Seeking An Extraordinary Life - A Travel Journal

Labels: las vegas, Nevada, San Francisco

Unexpectedly PJ gives me today off as well, so I spend the morning shopping the thrift stores for clothes with Sharon, one of my fellow longtimers from the hostel. The thrift stores (charity shops for those back home) in San Francisco are amazing - huge and well-stocked with genuinely good quality clothing, and the prices compare very well. Goodwill are the nationwide chain, but in San Francisco there are also several stores owned by Out of the Closet, which have still better clothing (although it's generally a little pricier) and give most of their profits to Aids research.

In the afternoon I go with Jennifer, a recent arrival at the Adelaide, to a potluck thrown by the local group of Couch Surfers. It's an organisation similar to Servas which I already belong to - both of them provide a connection between travellers and hosts who will provide them with free accomodation. Couch Surfers is rather more laidback and anarchic, and the crowd contains several Burners among other interesting individuals. I plan to create a Couch Surfer profile in the not-too-distant future, as there are many members scattered across the countries I'll be visiting.

In the evening I gather a small crowd and we go to Swig for a last night out. It's my first time in this bar which is just round the corner from the hostel, and I regret not having been in sooner - it's a cool, dark but welcoming space with a long bar and comfortable sofas, and tonight they have wonderful live blues music. We drink and talk, I take a couple of turns on the dancefloor and turn out to be gratifyingly less awful than I would have expected, the evening rolls by. Finally, with the crowd thinning, we retire to the hostel dining room until we can't stay awake any longer.

Labels: couch surfers, out of the closet, San Francisco, servas, swig, thrift stores

Back again after another blogging break, and it's just two full days to go before I leave San Francisco. On Monday I'll be flying out to see Deidre, my surrogate big sister in Las Vegas, baby!

Labels: garlic restaurant, restaurant, San Francisco, stinking rose

So, it's been a little while since my last update. Frankly, I just haven't had much to talk about, and more than that I've felt that I needed a bit of a break from thinking about the blog - all part of my rest and recovery period. Just a few brief things to report.

Had another great acrobatics lesson last week, I've definitely made progress on my flexibility, balance, and I'm nearly managing the cartwheels now! I'd had a bit of pain in my upper back and neck after I slipped on a metal plate during that week (for a city with so much rain, San Francisco has a dangerous number of smooth metal plates, gratings and manhole covers in every stretch of pavement), so I had to leave off headstands, but everything else was great and really satisfying to be making progress.

I'm still doing basically the same work cleaning here at the hostel, and it's still fine by me - not particularly interesting but just enough variation to not drive me up the wall. I've made a bunch of good friends here among the longtimers and always find interesting people arriving to talk to. It's a very different atmosphere than India House, people are a lot more focussed, but equally friendly when you get to know them.

I'm doing pretty well moderating my spending, cooking a few simple things (lots of pasta) and avoiding cash drains like eating out much (apart from the odd Subway or Jack in the Box, both good cheap lunch options). I'm also still doing well moderating my drinking, I haven't had more than three drinks in an evening in as long as I can remember and I've gotten right out of the habit of drinking in the evenings after dinner.

The city's winding up for Halloween right now, and there were a bunch of events over the weekend. I went to Mighty on Utah Street and 15th on Saturday night for their Night of the Living Bass costume dance party. The bill was loaded with DJs from Opulent Temple, Black Rock City's premiere dance location, so I reckoned it'd be a pretty awesome night, and I put together a great inexpensive devil costume - black suit, shirt and dark red tie ($20 at Goodwill), red body paint and horns and black nail varnish. Half a dozen other hostel dwellers had planned to come but they all ended up dropping out at the last minute.

The party was good but I may have just been off my game due to tiredness - after a couple of hours I felt my energy flagging and the music just couldn't keep me up. I stayed about three hours all told and wandered back absolutely exhausted but reasonably satisfied. When I got back in a bunch of folks were gathered in the dining room chatting and watching videos, and I ended up sitting up with the group till dawn as various other bizarrely-costumed hostel denizens wandered in and out, returning from other parties.

Nothing major going on at the moment - I've spent a couple of satisfying days exploring the art galleries along Geary and Post, which are all free to look, and there's some fantastic work on display (as well as quite a lot of awful cheesy stuff). There's going to be a party here at the hostel on Wednesday for Halloween itself. If I stay in for it I'll probably dress up again, although I don't think I'll be putting the body paint on this time - I'm still washing it out of my ears and other corners and I had to change all my bed linen yesterday.

Labels: adelaide hostel, halloween, San Francisco

I get down to Union Square again in the morning in what's becoming a really nice morning routine, to meditate in the fresh air and sunshine with the noises of the city going on around me. It's soothing and focussing, and I feel good and full of energy by the time I return to start my shift.

After shift I take a walk to Cala Foods to get some supplies, and spend the evening in front of the TV with a 40oz of "Olde English" malt liquor (not actually as bad as it sounds, even if they can't legally call it beer) and a few plates of pasta and tomato sauce (made from scratch with real tomatoes, simple but very satisfying to cook).

The weather here is definitely changing now - even when the sun's shining it doesn't get really warm, and there's been a bit of fine drizzle most days. It's that cool crisp autumn feeling coming in, and it's actually really refreshing and gives the city a comfortable feeling. I wonder how the transition toward winter's going to affect me...in the past I've tended to get pretty depressed and demotivated once the days get shorter. Of course, if things get bad I can just head south early and find the sun again...ah, the hard life of a nomad!

Labels: Pasta, San Francisco, Union Square

Before my shift I'm chatting with Travis, a newly arrived resident, who tells me he saw Go Team just a couple of nights ago across town, and they're playing again tonight. I'm electrified - I've been wanting to see The Go! Team in concert for ages and it's serendipitous to get this opportunity now when I had no idea they were even in town.

