Bad lucks all come together

I'm stuck here now. I went to Guangzhou the day before for my visa interview, but I didn't get it. I was told that they need a background check on me even though I have been in and out of US for about 10 times with no background check needed before. I think the consular decided not to give me the visa even before he interviewed me. I don't know how long exactly the background check can take, I heard it could take up to 3 months or even longer, so I won't be able to go back to US right now. My work, my house, my life ...

My flight for coming back to Shanghai was delayed today, I waited for over 4 hours at the airport. All other flights coming back to Shanghai are on time except for mine. I finally got home at midnight.

I got diarrhea last night. It's not a very good feeling while you are having diarrhea on the airplane.

I'm mentally and physically very tired now. :(

Barbary Coast Trail (7) -- Bank of Canton

The next stop on the map is Bank of Canton, which is located at 743 Washington Street (between Grant Avenue & Kearney Street). It took us quite some time to find it, because it's not Bank of Canton any more. In 2002, United Commercial Bank acquired Bank of Canton of California. That's why we kept passing the bank without noticing it until finally we matched the address of the bank.


The former Bank of Canton

The pagoda-like building on the corner of Grant Avenue and Washington Street is formerly occupied by the Bank of Canton. It was built in 1909 as the Chinatown telephone office. From 1894 to 1949 there was a Chinese language telephone service which operated independently of the central San Francisco exchange; calls were put through manually. In 1847 the first San Francisco newspaper, the "California Star", was printed here.

Barbary Coast Trail (6) -- Golden Gate Fortune Cookie Factory

San Francisco Chinatown is the largest Chinatown outside of Asia. Even though I'm Chinese, I have never really walked around Chinatown. So it's a great opportunity for me to explore the oldest and one of the most historic Chinatowns this time. Established in the 1850s, SF Chinatown has been featured in popular culture, such as in film, music, photography, and literature. To me, the Chinatown doesn't look like anywhere in modernized China, it only looks similar to those scenes I've seen in the movie which talks about China at the beginning of the 20th century. I guess there is not much change to Chinatown after it's built at the gold rush time, amazing!

There are all kinds of shops in Chinatown, I think you can get whatever you want here, from small daily use stuff like bowls or hair product to expensive watches or jewelries. What attracts people to shop here is that most of the stuff sold here are very cheap comparing to other stores' price. Since everything is made in China, I guess those store owners have their exclusive sources to import the goodies with a very cheap price. H bought a nice wooden Samurai sword for only 10 bucks. He carried it in his backpack with the sword head sticking out of the backpack. He looked like a Ninja to me for the rest of the day. :P

SF Chinatown History Timeline



In Chinatown, beside the Barbary Coast Trail bronze medallion, there is also this kind of Chinatown bronze sign embedded in the sidewalk. (My feet are not included with the sign. :P) Following this sign, we arrived at Rose Alley.



Here, tucked inside a storefront on tiny Ross Alley, some 20,000 fortune cookies a day are handmade by two women, each manning a conveyor belt of what look like miniature waffle irons. The factory opened in August 1962, and though there are other fortune cookie bakeries in the city, this is the only one where the cookies are still made by hand, the old-fashioned way.

Lost

A couple of days ago, I went to People's Square to meet some friends. I went there a little early so that I can walk around myself. It was Sunday, so there were many people on the square, young people making out on the park bench, kids rollerblading on the square, foreigners walking in and out of the Shanghai museum. It's very humid, hot and cloudy that day. Sky was pure grey the whole day.

I used to come to People Square a lot. My grandparent's house was only about a few blocks away from People Square, I came to visit them often when I was a little kid with my parents. But now their old house is replaced by a very expensive high rise building where no kid-memory was kept there. When I was in high school, I had to take bus to school everyday because my parent's house is very far from my high school. It's so far that we didn't have direct bus line from my home to the school, so I had to transfer at People Square. The bus is always always crowded. I remembered there are a few times that I tried to get off the bus, I squeezed myself out of the crowd to get to the door, but my big backpack was still stuck in the crowd behind me. I had to use all my strength trying to pull it out, a couple of times the straps was completely pulled broken off from the backpack.

I was walking around absently by myself with all the memories flashing back in front of my eyes. People were chatting, kids were screaming and laughing, buses were honking. I was surrounded by all kinds of noises. Suddenly I felt very lonely and lost.

