at some ungodly hour in the morning, driving around half awake and less than half conscious, circling through some never-ending plains with distant dark vines scattered around, all caked up and encrusted in snow, with white, indistinguishable clouds on top, all while white flurries were occasionally coming down from the sky to really rub this in.

Auschwitz

To make things even darker in this midst of cold weather, the first destination on our trip was Auschwitz, the old concentration camp.

Our male tourguide spoke very slowly with a thick accent, and told us of treacherous death facts and statistics while showing us off to these awful cellar areas where humans were crammed in like mistreated cattle. He also showed us a room completely full of cut-off human hair displayed behind glass. As we were shivering in our thick coats and lined boots and knit hats and mittens and Turkish scarves, we were shown to the clothes of these prisoners, which consisted of flat wooden clogs and shoddy pajamas full of holes. A lot can be said about this, but I will just describe it as creepy, and even though I was amongst some of my closet friends, no one talked or made eye contact with one another. We all just stared at the ground and observed the footsteps making grey patterns in the white snow.

Out of this strange universe, we were driven to Krakow. A female guide showed us to the old Jewish neighborhood, which was somewhat sad that there were no Jews living there any more, but not quite as sad as our previous spot. The buildings were all toned in shades of grey, whether a bit brown or green, and the old menorahs and stars of David were now blanketed in snow that would gradually drop off and be replaced with more snow.

We were shown to the Royal Castle on Wawel Hill, where we got to look down upon the rest of the city and see the precipitation being residually placed on all of the rooftops.

Further down the walk, we bundled up more and more, buttoned the topmost buttons on our inner and outer layers, and were led to Jag University, one of the oldest schools in Europe, and then to many many sites of churches, seeing pictures and statues of the pope and Jesus all over the place, standing strong in a static state against the elements.

I was the most excited to head to the shopping square in Old Town, where I was finally able to buy some thick, itchy wool socks that could hike up to my knees, as my feet were frozen solid. I would also think about some of my imagined ancestors in this land I actually liked in a weird way.

Trip to Seattle

This weekend I did a mini-excursion up to Seattle. We found a ride off craigslist and drove up through the cloudy greenery from the Oregon border of the Columbia River up through Washington State.

I’m getting to know this three-hour drive a little better each time I go through it. I know we pass through a suburban sprawl area around and north of Vancouver, WA, and then enter an area of vast greenery with lots of RV truck lots on the sides. There is also some redneck sign that’s always standing strong half of the ride through, with a giant cartoon of Uncle Sam dressed in red, white and blue, which always displays some right-wing banter like “Guns, Glory and God: You Keep the Change!” I’m always excited to see what they have to say next. Then down the freeway is the long journey through Tacoma, with the domes and big box stores and malls all glorifying their own development with huge, colorful signs.

Getting to Seattle was fun. Upon entrance in the automobile, I always see the vaguely distinguished skyline with the Space Needle off to the left in the distance, with the beautiful water and hills; also the vast industrial lot of cranes, warehouses and cargo to the immediate left of I-5. The traffic always slows down upon entrance to Seattle’s outskirts, with people changing lanes and getting off and on and around the cluster of connecting roads.

Unfortunately the rainy weather followed us, but despite the clouds and precipitation, it was fun. I enjoy the walk from the Capitol Hill district downhill to the downtown area, past the skyscrapers and to the convention center. I like the faster-paced urban experience and passing some landmarks that I vaguely remember from times before, be it a bleak Greyhound station or a funny pink elephant car wash, to the back and forth journeys of the monorails.

Folklife, the festival I went to, was interesting. Got to walk in and out and above and around examples from lots of different places, seeing little kids kicking off traditional Cossack dances to people playing strange Asian instruments I’ve never seen before but vaguely recognized in some background music I’ve certainly heard at some point in my life.

Folklife had lots of crust punk bands playing washboards and walking their dogs, and some older people strumming guitars and patting wooden boxes to bluegrass beats on benches.

We checked out the urban scene too of course, shopped around at bookstores and record stores, ate at the fine eateries that had pescatarian and ovo-lacto vegetarian versions of Pad Thai, and even a place that prided itself on its New York style pizza, full of illustrations and photographs of good ol’ New York. Rode the city buses and observed the different looks and accents and attitude of different people.

The ride back was nice and sunny. These three hippie girls picked us up in Seattle, who were doing some farm training workshop up at Orcas Island. Back we journeyed to Portland, and everything looked so much different with the golden touch from above. Back down south through the little bridges over the regional rivers to the large bridge over the Columbia River, back to Portland yet again.

Waiting for Summer

It has been very rainy lately. I’m looking forward to summer but this constant rainfall and teasing so-called “sunbreaks” really make it seem like a distant imaginary thing rather than something that will be spur of the moment. Someone told me before that the real summer of the Northwest really starts after the Fourth of July weekend, but I was in denial because it was so nice around this time last year.

I have a few summer plans I’d like to turn into reality. I’m supposed to head up to Seattle for the Northwest Folklife Festival this Saturday. Hopefully I’ll be able to make it happen, and hopefully the clouds will finally give us a break. I went last year and it was an eventful time of marching around a new city and seeing a variety of musical acts and dancers I would never expect in the same place, all conglomerated under the Space Needle.

I’m also trying to decide what to do for my birthday in mid-June. There’s a concert I want to see in the Bay Area, plus I have a lot more friends there than I do here, but there are supposed to be some fun things going on around Portland as well. I suppose that is a good problem to have!

I talked to a couple friends recently and also may have some visitors crashing at my place this summer, which is always fun. It gives you an excuse to step out of your routine and actually check out the city you live in but take for granted.