The Go! Team are an experimental hiphop/funk/indie rock band from Brighton, England who make simple upbeat incredibly catchy tracks with a lot of fuzzy guitar, harmonica and intricate drum work.

They're playing Mezzanine, which is only about ten minutes walk from the hostel, and booked online the ticket is $24.00 - very reasonable indeed. I book my ticket right away and look forward to the evening in anticipation.

I'm at the venue shortly after the doors open at 9pm, and the bands aren't coming on till after ten o'clock, but DJ Amplive is already playing when I arrive and has some great tracks, so it's no trial waiting. I have a beer and a vodka and coke, but don't particularly feel like drinking any more (particularly since drinks are $6.00 each).

The crowd are, predictably, mostly indie kids in standard plumage. On the dance floor this means very little movement whatsoever, mostly people just stand around in little knots and sway a bit. But there's a good crowd gathering and when the opening act come on everyone hustles up to the stage at one end and there's life in the party.

Bodies of Water are supporting, and actually make a pretty good set - lots of close-harmony singing/yelling and 70s hippie rock sounds, with good energy and real heart (and a couple of very impressive moustaches). The crowd are pretty into it, lots of dancing, fist-pumping and cheering throughout. Meanwhile the venue continues to fill up. It's got a 1000 person capacity and there have to be easily 500 people in here already.

Then, after fifteen minutes or so of tuning and preparation of the stage covered by the return of DJ Amplive, The Go! Team arrive on stage in a series of flying leaps out of the shadows, and launch into Panther Dash. The opening chords are near-deafening, the drumbeat electrifying, and the total wall of noise and rhythm lifts me off the floor.

The entire crowd surges forward, ramming the barriers into the edge of the stage (and nearly crushing the cameraman) and a mosh pit forms the likes of which which I never expected to see in a crowd of indie kids - most of the crowd is dancing, jumping up and down, waves of collision spread back and forth across the room, we sway and crash into each other and yell and punch the air and dance and do it again. By now it looks like the club is almost at capacity, looking back over the sea of heads.

The band are amazing, raw-sounding but expert and playing the crowd brilliantly. There are three skinny indie guys (band creator Ian, Sam and Jamie), two Japanese girls (Ky and Kaori) and Ninja, a beautiful black ball of fire in a pink hoodie dress and rainbow kneesocks who absolutely never stops moving, dancing, bouncing, chanting, rapping, singing and exhorting the crowd to greater levels of frenzy.

It takes two burly security guys to keep the barriers from being rammed into the stage throughout the performance, and when Bottle Rocket begins and the whole crowd gets bouncing it feels like the building's going to collapse. The band play a good mixture of songs from their original and new albums, all the classics, and come back on for a double encore before disappearing back into the shadows.

I'm still completely psyched up and full of energy, and a good part of the crowd stick around for DJ Amplive to play out the evening - I dance till 2am, when my feet just won't take it any more and I fade out into the cool night. I walk home on shaking legs, ears ringing, feeling totally spent and utterly at peace.

Labels: Go Team, indie rock, live music, mezzanine, San Francisco

Life continues as before. The work still isn't dragging, three hours seems to be just a nice period to work each day, and I'm still having fun just exploring the city and wandering up and down the hills, as well as getting rapidly into great shape.

I'm discovering more and more of the hotspots of San Francisco, particularly the places to save money - there are loads of great thrift stores here from which I've obtained some great clothes and a pair of cheap very good-quality trainers, the choice of grocery store can make a significant difference to one's food costs, and there are always odd little stores to discover where necessities can be obtained cheaply.

Otherwise...I'm reading a lot (just finished Silence of the Lambs and I'm working on Wicked), mostly keeping up with email, wandering the streets and getting back to cooking a little bit. I've established a bit of a routine, on mornings when I'm up in time and the weather is nice enough, to walk down to Union Square and meditate on a comfortable step there for half an hour or so before starting my shift.

The mornings have mostly been bright and clear, coldish (but I have my beautiful Nepalese sweater/jacket to keep me warm) and invigorating, and it's really nice to get out of the house and refresh and calm my head before getting into the slog of cleaning.

I need to get into a routine of doing my acrobatics exercises now, and improve my flexibility and specific technique - I've been a bit slack about getting down to it, despite my initial excitement and motivation.

All in all I feel good. I feel healthy, mostly on top of things and I feel like I'm making the most of my time here, discovering what the city has to offer. If I can keep my costs down I may stay here for more than a month - just living here seems like as much a learning and growing experience as being on the road.

Labels: acrobatics, adelaide hostel, California, Grocery store, meditation, Metro Areas, San Francisco, Union Square

I finish work in good time, and spend the afternoon reading before I head out for the Civic Center and UN Plaza. The Civic Center is a remarkable cluster of buildings which includes the Opera House, Library, Federal Building and a number of other city landmarks. They are almost all of white stone, towering and pillared monuments. Around their bases, on the carefully manicured vivid green grass, many of the city's homeless congregate to smoke, drink out of bottles and cans in brown paper bags, fight and beg.

I get to the Bart station about five and ring Binod, but he's delayed in traffic and doesn't arrive till nearly six. He's small and slim, with his hair cut short with a spiky fringe and a mischievous grin, but a deep calm and spirituality about him too. He brings me to the side of the plaza, where the group are already set up by the flatbed truck they use to transport their kit, and handing out plates and forks and serving food to a line of hungry arrivals from every kind of background - vagrants in the majority, but also a number of students, business people and local Nepalese who come for a taste of home. There's no discrimination and no-one is turned away.

I join the group and take over from Binod's friend Kigo in handing out triangular slices of fried flatbread. The food is simple, all-vegetarian, healthy and tasty - piles of steamed white rice with curry, chutney, a Nine Sprouted Bean Soup which the Nepalese swear by to increase strength and protect against disease, and the fried flatbread.