Every time I come back to visit, I feel lost. Not that I don't know the streets any more, it's just that I don't feel I belong to here -- the place where I spent my childhood and youth. It's a weird feeling, I feel like I belong to nowhere, I don't feel this is my home, even though my parents are still living here. But I also don't feel that US is my home, because I don't have a family or root there. It is a very scary feeling, you feel yourself so tiny, and the tiny you can't find your spot in such a big universe. You were like a microorganism, floating in the air while nobody knows and cares.

Where do I belong to? Where is my spot?

Barbary Coast Trail (5) -- Old St. Mary’s Cathedral

Erected six years after the beginning of the Gold Rush. Towering over the corner of Grant Avenue and California Street is Old St. Mary's Cathedral, the first cathedral built in California, 1854. Just a block-and-a-half from the Chinatown Gate, Old St. Mary's also hosts a popular series of lunchtime classical chamber music concerts Tuesdays and Thursdays.

Old St. Mary's was designed by architects William Craine and Thomas England, who followed the instructions of the church's Bishop, Joseph Sadoc Alemany, to replicate a cathedral in his hometown of Vich, Spain. The new cathedral, built mostly with Chinese labor, had parapets on either flank, surmounted with embrasures and buttresses finished cut-stone pinnacles. Inside, a vaulted ceiling with groin arches rises above a Carrara marble altar imported from Rome.



The original plan included a steeple, but fear that an earthquake would send it toppling into the street led the designers to change the plans, leaving only a bell tower.

Granite, quarried in China, was used around the base of the structure to deflect rainwater, while bricks minted in New England for the outer walls came around Cape Horn as ship ballast.

In keeping with its tradition of community involvement, the church is home to several Twelve-Step groups and a vibrant gay and lesbian ministry, and holds a regular Saturday for Engaged Couples, a one-day, all-day series of presentations focusing the engaged couples' attention on the meaning of marriage from a Roman Catholic perspective.

Barbary Coast Trail (4) -- Union Square

As soon as we found the first Bronze Medallion, it is a lot easier for us to identify the rest. The medallions are actually everywhere along the trail path -- huge, shiny, nicely engraved, very easy to follow.


Bronze Medallion

Following the bronze medallion, the next visiting spot is Union Square, which locates at Powell and Post.

Union Square is the heartbeat of San Francisco itself -- ever changing, eternally celebrating, yet firmly rooted in its glorious past. Two years before the Gold Rush, in 1847, Jasper O'Farrell created a design for San Francisco, with Union Square as a public plaza. By the 1880s, it was a fashionable residential district, and in 1903, the towering monument was added, topped by the bronze goddess Victory, modeled after Alma de Bretteville Spreckels, known for her enormous influence in the San Francisco art community. After the great earthquake of 1906, Union Square became San Francisco's premier shopping district, and, by the 1930s, the site of the world's first underground parking structure. Today, as a result of an international design competition and a $25 million renewal, Union Square is reborn. It's the obvious place to meet, enjoy coffee, or just let the world go by. Featured are a large central plaza with a terraced performance state and lawn seating...four grand entrance corners bordered by signature palms...a café pavilion with outdoor seating...visitor information and ticketing services...and four magnificent light sculptures; and, of course, Victory, surveying the vitality of one of the world's great cities.


Union Square. Macy's is right next to union square, and Cheese Cake Factory is on the top floor of the building.

Across Powell Street from Union Square, there is St Francis Hotel, which is the first hotel build around Union Square. It was first built in 1905. But just one year after it's built, in 1906, the great earthquake and fire destroyed all builds around union square. St Francis hotel was rebuilt and expanded after that.


St Francis Hotel

Timeline of Union Square history

Barbary Coast Trail (3) -- Powell Street

The Cable car starting point is located at Powell and Market Street. I didn't really take Cable Car for visiting before; just like that I have stayed in Shanghai for so many years, I've never really been to the famous Yu Garden. 真是越近在眼前的东西越不怎么在意啊!

Until the day I walked the Barbary Coast trail, I just realized that I have been stupid for such a long time. I always thought that the cable car is just like the tram -- it is powered by the engine in the tram but runs along the rail. H was teasing me quite a lot on that. :P Now I learned that it runs by the cable underground. Of course, Cable car has to be run by Cable, literally, how stupid I was! The cable kept running underground all the time, the cable car just grabs the cable when it needs to run, and looses the grip and brakes when it needs to stop. It doesn't have a power inside at all! If you look closely between the gap of the rail, you can see the cable running underground. We did that a few times, staring at the ground to see how cable works, then people stopped next to us, trying to find out what we were looking at, they may wonder whether we found a gold mine there! :P A new gold rush age!