I’ll also be going to New York from June 30-July 13. New York City is a wonderful place in the summer, maybe crowded and full of car fumes and hot concrete, but definitely also full of enhanced delight from the millions of people who wait so long all year to have the sun.

I want to try to make it up to Binghamton, NY, where I went to school. I spend most of my time in NYC whenever I’m back on the East Coast, but I’m most nostalgic for my past summer drives up Route 17, where you finally get out of greater suburban New York and into upstate, from Bear Mountain, then past Orange County, along the Catskill Mountain borders, cutting through the little fishing villages on the bridges over the gushing river. I’d like to test what I actually remember from that drive, from the strange names of towns like Downsville and Fishs Eddy, the Beaver-something Log Cabins all beautifully situated on a grassy incline, the bleak-looking factory town of Deposit, and then an entrance into Broome County, under a highway overpass, where the surrounding hills would magically get shorter, the skies darker and cloudier and the air more humid, until you voyage into its post-industrial decaying city of Binghamton, a strange place of so many of my memories for better or worse.

Well, the sun just came out…

Chiapas

I think everyone who has traveled through Chiapas has definitely left with an impression. I went to San Cristobal de Las Casas when I was in Mexico, which is an old colonial city high up in the mountains. The city is well-lined with short, colorful buildings and cobblestone streets, and this structure makes its way up several tall hills at which you can get a crazy view of the roads and structures and beyond.

San Cristobal is populated mostly by Mayans who speak their native language instead of Spanish. Many of the women make money by walking around town and carrying about 20 scarves on their shoulders, 50 necklaces wrapped around one hand, and hand-crafted skirts stacked on top of the other, all while carrying an infant in a sling on their backs. The other major demographic of this town was clusters of foreign hippies, sporting their rainbow hemp wear and dreadlocks, who looked like they were likely of American or European origin.

We took a shared minibus out to some interesting church a few miles outside of San Cristobal to a little city. On the drive there, we would pick up people off the side of the streets who were flagging down the vans, and then drop other people off at their respective rural residencies while they would take live chickens out of the van’s trunk during their departure. We went to the little town and saw the famous strange church from the outside. We entered the hyped- up madness, and there were pine branches and needles scattered all over the floor, along with a few people crouched down on the ground either lighting small, white several candles or drinking Coca Cola and going into some inverted prayer trance. All the while, some plastic children’s toys were playing single-key Christmas songs and there were even some electric Christmas lights lit up. Apparently they sacrifice chickens at this church, but fortunately we missed that.

While I was staying around Palenque, another part of Chiapas, we also had a shared bus excursion to some waterfalls. On the way, the locals stop you and little children press their faces up against the glass and try to sell you their bananas. The waterfalls represented what I’ve seen in the Columbia Gorge in Oregon, except in hot and humid jungle settings rather than cloudy temperate rainforest settings.

Riding Around Town

Portland can be a very pleasant city to ride around on bicycle. One of the reasons I decided to move here was because I would not have to buy a car. Sure there is public transport, but the city is set up especially nice for biking, and you do not have to squish against some unpleasant people.

Riding is especially fun when it is actually nice out and you are not being massacred by the thunderless rain, trying to keep your plastic hood shelled over your head by working against the force of the wind.

I think my favorite ride in Portland is from my house to the St Johns neighborhood via Willamette Boulevard. This is a long street that goes along the carved out road on the cliffs viewing the Willamette River down below. On part of this ride, you get an opportunity to see the hills of Forest Park on the West Side of the river. When you look at Forest Park from this perspective, you get a greater view on how the short trees change according to the season, whether light green in spring or deep green in summer, or red and brown in fall or naked in winter, against the pines that firmly stand forever tall and deeply green. You also get a wonderful view of downtown Portland, in a way that is always distantly hazy, and you can see the small and vague skyline, the fields of industrial, white warehouses, the Union Pacific tracks and the assortment of notable bridges.

Once you pass the university of Portland part, you are then in a largely residential area full of gridded small houses that usually have assorted yard sales in the warmer months. Further down, you begin to see the top of the minty green St John’s Bridge in the air from the distance, knowing you are approaching your destination.

The St John’s Bridge is especially scenic to ride under and look at the symmetry. It is situated above Cathedral Park, which is a manicured grassy field with loopy paths that take one straight downhill into the Willamette River shore. Though I would not recommend swimming in this river, some people do in fact enjoy it.

The St Johns neighborhood is a satisfying place to finally lock up your bike, full of friendly small businesses and casual strollers during the daytime hours. I’m fortunate that I live close enough to but far enough from St John’s to enjoy my journey and destination at a somewhat short reach.

Cannon Beach

I think Cannon Beach, Oregon is one of the most gorgeous places on the Pacific Coast. Maybe it isn’t all Beach Boys surfer ecstasy or beefy men working out on Venice Beach, but it definitely has its own thing going on. The rock formations are certainly one of the best parts of Cannon Beach, I’ve never seen anything like these on the Atlantic Ocean.

I love how in Oregon the forest goes up until the coast, where it ends right before the sand. Really tall, old pine trees make the best compliment to the yellow sandy shores and the clear blue water’s incoming waves. I feel like anywhere you go around here is some crazy pristine nature experience where you realize human architecture and city lights can never quite top the aesthetic potential the earth has.

I went to Cannon Beach last week, and though I had to bundle up a little, it was really enjoyable. I went there last summer for a few hours, and though it was incredibly beautiful, it was quite cloudy, hazy and humid. This time, it was clear and crisp and of course breezy, but not crowded because it was not high season, and the ocean was a lovely stark blue contrast below the sky’s subtle blue tone.

On the actual beach part, the windy, salty cool air was another appropriate contrast to the soft and hot sand on the ground.