This is Curry Without Worry, the group started by Shrawan Nepali four years ago. Food is cooked by Shrawan's father using the kitchen of a Nepalese restaurant uptown called Taste of the Himalayas - it costs roughly $1.00 per head to provide these meals.

Until now the group have literally been paying all the costs out of their own pockets, as they've been awaiting the granting of their 501(c)(3) not-for-profit corporate licence, but literally today they have received the word that their licence has been granted, and they can now deposit the large number of donation cheques they've been receiving.

Shrawan himself - a relaxed, athletic man with boyish good looks and curly hair just picking up a little grey - is here, as well as his father, and both of them drum, dance and sing as the line moves steadily past our trestle tables.

The group are almost all Nepalese (and from roughly the same area around Kathmandu) but there are two other Caucasian volunteers - Amanda, with long brown hair around a long face and wide dreamy eyes, who is ladling chutney, and a young bearded man who I believe is called Trigger - I don't get a chance to speak to him, as he leaves when the serving is over.

We all get a plateful of food before the trays are drained, and it's really good - rich in flavour and aromatic, the vegetables firm and fresh, the curry comfortably spicy. When the food is gone (the last corners are scraped out for a latecomer wrapped in a khaki blanket), the table, trays and other equipment are loaded into the flatbed and between two vehicles we all head for Shrawan's place, for what I gather is a religiously-observed Tuesday night routine, deviating out through Golden Gate Park to pick up Laqua, who I also met in the store the day before Decompression.

Shrawan's living room is a real sanctuary. On the floor is a circle of big cushions beside a raised dais area with more cushions and a thick rug laid across it. In one corner is a potbellied stove standing on a little square of tiles surrounded by bundles of wood, with a narrow chimney going up, across and into the wall above it.

All around the room are beautiful statues and hangings, as well as a number of little lamps and candles which the group light as we settle ourselves crosslegged on the cushions and relax. Somewhere incense is burning. Shrawan brings us all cans of ice cold beer (Japanese Sapporo, oddly enough) and we talk and relax in the soft lamplight.

Thus begins a truly magical evening. We eat in a number of small courses, with various members of the group piling in to help prepare - first incredibly fresh green beans in the pod, just lightly salted and accompanied by slices of chile pepper in an amazing Nepalese spice mix. Then, an hour or so later, red-hot fried peanuts, more chiles, slices of fresh avocado, red onion and raw garlic. At almost midnight we have a medley much like the meal we served at Civic Centre - mixed beans, chutney and curry with white rice.

Between courses we talk back and forth, drink beer with dozens of toasts in at least four different languages, and all the time music breaks out spontaneously, the guys picking up drums and guitar as the mood takes them, everyone singing and sometimes dancing. The stove is lit when the room is too cool, allowed to burn down when it gets too hot.

I talk to Shrawan about the charity. He has a dream of Curry Without Worry spreading to every city and every country in the world, bringing not just food but philosophical and spiritual nourishment to hungry people, spreading a simple message of peace and brotherhood independent of denominations and religions. He draws on Buddhist and Hindu principles as well as broader philosophical strands.

Shrawan is also responsible for the Ama Foundation back in Nepal, set up to build and staff orphanages to house, feed, educate and provide a family for the most needy children in his home country. Several extraordinary photographs are dotted around his living room of life at the first Ama house, run by Shrawan's godmother Ama Tika. Currently this is a rented facility - soon they hope to build their first dedicated house.

I get the Bart back into town well after midnight, and go to bed feeling buoyed up, calm but joyful after my day's experience.

Labels: ama foundation, Civic Center, curry without worry, Golden Gate Park, Kathmandu, Nepal, San Francisco

Nothing particular to report, except that I've got a nice steady ache all over (and a good thumping pain in my abs) from my exertions the previous evening. With exquisite timing my work for the day is cleaning the ceilings of the showers, which requires standing on a stool on tiptoe and reaching up at the very limit of my arms to get into the corners. But it's a good feeling having pushed past my limits.

In the afternoon I do get back down to Chinatown for a good explore, despite a light drizzle which is more refreshing than dampening. On Columbus I go back to the Nepalese shop we visited the day before Decompression. At the time I had a great talk with the manager's son, Binod, who's part of a group who provide free Nepalese food for all comers on UN Plaza downtown. He invited me to come along and help out, but his card was in the bag I left in the taxi that night. I get his number again and intend to get down and join in the following day.

Labels: Chinatown, columbus, San Francisco

Morning and work are as normal, and in the afternoon I lounge around and get some reading in until it's time to leave for the Beginners Acrobatics class at Sophia Healing Center. I've done my best to persuade my fellow hostellers to join me, and a few are interested but everyone seems to have other commitments, short funds or just aren't going until they hear what it's really like, so I go alone this time.

The class takes place in the front room of the centre, wood-floored (which is a little intimidating) with big mirrors at the back. The group is small - there are only four of us, besides Leo and Hannah who are teaching - so we get lots of one-to-one attention, which is great. I have absolutely no skill in this area whatsoever; my balance is poor, I'm fairly poorly coordinated and while my legs are in pretty good shape from all the walking my upper body strength is nil, so I'm prepared to start from the very bottom but have fun trying, which is exactly what I get.

Having ascertained that I can't do a cartwheel or a handstand to save my life, and finding that one of the girls is basically on the same level, Leo and Hannah give us a bunch of good exercises to build flexibility, strength and get used to being inverted. I start making good progress doing partial cartwheels, (spinning more than flipping over to get into the rhythm, and throwing my legs higher on each pass) and both of us work up to a partial headstand, inverted with our knees resting on our elbows, and raising one leg at a time to build up balance and strength.