Cable car @ Powell street


It is also interesting to see how Cable car makes a U-Turn at the station. Since the rails (back and forth) are pretty close to each other, and cable car size is not small, it's kind of hard for Cable car to make a U-turn after it comes back to the station. So a big turning wheel with rail is built on the ground. The wheel's diameter is about the Cable car's size. And the rail is connected to the one side of rail first, when Cable car gets on the big wheel, the whole wheel will be turned certain degrees by human force, so that the rail will connect to the other side of rail and cable car can keep on going. It is pretty amazing to see how it works.

Walking along Powell street, there are very nice antique shops along the street. I love the window design there. Maybe I shall study to be a window designer.


The antique shop has lots of interesting stuff, like those very delicate carved elephant trunks, it looked to me like the very precious Chinese antiques. I wondered how they get those. By robbering or stealing from China during the Qing Dynasty?

In front of an antique shop.

Monkey A: Hear no evil
Monkey B: See no evil
Grace: Think no evil
Monkey C: Speak no evil

Vacation!

I'm going back to China for about two and a half weeks. Pity that blogspot is blocked there, also some of other my favorite sites. :( But I'll try to use remote desktop to access those. :P

正好又是吃大闸蟹的季节，兴奋中！

Barbary Coast Trail (2) -- Hallidie Plaza

Hallidie Plaza

Hallidie Plaza is located at Powell and Market Street. I always pass that area, but have never known it has a name before. The cable car station is right next to the plaza. Therefore there are lots of street vendors who are selling souvenirs to the tourists around the plaza.


Some street performers dancing around Hillidie plaza. Behind it, it's my favorite store -- Forever 21. (有装嫩之嫌 :P)

Bronze medallion

We walked around Hallidie plaza, watched the street performance, and browsed the souvenirs. Right while we were enjoying our moment, we suddenly remembered that we haven't seen one bronze medallion yet. So we started our search. We looked at the street corner, and went to check under each street vender's cart. We had no idea how it should look like and how big it should be. In my imagination, it's a small round yellow thing, kind of rusted and dusted, lying in some corner unnoticeable. We went to ask the street vender, hoping that they may have ever seen such a thing. Sadly no one has ever heard of it. We were about to give up, then I noticed there is this huge shiny thing lying in the middle of the walkway. I didn't even think that will be it because it's so big and shiny, and nicely engraved. It just looked too good to be true. But it has "Barbary Coast Trail" boldly and clearly carved on it, THAT'S IT -- our "Barbary Coast Trail" bronze medallion! 踏破铁鞋无觅处，得来全不费功夫！


The first bronze medallion we found，one arrow pointing to the way we come from, the other pointing to the way we need to go. Very clear instruction, excellent road guide, not like the rocks piled up by the rangers in the national park, this road sign will always give you a correct direction!

Andrew Hallidie

Andrew Hallidie is the father of the cable car. He promoted the first cable line in the world, the Clay Street Hill Railroad.

Andrew was born in London. His father held several patents for the manufacture of metal wire ropes. Hallidie had hurt his health through overwork, so he and his father visited California in 1852. Later his father returned to Britain Hillidie remained in California. Andrew Hallidie mined, surveyed, blacksmithed, and built bridges. He became the first person to make wire rope in California. He built many suspension bridges in northern California. His cables were critical elements of suspension bridges, mine hauling systems, and an endless cable ropeway for industrial purposes which Hallidie patented in 1867. An important feature of the ropeway was a "grip wheel", a driving sheave with clips around its perimeter to keep the cable from slipping. Hallidie later used the grip wheel on the Clay Street Hill Railroad.



Various stories claim that Hallidie conceived of the idea of the cable railway while watching horses struggle to haul cars up Jackson Street, from Kearny to Stockton Street. The horses had to be whipped cruelly. They would sometimes slip and be dragged back down the hill. This may be true, but Hallidie took over an existing proposal for a cable railway from Benjamin H Brooks, who had not been able to find financing for his plan. In any event, Hallidie built a model cable railway and obtained financing from three partners. He received his first cable car-related patent on 17-Jan-1871. He had surveyed California Street for his line, but decided that it would be less expensive to build on Clay Street, and that Clay Street came closer to the peak of Nob Hill and so would offer a better demonstration of the system. Hallidie and his partners worked hard to sell stock in the line and did not have much success. The line and the grip which bears Hallidie's name were designed by engineer William E Eppelsheimer. The franchise demanded that a test run take place no later than 01-Aug-1873. The first test run actually took place early in the morning on 02-Aug-1873, but the city did not void the franchise. Most accounts say that the first gripman hired by Hallidie looked down the steep hill from Jones and refused to operate the car, so Hallidie took the grip himself and ran the car down the hill and up again without any problems. The line started regular service on 01-Sep-1873 and was a financial success. Hallidie's patents, managed by a Cable Railway Trust, made him rich.

