The Long Weekend and the longer Long Post

This was a holiday weekend and somehow I managed to pack every day with unprecedented amounts of fun. On Friday night there was a gallery walk in Oakland, California which I attended alone and fell in love....with the East Bay! Oakland is this amazing amalgam of the post-industrial + Victorian architecture that I miss from Cincinnati AND palm trees! Couple that with a representative group from every ethnicity and social group I've ever known and you have thriving, rithing, awesome Oakland. Too bad I forgot my camera!

So I'll move on to Saturday:

Well again all by myself, I decided to go back to Oakland to watch the Spain game but the bar there was empty. During a mad dash back to Berkeley Lisa Daye called, who is an intern at another firm, and invited me to watch the game with her and her friends. Lucky for me Lisa was at a favorite place, that old Irish cafeteria that was featured in last week's post. So over a heaping plate of turkey ala king we watched the game Brennan's cafeteria style.

Lisa worked in Spain for two years and is obsessed with soccer, she was a national player to watch while in high school and then blew her knee out. She doesn't lament her short-lived soccer fame because if she had kept playing soccer she would never have found landscape architecture and hence never have gone to Spain.

I was also accompanied by a newly engaged couple, the woman was American but born in Spain and the man was from Chile, so they were rooting for opposite teams and oscillated between taunting each other and checking on each other. Cute.



Spain won. Much to our Chilean friend's ire! After that Lisa invited me to a wild dance party in the Mission in SF, of course I said "Let's go!" but first I had an important mission to accomplish.



This tiny kitten is my co-worker's and I was charged with giving him eye medicine while she was in Tahoe. It was a pleasure as he and his brother are adorable and very well-read.



See you later kitties, hello San Francisco!









It was indeed a wild dance party at another gay bar and my new friend Lin Feng was in attendance. Lin is at Cornell and we've just hit it off famously probably because we are both quiet nerds at heart.



There were some other landscape architects but I really hit it off with this guy Brian Green who I must have been vaudeville partners with in a past life:



All the guys were going to some other parties and Lisa and I were hungry so she took me to her favorite burrito place. Which by the way would be anyone's favorite burrito place because each bite of these succulent, soft, spicy burritos is like a little piece of heaven.





My idea of what a burrito 'is' was shattered and a new pure defintiion was born and I will never be the same. Wish I could send you all one express mail.

Sleep.

The next day was the 4th of July and Shannon suggested that I come down to Sausalito to see the fireworks on her intern house boat. Houseboat?! Yes. Not only that but in order to reach the houseboat one is required to take a ferry that passes by all the notable San Fransisco landmarks like Coit Tower, Alcatraz, and the Golden Gate Bridge. Ferries have always been one of my preferred modes of transportation so this was a delight.





Here is the Golden Gate bridge peaking out of the typical San Fransisco fog.



As we approached Sausalito the landscape and houses became very European looking with ornately decorated houses, lots of stone work, and houses built into the cliff face.






According to Wikipidea the origin of the city name is..."Sausalito (from Spanish: sauzalito "small willow grove", from sauce "willow" + collective derivative -al meaning "place of abundance. In 2000 it had a population of 7,000" It is a very small, beautiful place to live that seems to be a mix of old hippies whose family had property there before the Golden Gate Bridge was built and really affluent people. The house boats looked like they belonged to the former group but we saw a For Sale sign on one and it was $325,000. So...

Here is the gangway to Shannon's boat and other house boats along the route.









The colorful houseboats were only surpassed by the gorgeous plants and oddities on site.










It was a sunny day so we decided to go for a quick hike, the landscape here is really different it's called a Chaparral landscape which consists of drought resistant scrubby evergreens. Then by the areas with more water are Eucalyptus groves whose scent makes everything smell fresh and clean.





The hike culminated in a dream come true, I saw the Pacific Ocean for the first time. Compared to the glassy green and sandy yellow beaches from the Gulf in Floridia, which are the beaches I'm most familiar with, these beaches are much darker. Browns and navy blues are the dominant colors which gives the beach a cool, moody feel. It was beautiful.







Back at the houseboat I went kayaking with Shannon's friend Jeff who just moved here from Hawaii and then the rest of the night was spent cooking and celebrating with the South Korean interns on the boat. South Korea has similar drinking culture to the United States and the interns taught us a friendly game called 'Korean Game of Death.'







Amidst cries of confusion from all of the Americans, "Wait the Americans do not understand the rules!" the Koreans tried to teach us the game. We played and lost repeatedly which had Shannon and I begging for mercy a few rounds in. ( I finally understand it a day later and you all will soon be subjected to the 'Korean Game of Death' at our next family BBQ)

Thankfully, we were quickly saved by the fireworks which we all watched from the boat's veranda. As the fireworks were going off I looked around and was struck by all the smiling faces, we were all mostly strangers to each other, half of us were from different countries and we were all having a wonderful time together. A hodgepodge group of new friends from different cultures is about the best I could ask for to celebrate the 4th of July and my cultural ideals of the US. Of course I missed everybody in Ohio, Texas, and Minnesota and I hope you all had a great 4th of July.

Today was all about a solo tour of San Fransico which included Lombardi Street, Coit Tower, Little Italy (North Beach) and China Town. A bakery in Chinatown provided another life altering food experience with the most flaky and eggy egg custard ever made!


At Coit Tower one of the water fountains struck me as very nostalgic and familiar. That's because it was made in Cincinnati and is the same type of water fountain used in Eden Park. These fountains are one of my favorite things about Cincinnati so if they are here, I guess I can just stay forever.




Wishing everyone a week full of laughter and great food. Love you all.