It's incredibly satisfying as well as a great workout, and I come away still feeling not all that capable but immensely proud of my progress and buzzing with endorphins from the exertion, and float home eager to practice my exercises and make progress before the class next week. Hearing about the class a bunch of others at the hostel get excited about the idea too, so I may well have some company next week.

Labels: acrobatics, Haight Street, San Francisco

Back again, after a few days of nothing much interesting to report. I worked, I wandered, I slept.

I'm getting into a rhythm of being up at around half past seven, which feels good - time to make the most of the day. And today I have an extra day to make the most of, because P.J.'s given me the day off. In theory I work one day to cover one night's stay, but apparently I'll usually get a day off at the weekend.

My working days are hardly gruelling, but nonetheless having a full day to do what I want with has a nice savour to it. I get through my morning routine briskly, and am out of the door by half past eight. I've got three missions for today: Begin exploring Golden Gate Park, continue an ongoing search for a characterful cafe with free wireless internet and properly check out Chinatown.

On the second point, I'm reminded that I did miss out one event from the week: I acquired a laptop. I've been scanning Craigslist for a cheap, reasonably functional laptop I can use to work on the blog, having finally realised that even if I pay a couple of hundred for it I'll save the money back in a month or two of using (usually free) wi-fi instead of paying for a computer in internet cafes (after I leave the Adelaide anyway, internet computers here are all free).

Finally a Fujitsu Lifebook C shows up, reasonably fast, with Windows XP installed, a DVD drive and all fittings, for only $150.00, and I snap it up quickly. I ride out to Noe Hill to pick it up and have my first experience of the Muni, the peculiar tube train/tram which runs through most of San Francisco.

We start out in a familiar tube station, tear along tunnels, and then go clanking and jerking up a slope onto the middle of a street, to wind along at a much more sedate five or ten miles an hour. Because the street is lower than the platforms in the tube, there is a section of floor just inside each door which drops down into a set of steps as we emerge from the tunnel. This is particularly surprising to me as I'm standing on it at the time, not having noticed the warning notices. It's rather like riding inside a relatively dull Transformer.

Rabbit, the current owner of the laptop, is a musician who's looking to move over to an Apple laptop which is more compatible with her needs. While I'm checking out the laptop she correctly identifies the playa dust still embedded in my jacket - it turns out that her roommate Christy (who I meet shortly) is a veteran Burner, one of the hardcore, having been with several theme camps, worked with DPW and welded art projects and structures.

The laptop is great, I'm very happy with my bargain and I make it back on the Muni before my transfer runs out. The ride back is even more interesting, as the tram rolls along at its sedate pace, bumps down into the opening of the tunnel, grinds and whirs for a minute or so (presumably as it changes power pickups) and then takes off like a rocket down the underground passage.

So, back to my day off. I set out to find Golden Gate Park first. It's at the end of Haight but I get off early and walk down to have a good look around the many fascinating shops first. I take my time and enjoy the fresh morning air (it rained quite a bit last night) and browse freely. Before I get to Golden Gate Park, however, I discover Buena Vista Park which is on the side of Haight Street around where the shops peter out.

Buena Vista ends up taking up the rest of my morning. I climb to the top of the precipitous hill, through banks of big old trees where the light shines down in complex patterns through the leaves and needles, and see extraordinary views of the city from higher and higher vantage points. At the top the hill is rounded and ringed with thick trees. I climb down a short bank and find a huge root to sit on and look out and down at the view.

The damp earth smells like good tobacco, rich, earthy and fruity all at once. Where shafts of sun hit the soaked wood, curls of steam rise and interweave in the bright beams. I feel at peace, relaxed but alert, very here and now and plugged into my place and time. The day seems endless ahead of me.

I explore around the Haight and adjacent streets for part of the afternoon, but have no luck finding the perfect cafe. I do, however, find a fascinating studio just opening up, offering very cheap prices for all kinds of classes. All their yoga classes are in the middle of the day, unfortunately, although they plan to add some evening sessions shortly - what they do have is a Beginning Acrobatics course on Sunday night which really intrigues me, and turns out to cost only $10.00 - I take note of it for tomorrow.

I do attempt to explore Chinatown in the later afternoon, but it's just too crazily busy - the streets are literally crammed and progress on the pavement is impossible. I branch off and head back to the hostel, planning to go back on Monday when it's quieter.

In the evening a small group of us go out for pool at the Edinburgh, a "Scottish" pub just a couple of streets over. The evening turns out a bit jumbly but fun; no pool actually happens and we wander around a bit trying to find somewhere everyone's happy with, but it's nice and sociable and a chance to get to know people a bit better. I just have a couple of pints, continuing my commitment not to go back to heavy drinking at least until my liver's had some time to recover.

Labels: Buena Vista Park, Golden Gate Park, Haight Street, San Francisco

A fairly ordinary day - another shift of cleaning, a bit more shopping and exploring. The combination of walking up and down stairs for three hours, then walking all over hilly San Francisco is proving excellent exercise - this should be a great place to get into shape.

On Andy's recommendation I find a good local supermarket - Cala Foods - and pick up a big bag of rice, some good pork and nice fresh vegetables at a very reasonable price. In the evening I cook my first meal since Scotch pancakes at the Black Rock Burner Hostel - just fried rice with garlic and onion, pork and veggies, in a soy-based sauce, but it's really satisfying to be cooking again and a nice social experience with a lot of people going in and out of the kitchen.

Labels: adelaide hostel, San Francisco

I sleep pretty well although my room is a little cramped and noisy - there are six of us on bunkbeds in a pretty small room - and come down to dig into the Adelaide Hostel's wonderful free breakfast - there are huge quantities of four different kinds of bagels, croissants, currant bread and some kind of biscuity things, and unlimited tea and coffee.