Barbary Coast Trail (1) -- US Mint (Mission + 5th)

The U.S. Mint is the starting point of the Barbary Coast Trail. It locates at Mission and 5th ave. When I first heard about U.S. Mint, I was wondering why mint is so important in American history, because I don't think many people like to eat mint except for mint flavored gum. :P 后来才得知，此mint非彼mint啊！Mint has another meaning which I've never known before -- mint can also be a verb, to make coins out of metals.



The United States Mint at San Francisco plays an important role in US's coinage. Although it does not currently produce circulating coins, it is the exclusive manufacturer of regular proof and silver proof coin sets that set the standard for numismatic excellence with their brilliant artistry, fine craftsmanship and enduring quality. With the California Gold Rush underway in 1849, the United States Mint was overwhelmed with the task of turning all that gold into coins. Also, transporting it all to Philadelphia for coining was both time-consuming and hazardous. So in 1850, President Millard Fillmore recommended that a branch of the United States Mint be established in California. Congress approved the plan in 1852, and the San Francisco Mint was born. In 1854, the San Francisco Mint opened its doors and began converting miners' gold into coins, producing $4,084,207 in gold pieces by December of that first year alone. The new mint soon outgrew the small brick building in which it was housed. In 1874 it moved to an imposing new facility, with walls of stone, resembling an ancient Greek temple. The Mint's production of coins was uninterrupted for 32 years, until the disastrous earthquake of 1906. Because the gas works were partially destroyed, operations stopped temporarily. But the beautiful, solidly constructed Mint building survived both the earthquake and the ensuing firestorm. In fact, the Mint was the only financial institution capable of operating immediately after the disaster and became the treasury for disaster relief funds, performing other emergency banking services as well. Coining operations resumed soon afterward and continued in this building until 1937, when Mint workers moved to a larger, more modern facility, the present United States Mint at San Francisco. Today, the United States Mint at San Francisco does not accommodate visitors, as all space is needed for personnel and machinery.

Barbary Coast Trail -- Preface

Before the trail starts, let’s review some history of San Francisco.

The City and County of San Francisco is the fourth-largest city in California and the fourteenth-largest in the United States. It is located on the tip of the San Francisco Peninsula and has traditionally been the focal point of the San Francisco Bay Area.

October 9, 1776, the Spanish became the first Europeans to settle in San Francisco, establishing a mission named for Francis of Assisi. With the advent of the California Gold Rush in 1848, the city entered a period of rapid growth. After being devastated by the 1906 earthquake and fire, San Francisco was quickly rebuilt and is today one of the most recognizable cities in the world.

Golden Gate Bridge


October 2000, Grace stepped on the land of San Francisco and started her career as a software engineer.

September 2006, Grace is still living in this area as a software engineer, but she discovered the Barbary Coast Trail and took a self guided tour. From that trail, she learned more things about San Francisco than what she has learned in the past 6 years! She starts to love this city more and more now!

Barbary Coast Trail

Have you ever known that there is a marked trail in the city of San Francisco? Well, I have never heard of that until about two weeks ago, even though I have been in the Bay Area for about 6 years now. And yes, it is called "Barbary Coast Trail"!

What is "Barbary Coast Trail"? And why is it so special to be mentioned here? If you are a curious person as I am, you may already have googled it! But here, I will tell you my own expierence of this "Barbary Coast Trail", first handed! ;)

The Barbary Coast Trail is a 3.8 mile walk through the heart of historic San Francisco. As a pathway to San Francisco's past, a series of bronze medallions and arrows embedded in the sidewalk connect the trail’s 20 historic sites, which are shown in the following map (click on the map to see the whole map).



You may wonder now how I got to know about this trail, since I'm one of those kind who need to read "History for Dummies". :P But I have resources other than reading about it myself. My dearest friend H was surfing online and happened to see an introduction of this trail. He told me about it, I'm not particularly interested in history, but one thing really interests me is that you have to follow the bronze medallions to guide through all 20 historic sites. Since all medallions are embedded in the sidewalk, there is a good chance that they can be blocked by the street vender's cart. So you have to really look for them when you walk along the trail. Since neither of us knows how this medallion looks like, plus I just finished "Angle and Demon", the whole thing sounds an adventure to me. So we decided to explore the trail.