At ten I meet Andy - a small, nervous-looking Englishman - in the lobby, and he takes me through the job, which consists of making up beds, cleaning mirrors and basins, emptying bins and cleaning the bathrooms. It's pretty good exercise with a lot of tramping up and down stairs but not hard work by any means. We're comfortably finished and enjoying a cuppa by one.

For the rest of the afternoon I do a little shopping for some essentials I'm missing, and explore the local area. We're slap bang in the middle of downtown, convenient for all kinds of shopping from the most expensive stores to very economic ones, as well as many of the city's major attractions.

In the evening I hang out in the lounge, catch up on the blog and get to know a few of the hostel's other residents. Thirty-three beds are currently occupied by a Danish party touring Silicon Valley, who pretty much keep themselves to themselves, but I get on well with many of the other hostellers and there's quite a community of long-timers, working here and elsewhere.

Labels: Adelaide Hostel, San Francisco, Youth Hostel

I sleep late and wake after nine o'clock to find that Deidre has already gone and I'm alone in the hotel room. Combined with the aftershock of yesterday's amazing party and concern about my lost bag I find my mood crashing - I feel completely alone in a foreign city, and that lost feeling, that detachment I've been feeling for so long seems to come crashing down in waves. I shower and pack, and use my remaining time before checkout to call round as many taxi companies as I can, with no luck, which doesn't improve my mood.

I'm out of the room just ahead of the maid, and dump my gear in the lobby to consider my options. My plan is to find a hostel where I can work for my room so I can drastically slow the erosion of my savings and rest up in one place for a while. A realisation is growing on me that the feelings of disconnection and lack of energy I've been feeling are just down to too much change without a break...I haven't stayed in one place for more than a week for almost exactly three months. With a little stability, maybe I can find a bit of peace and centredness, and I can't think of a better city for that purpose.

I start working my way down a hostel list I picked up at the Haight guesthouse. The first few, including the Green Turtle, bring no luck, but when I ring the fourth I am welcomed by a warm female voice. "Adelaide Hostel, Zoe speaking. How may I help you?" I try to speak when she continues "How may I provide excellent service for you today?" I try again but "How can I make your day better?" By now I'm laughing out loud and getting a good feeling about this place. Zoe tells me that there probably is a job available, but I'm best to come over and book in for a night first, as that's how the managers usually like to meet people before employing them.

I arrive, book in and meet Zoe in person - she turns out to be darkhaired, a little gothic with a wide red-lipsticked smile and as warm in person as she sounded on the phone - and I'm told that I've got a good shot at the job but it's down to P.J., one of two Irishmen who own the hostel and who makes the hiring decisions. The hostel is very nice, clean and neat with a big lounge area furnished with huge comfy sofas, a huge kitchen and dining room, free internet and breakfasts thrown in - it couldn't be more perfect. However, when I do meet P.J. he seems doubtful, and tells me he'll need to look over his lists to see if he can fit me in.

I spend the rest of the day on tenterhooks, unable to get on with anything because I don't know where I stand. I get out for a cheap (and pretty nasty) Chinese meal on Powell Street, then come back to mess around on the computers in the evening, still in that state of vacuum. Then, mid-evening, P.J. wanders by the desk with a wad of paper and says, almost as an aside, "Oh, you can start work tomorrow. Meet Andy in the lobby at ten, he'll show you the ropes. You're cleaning rooms."

I'm filled with relief and joy. It suddenly comes home to me how much I've been needing and wanting this chance...somewhere to stop for a while, where I'm not constantly thinking about the next trip, aware that whatever I find and whoever I meet I'll have to leave them behind in days. I have the opportunity to actually live somewhere. I start making lists of the hundred things I want to do in San Francisco, my new home for a little while.

Labels: adelaide hostel, San Francisco, Youth Hostel

I crash in Deidre and Brian's hotel room, and wake feeling a little battered and ill but not too bad considering we did get round quite a few bars last night. Deidre and Brian are still asleep, so I slip out the door and take a fast bus to the guesthouse to pick up my gear and come back.

When I return Deidre is up and about and fairly chipper, but Brian looks to be on the brink of death and is staying in bed - his flight leaves in the early evening anyway. We split a huge room service sandwich and salad, commiserate with Brian then gear up for Decompression. In my case this process takes about fifteen minutes, in Deidre's case somewhere around two hours. To be fair I dress fairly simply in my kilt and t-shirt and a set of rings with little jingling bells which I picked up in Reno, while Deidre has a beautiful indonesian outfit, elaborate hair arrangement covered with little gems and clips and a multilayered makeup job with amazing inch-long stick-on lashes.

We finally make it out to the taxi and it's about a half-hour ride across town to the street which is being closed to host Decompression. We're looking for Burner-sign all the way, and finally we spot signs for "Decom Parking" shortly followed by a group of people in furs, glitter, masks and huge puffy boots, who can only be going to a Burning Man-related event.

The line to enter is still short when we arrive, and we join a crowd which to most people would be bizarre, to us is incredibly welcoming. We hug everyone in sight and compare dust experiences as we work our way to the entrance booth and pay a paltry $10.00 to get our tickets and hand-stamps, and then we're in. At the entrance we're passed by gothic stiltwalkers, hugged again by a guy dressed entirely in gold and targeted by wandering drummers. We're home.

Before moving on to see the rest of the event we meet up with Cody, who I last saw back during Exodus back on the playa - I was going to get chai at centre camp, she was in a car very slowly moving toward the exit and as is the way of things in Black Rock City we became friends in the space of about five minutes just through going in the same direction at the same time.

She's darkhaired and statuesque, with dark eyes that snap with lifeforce and like Deidre she's a first-timer but a natural Burner - she just rides the love and good energy here and shares it around. She's actually here with her mum, who's all set to do Burning Man next year on Cody's enthusiastic recommendation. They split off to explore the street for themselves while we head towards the nearest dance music from the Space Cowboys stage.

The day is, to put it simply, amazing. There is an entire street closed off for the purpose of Decompression, with around ten stages at intervals along its length playing all kinds of excellent music, and crowds are already gathering and dancing even at two in the afternoon. We work the length of the street, following the movement of the crowd, drawn into each group of dancers and spilled out again when we're tired, soaking up the atmosphere and riding the buzz.

There's plenty to see, too, apart from the extraordinary costumes and performances (all the poi and staff spinners, hula hoopers, acrobats and other performers are out in force, seeding every dance floor and moving through the spaces in between). The little park on one side of the street is full of sculpture which survived the playa, and between the stages are numerous interactive installations, many of which I missed the first time round and am overjoyed to have a second chance to see.

There are displays of photographs along the fences, numerous art cars (mostly rather battered from heavy use - and sometimes scorched), and several theme camps have re-assembled themselves, including the Liquid Latex Lounge (who will cover any body part you select in latex), Camp Collage (who assemble images of BRC into extraordinary digital collages which conjure up very strange atmospheres), The Hydrogen Economy (who give participants the chance to burst rising bubbles of hydrogen gas with a blowtorch, creating goodsized fireballs) and many more.

We get to try the Unfortunate Monkey Experiment, a climb into a blackened replica space capsule in which an animatronic chimp sits by a series of displays - we have to answer questions and hit buttons in a pre-defined sequence in order to reactivate the capsule and launch it into space (with excellent light effects, a powerful vibration and launch views on the screens making a very effective feeling of liftoff). The queue is organised and motivated by an energetic geeky nutter in a spacesuit who offers us cups of orangeade (declaring in a dramatic voice "Would you like some Tang....IN SPACE?").

As the sun goes down we get to the serious business of dancing like maniacs - the Space Cowboys' DJs are consistently excellent but Opulent Temple and the Deep End have joined forces to create a great string of sets too. The crowd is a riot of LEDs, glowsticks, flames and luminous paint, a constantly moving, glowing tapestry of light, and the energy is incredible.

Once it gets a little later we move to Cafe Cocomo which will be open after the other stages close. We catch The Zoopy Show on the patio, a bizarre rock/electronica band with giant monster masks reminiscent of The Maxx, gothic/punk cheerleader dancing girls and a demented puppet sidekick, then move inside where Doctor Booty is wrapping up and about to be replaced by the extraordinary DMT Labs, a mixture of dance music, guerilla theatre and comedy performance art.

We go right through till after midnight, and stumble out of the street exhausted but utterly joyful in the early hours, ears ringing, to fall into a taxi. All this without a drink all day.

Labels: Burning Man, decompression, dmt labs, Hydrogen Economy, San Francisco, Space Cowboys

Pictures in this page are courtesy of (and owned by) Deidre Radford.

When I wake up things look a lot cheerier. I've slept for over nine hours and I'm feeling a bit more on top of things, if still very tired - it's going to take some time for me to catch up my enormous amount of lost sleep lately. But it's a beautiful fresh morning, and let's face it, I'm waking up in a guesthouse on the Haight, in San Francisco, California!

First priority is to shower, breakfast and resume the search for Gadget. The guesthouse turns out to be rather amazing - a very tall, narrow building with all sorts of odd nooks and crannies, corners and siderooms. There's a kitchen on each floor - I'm on the second, and I walk first into the kitchen then straight out onto a balcony with an amazing view across the city roofs toward the distant hills over the city.

I try Deidre from the payphone once I've showered and changed, but there's no answer - presumably she's still in bed after the late night - so I grab a few essentials and set out onto the Haight to find internet access. As it turns out it's right across the road, in the Cafe International, but it costs $7.00 per hour, definitely too much for regular use - also all the applications are locked out so I can't work on the blog if I need to.

What it does allow me to do, while I drink some great cappucino and munch on a classic Haight chicken mayo bagel (it comes with a big pile of sprouts by default), is check my email, and discover that Gadget has left me rather in the lurch. I have an email back from Dennis at the Cozy Castro Cottage, informing me that Gadget has gone to Hawaii. So, no accomodation arrangements then. I'll have to figure out something for myself.

I need to answer a whole bunch of emails and look up a load of information but by the time I've knocked out the first couple of mails I'm out of time, and I'm not paying another $7.00 from my dwindling funds. Asking around I find that the public library has free net access, and I'm given directions. It's about half an hour's walk, and turns out to take me through some beautiful areas of the city, from the little bohemian shops and guesthouses around Haight to the extraordinary marble edifices of the Opera district and the library itself.

The library access is only available in fifteen minute chunks, but there are loads of terminals and not too many people waiting so I never have to wait more than ten minutes to get back on. I hang out for about two hours, slowly getting up to date on my email and digging up the various bits of information I need.

I head back up to the guesthouse, and on the way I go to buy a phonecard but notice that the store are selling prepay mobile phones with ridiculously good rates (10c per minute anywhere in the US and 15c for international calls) for $30.00. It seems like a worthwhile investment so I pick up a Nokia Net10. I'm phoneable again!

Once I get back to the guesthouse, charge and activate the phone and call Deidre, she and Brian are heading toward Coit Tower on Telegraph Hill so I head to synchronise with them. It takes about four buses and a lot of waiting around. Telegraph Hill stands on the northeast corner of San Francisco, with the houses rising around its base - the top of the tower is all beautiful junglish forest, and a breeding colony of parrots live and thrive there. On top is the huge concrete spike of Coit Tower, overlooking the city on two sides and the bay on the others.

I buy my ticket in the tiny shop which is wrapped round the base of the tower, and ride the antique elevator to the small viewing space inside the top of the tower - there are big perspex-covered windows on all sides from which to see the views. I am reunited with Deidre and introduced to Brian, a skinny, slightly nervous-looking guy with long red hair. We see and photograph everything in sight then make our way back down.