【寻找上海】巨鹿路 (旧文）

【寻找上海】巨鹿路 于2006.03

小时候总是喜欢去外婆家，外婆家在巨鹿路一弄八号二楼。解放前，整栋房子都是外公的，文革时分给了好几家住户，好在外婆和邻里的关系都出得不错，还时不时和隔壁阿杜阿尼的姆妈及住在亭子间的张师母一起搓麻将，还记得他们最大的赌注就是两毛钱。

那时候喜欢去外婆家玩是因为有和我年纪差不多的表弟，会和表弟一起在天井里玩好人坏人的游戏，我总是争着做好人的。有的时候外婆会给零花钱让我和表弟去弄堂门口的小卖部买雪糕吃。记得弄堂门口还有一个老虎灶，好像是两分钱一瓶热水吧，谁家想要洗澡了就会去老虎灶泡开水。水房和厨房一样，都在楼下，是公用的。不过每家都有自己的煤气灶，一到吃饭时间厨房里就挤得不可开交，邻里之间各显身手，楼道里飘满了百家香。

后来房子拆迁，外公外婆就搬来和我父母一起住了。刚开始时他们旧时的邻居还来我们家看过外公外婆，又过了些年，大家都上了年纪，不怎么来往了，也就外婆偶尔会和他们通通电话。

我上大学时外公外婆都相继过时了，现在有时我还会想起他们，有时在梦中还会梦到巨鹿路一弄八号的老石窟门房子。只可惜那老房子早就不在了，取而代之的是一栋高楼。我也还是喜欢我记忆中的巨鹿路。

雨

今年的雨季似乎来得格外的早，才刚刚到10月份，就开始阴雨连绵了。年初的雨停得也比往年晚很多，夏天只有短短的两三个月，白白守着这么好一个游泳池和jacuzzi，整整一年只下了一趟水，可真有点辜负了住这么luxary apartment的房租了。

并不是很喜欢雨天，潮湿的气候总是令人心情不好，像天空一样灰蒙蒙的。唯一喜欢下雨的时候是在闷热的夏天午后，狂风大作，大颗大颗的雨点打在窗台上，并从未关紧的窗缝中延伸进来，溅上一桌子的水。那时最惬意的事就是躺在已经陈旧的发黑的竹席上睡午觉了。身下冰凉的竹席，身上裹着单薄的毛巾被，听着密集的雨点声，总能让人迅速进入梦乡去神游四方。一觉醒来雨停了，可以闻见空气中湿润的青草气息，令人神清气爽。屋外的建筑，树木，经过雨水的冲刷，显得格外的鲜明，似乎整个世界也变的美丽起来。

黄梅雨季是最让心烦的季节了。雨总是稀稀拉拉的下个不停，像小姑娘受到了小伙子的邀请，想要去dating，却扭扭捏捏的不给人一句痛快话，不如夏日午后的雷阵雨那样来得痛快淋漓。梅雨季节的天气十分闷热，即使刚洗过澡，也会觉得身上粘唧唧的，衣服总是贴着皮肤，很不爽，头发似乎也总是油的出水，恨不得全剃光了的好。晚上睡觉盖着被子，也觉得潮乎乎的，到处散发着一股霉味，也许叫做“黄霉雨季”更为恰当。

加洲是没有黄梅雨季的，夏天是旱季，自然也没有了夏日午后的雷阵雨。加州的雨总是在天气微凉的晚秋开始细细密密的下下来，延续一整个冬天，也使草地由夏天的枯黄转为初春的嫩绿。因为怕冷，所以不喜欢冬雨。冬雨给人一种极其萧瑟的感觉，每当想起冬雨，出现在眼前的就是这样一幅画。大雨下在偌大一个空空旷旷的停车场上，到处白花花的一片，几棵小树撑着光秃秃的枝杈孤零零的矗立在停车场上，让人觉得手脚冰凉，不尽想把冬衣裹紧再裹紧。

晚秋的雨却是另有一番情趣。喜欢散步在晚秋雨中的林荫道上，因为有树叶挡着，不怎么会淋湿，只是偶尔会有在树叶上聚积的大滴雨点落入脖子，冰的让人不禁打一个寒颤。走累了在树下稍稍停留，深吸一口气闻闻青草的香味，缓缓吐出可以看见嘴前的那片白雾，知道是深秋了。街上积了水，如果是傍晚，可以看见倒映在水中的街灯，橙橙黄黄，影影烁烁，十分美丽。只可惜加州基本上只有冬夏两季而没有什么秋天的，趁着冬天来临前好好享受这秋雨吧！