Comparing our various maps we decide to head toward Japantown by trolleycar, but after three of the things go by completely overloaded we begin to realise it's not going to be a viable option at this time on a Saturday. Instead we walk down into Chinatown which is much nearer. We're idly talking about dinner options when we pass a Chinese restaurant with an extraordinary rack of carcasses in the window, a huge array of dishes on display and a wonderful smell wafting out, and dinner plans are determined instantly.

I'm particularly drawn by the range of offal on display, and I order a combination meal of steamed rice and vegetables with a selection of samples from the trays - intestines from what I assume is chicken, chicken feet in brown sauce and duck feet in a sweet and sour sauce, with some barbecue pork in case I can't eat anything else. Deidre goes a bit safer with some duck and some pork - Brian's not that hungry but willing to sample what we get. Everything is portioned out with precision by two chefs wielding huge cleavers in an intricate dance around a tiny kitchen.

We sit on a kerb and eat out of the plastic trays. The intestines are very chewy but taste pretty good, and the feet are delicious, although they take a lot of work to eat the small amount of meat off the bones. On the whole the pork wins for convenience and gorgeous flavour and texture. Brian tries the intestines and seems mildly traumatised.



Slightly greasy and replete we walk on down through Chinatown to find the City Lights bookshop, legendary hangout of Kerouac and other literary figures. On the way we are diverted against our will into a beautiful shop full of Tibetan and Nepalese rugs, jewellery, instruments and tapestries, and a huge range of buddhist books. We're engrossed for some time - Deidre finds a couple of beautiful pendants, and I replace my missing fleece with an (actually quite reasonable at $65.00) red and orange fleece-lined woollen jacket with which I completely fall in love.

After a quick cruise around City Lights we head further into town and find some really great little bars which occupy the rest of the evening. We hear some wonderful live music, dance like maniacs to some nineties classics and generally have a pretty good night of it. The evening only falls down when I leave my shoulder bag in a taxi cab. It contains my vaccination record and some other paperwork, recipe book and various other bits and bobs (replaceable), and my journals, address book and my camera with NASA photos still on it and not uploaded (definitely not).

Labels: California, Chinese cuisine, city lights, Coit Tower, intestines, Metro Areas, San Francisco, San Francisco Bay Area

It's 6am and it's pretty cold in Santa Barbara, but I warm up quickly lugging my gear out to the onramp for Route 1. Santa Barbara is clearly a rich area - all perfect little villas, arty shops and manicured greenery. I begin to suspect I'm still in a hitching black hole.

The location is good - unusually the "Pedestrians Prohibited" sign is at the top of the onramp not the bottom, so I can stand on the shoulder of the onramp itself as the vehicles roll up past me, almost a perfect location. As the traffic slowly picks up a lot of it consists of oldish, well-used trucks and vans, also a very good sign.

After three hours I reach the end of my tether. It's not as though it's a horrendous time to work - I've waited three hours elsewhere before getting a ride - but yesterday has sapped my confidence. I've also lost my little MP3 player somewhere along the way and without music it's really hard to keep morale up after the two hour mark.

I trudge back down the onramp having concluded that California in general may not be the place to hitch. Back in Canada and Washington I shrugged off the warnings of people who told me you couldn't hitch-hike any more, but in this state it might actually be true - people here do seem really insulated from the world and other people in a way I haven't found elsewhere.

Back at the station I buy a very reasonable ticket for San Francisco - I'll travel the first part by train, then switch to a bus for the last stretch. While I'm sure this is the right choice and hitching would be impossible in the time I have, I'm still depressed and let down at having really failed at hitching for the first time.

I have almost two hours before my train so I walk back to a nice little cafe I saw on my way to the onramp, and settle in with a cup of coffee and a really good breakfast burrito. My spirits slowly rise again with good food, caffeine and warmth, and the realisation that I'll be in San Francisco by evening, the city I've looked forward to seeing for years, and have been anticipating since I started travelling.

The train is another Surfliner commuter unit, comfortable and fast, and the bus connection is smoothly arranged. Through the afternoon we roll into northern California, and the mirrored buildings of Silicon Valley flash with sunset colours on either side of us. I'm sitting with Ronnie, a student who lives in San Jose to the southwest of the Bay. She's been away for some time in a small university, and talks dreamily about her mum's cooking.

It's just getting dark when I step off the bus on the Embarcadero, the main street which runs along the bay-front of the city. The bulk of downtown stretches away from me, an extraordinary range of skyscapers and beautiful buildings, and the crowds are pouring up and down the street and over the crossings on all sides.

My first priority is to track down Gadget, who's promised to sort me out a cheap or better place to stay in the city...I need to find an internet cafe and locate Cozy Castro Cottage, where he lives. I know it's in the Castro area, the gay district of San Francisco. I ask a friendly dreadlocked jewellery-seller about internet cafes - he reckons the Castro is the best place to find them anyway, and directs me to the nearest transit station.

San Francisco has two major transport systems - BART (Bay Area Rapid Transport) and Muni (the Municipal transport network, which technically covers all buses, trams and cable cars but is usually used to describe the city's unique hybrid tube train/tram network). BART, essentially a very fast over/under train system, has only a few stations and is mainly useful for longer journeys going outside the city centre, but in this case it'll deliver me conveniently to Civic Centre which is handy for the Castro area.

Descending into the station I have some doubts about locating Gadget tonight - it's already about 7pm and I have no idea where this place is or even if I'll be able to reach him there. I stand rethinking for a while, then dig out a wad of printouts - my last emails from India House, including one from Deidre regarding her arrival for Decompression. I had thought she was coming in on the Saturday, but my sudden suspicion is confirmed - she's actually already in the city if she's running to schedule.

I find a payphone and ring her, and we have a joyful telephonic reunion and arrange to meet by her hotel near to Union Square - it's just up the road from the Powell BART station and it takes me around ten minutes to get there. I walk up the road to Union Square through the craziest part of downtown San Francisco - the crowds are swarming, there's neon and glass on all sides, the road is thick with cars, taxis and buses.

Union Square is lit up all round and surrounded by huge brand-name stores. I search through the crowds and finally locate Deidre on the corner, joyful shouting and hugs are exchanged. We walk to the nearest internet cafe talking over each other as we exchange travelling stories - Deidre's just come back from an amazing business trip to Kyoto.

At the cafe the search for Gadget stops dead - he hasn't replied to my last email and Cozy Castro Cottage has no phone number. I leave another email for him, and one with the CCC email address asking them to tell him to get in touch with me. There's not much more I can do.

Still swapping stories and slowly getting up to date Deidre and I return to her hotel, and I start ringing around hostels. Most of them, as anticipated, are booked out with incoming Burners. The only one I can find is on the Haight, San Francisco's legendary historical centre of hippiedom and bohemia - a cool place to stay but it's miles out of the city centre.

Deidre's still waiting for her friend Brian to arrive by train, so I decide to get the bus out to the guesthouse, get signed in (their front desk closes shortly) then come back into town and we can all have dinner together. The concierge gives me directions and I head out to the bus stop.

In practice the directions are dreadful, taking me all the way out of town one way then back in again, and it takes me almost two hours to reach the Haight. By the time I'm booked in (the girl on the desk almost refuses to let me in as it's so late) it's midnight and not worth going back into town - I ring Deidre to tell her to go ahead and eat without me, and crash into bed. I'm frustrated, hungry and a bit miserable but I'm also shattered, and I quickly fall asleep.

Labels: amtrak, Bay Area Rapid Transit, California, Embarcadero, hitchhiking, San Francisco, San Francisco Bay Area, Santa Barbara, surfliner

I wake up at just after five, check the clock, prepare to go back to sleep then battle sheer horror as I realise that this is actually the best time to be up if I'm going to make an early start on my hitch-hiking toward San Francisco. Just shy of an hour later I'm showered, packed and on my way out of the hostel into the surprisingly cold morning air.

Once the initial trauma is over, I find the familiar buzz settling in at getting back on the road and I make my way to the onramp with high spirits and a cup of evil Starbucks coffee in my hand. I sip coffee, munch on the remaining third of my calzone and make myself a San Francisco sign on the back of a good durable cardboard tray. Then there's nothing to do but wait.

And wait. And wait. It's over three hours before I get my first ride, which gets me exactly 10 minutes down the road. I'm grateful to get moving at all though, and the new spot looks better - out of the centre of town, slow moving traffic, great visibility...I reckon I shouldn't have any trouble getting moving.

After two and a half hours I take a break to get lunch at a nearby In 'n Out Burger - and it's the best burger I've had in a fast food joint. In 'n Out have the admirable policy of keeping pretty much the menu they opened with as the first drivethrough in California - hamburger, cheeseburger, double cheeseburger and fries. That's basically it. They don't do much, but what they do they do really well. The patty is really good beef, goodsized and perfectly cooked, on a freshly-baked bun, and the fries are crunchy and flavoursome.

With renewed energy I get back out on the road, find a slightly different spot further down...

And stand there for another three hours before getting a ride 20 minutes further out. This time I'm dropped on the side of a major highway, again near an onramp but here the traffic is moving at breakneck speed and the location doesn't look at all promising. I drop my bags and raise my sign. By now I've been standing holding the thing for almost ten hours and I'm exhausted, but I don't have another option - I'm miles from anywhere, certainly nowhere near a place to stay, and there's no cover out here to sleep in.

I keep the sign up as long as my arms can hold it, and then I switch to the thumb - a last ditch attempt as the road here can go either way and I really need to be able to indicate which direction I need a lift in. Just when I think I'm really going to have to give up and start walking down the highway back into town, a car pulls over. But it's no good - he's going back into San Diego. I give up - it may be possible to hitch out of southern California, but I don't have the time it's clearly going to take.

I gratefully accept the ride back into San Diego, and decide I need to make at least some progress north today or I'm going to be in trouble tomorrow. The new plan: I'll get the train and bus north to Santa Barbara, about half of my journey time, stay there overnight then try and pick up the hitching again from there. I'm determined I'm not going to let this state beat me.

I'm on the train with Russ from San Diego, another of America's ubiquitous sweet-natured chunky rock dudes. He actually works in a club in San Diego and knows a whole bunch of places I should go if and when I do return...including the brewpub home of the awesome Arrogant Bastard ale I enjoyed in Seattle. It's well-known around here - in fact, once we're settled on the train he disappears to the bar car and comes back with a bottle for each of us. It's a very civilised journey to L.A. after that, drinking ale, chatting and watching the little towns flash by outside the windows.

Russ hops off a couple of stops before Union Station with promises to keep in touch, and I ride on to the central terminus, arriving with about twenty minutes to spare before my coach to Santa Barbara. The Amtrak Thruway coach is comfortable, a little more luxurious than the Greyhound equivalent, and I'm feeling my lack of sleep over the past week and a half not to mention my severely early morning, so I doze part of the way.

Arriving in Santa Barbara bus station it's almost midnight, I'm thoroughly exhausted and there are wide, smooth wooden benches which look very inviting - someone's already sleeping on one of them. I spread my sleeping bag on the next and settle in. Another fellow-traveller is preparing to settle down for the night, but he's arrived in only his t-shirt and the air is really cold. At his request, with some misgivings, I lend him my fleece. When I wake at 5am he's still sleeping under it, but after I sleep again from 5 to 6 he's gone, taking my fleece with him.

Labels: amtrak, bus, California, hitchhiking, San Diego, San Francisco, Santa Barbara, Union Station