On Traveling [Alone]

My first experience of traveling alone was nothing short of eye-opening. Despite that I’m a generally sociable creature, I found at times the loneliness of walking down a foreign street both fascinating and frightening. In an English-speaking environment, I feel generally comfortable approaching strangers by way of eaves-dropping or observation; this trick doesn’t work so well when you can’t understand anyone around you at the bar, and you’re never sure if they speak English, or least speak it well. I learned that acquiring new friends requires leveraging any social currency you have. This is to say I picked up smoking again, because its an easy way to pick up men. This is also to say that I got in the habit of getting one more beer at the bar, because that kept the conversation going between me and a new group of friends. I mostly stayed with other queer hosts, because it was something we had in common, even if there was a significant language barrier. Any commonality you can use to make a connection with someone, work it. 

Most of my experiences of cities were through everyday environments: sitting at a café, people watching at a park, sitting at the 5th-floor balcony looking down on the activity buzzing below. My favorite city person is the old woman. She inches along the sidewalk as the hurried young lives rush past her. She’s got her groceries in one hand, and perhaps a cigarette in the other, and I love watching this living history. I’d see these types in Berlin and think, what has this woman seen? She’s probably witnessed her city torn and pulled and demolished and rethought and rebuilt so many times. And all these youngsters think Berlin is still hip.

I was in a squat building in central Amsterdam, which had been turned into a punk bar-slash-music-venue, and there was a poster up high, with Margaret Thatcher’s face plastered over it. Words above it read: “Only the Good Die Young”

I don’t usually engage in watching sports. This is probably because I was never really that involved in playing sports (tennis aside, but does that even really count?). The FIFA World Cup was in full swing by the time I arrived in Copenhagen, and throughout my travels I was followed by the championship everywhere. In the beginning, there were at least two games every night, so to avoid it, I would have to be blind. After some time, I really grew to enjoy the camaraderie of watching football (excuse me, soccer). I was rooting for he Dutch, until they lost… then I was with the Germans. I was at a bar in Cologne where the conversations all surrounded the game: the players, the teams, the venues. We all got drunk, smiled at each as we joked about the players, scoffed when a move was mis-handled. These are things many people over the world take for granted, but to me it was quite special.  By the time it was over, I felt sort of sad, because I wasn’t sure what would replace that sort of camaraderie. Rio 2016?

I’ve grown to love trains even more than I did before this trip. On my way to Amsterdam from Hamburg, the landscape was generally pretty dull, and needless to say, this was on the German side. The clouds were gloomy and it rained occasionally as we smoothly whizzed past the provincial landscape. I got up to go to the bathroom, and when I returned, the light from the sun was shining through like it was the first day of spring. The trees seemed greener, the occasional cottages we passed were cuter, and somehow I knew I was in Holland. 

I met a lot of interesting, handsome men on my travels, and needless to say, I had a lot of fun with them. There was one in particular that I really connected with. He showed me around Cologne, and was the most open-minded, flexible host I had. We drank beers at midnight on a bench in Volksgarten, a beautiful park from the 19th century. He showed me to my train when I left the city, and there was a very real sort of sadness at hugging him, perhaps for the last time, as I boarded the regional Deutsche Baun to Cologne Hauptbaunhoff, the central station. I entered the train, and saw him wave as the train slowly inched forward. I waved back and saw his stunning grin fade away out of vision. I laughed for a moment, remembering all the fun we had together, how valuable that was to me, how much he taught me about myself in such a short time. And then I just wanted to cry.

Things I lost or got stolen whilst traveling:

-Kenneth Cole watch my father gave me for Christmas two years ago

-three shower luffas, each on separate occasions

-€90 at a bar in Paris

-skin moisturizer

-shampoo

-my brain

I awoke on the upper-level of the N11 night bus in London. It was raining, and from up above the city felt like the mysterious medieval metropolis I had begun to be charmed by. Through the foggy window, through the hazy darkness of the night, all I could see was a faintly-lit clock face atop a shadowy tower, whose time read 4:31 AM. Panicked, I wondered when I’d get home, if this bus was even going in the right direction. Big Ben is like a ghost of 19th-century London, a phantom watching the city as it booms once again. Even as skyscrapers colonize the old city, bombarding the  the skyline with Manhattanized verticality, Big Ben seems to top them all. 

I met a French boy in Berlin who was a very funny character. I met him at a gay bar called “Roses” which had pink fur lining the walls and a red hue of light permeating the interior. I immediately liked him because he smiled a lot, and, especially for a Parisian, he was very easy-going. Speaking of Parisians, he spoke almost no English (despite that people jokingly say that English is the national language of Berlin). We spent a few days together, and it was one of the first times I didn’t feel alone. The language barrier was so thick that every thought had to be mimed and hand-signed, like an ongoing game of trans-national charades. Every sentence took at least five minutes to explain, but somehow this was fun. We both would laugh when we couldn’t articulate what we wanted to say, which made the mood always light… but needless to say, a kiss is never lost in translation, especially a French one. 

I encountered a great deal of pretentiousness in most of the big cities I travelled through. The cosmic joke I found was that everyone seems to think that their city is the best in the world, despite that they’ve seldom seen the other big metropolises around the globe. London, Paris, Amsterdam, Berlin… they all claimed to hold the secret to city living, and no other city would do. I love San Francisco, no doubt, but I would never make the dubious claim that its the best city in the world. Neither is New York. No one city can possibly provide the best combination of urban living, because no one has really figured out what that combination is. To humble these pretentious city-dwellers, I will provide one short roast for each city I feel qualified to judge (despite that I pretty much loved all of them):

-San Francisco is being gutted of its character at warp speed, and the class warfare is splitting it into a bifurcated metropolis that doesn’t know what it is anymore (and I don’t know that I would call it the “liberal capital of the US” anymore)

-New York’s infrastructure looks like a third-world country compared to London and Paris

-Copenhagen is too racially homogenous, and too expensive for budgeted travelers

-Berlin, physically, is just plain ugly, because it was rebuilt during one of the most unfortunate eras in global architecture

-Amsterdam seems to be getting a bit too rich for its own good

-Utrecht is a little too small for its own good

-Cologne is not at all the “gay capital of Germany”. That goes to Berlin now. 

-Parisians need to realize that they don’t live in a global city… one could more accurately describe it as a large French city, but certainly not a global one

-London’s Underground needs to stay open later. Seriously. 

Having dropped all this hate on these cities, I’d like to balance it with some compliments:

-San Francisco is still fabulously weird

-New York is still just plain fabulous

-Copenhagen is truly a model of civilized culture and politeness

-Berlin is still an artist’s and poor-twenty-something’s dream

-Amsterdam is still so damn picturesque

-Utrecht has a true Dutch authenticity that other cities could take a note from

-Cologne is a beautifully green city, with lots of sidewalk gardens and beautiful street trees

-Paris is still stunningly romantic

-London is the city of cities, the first in so many ways, and all other modern cities really came after it. 

I can’t wait for my next adventure. 

BERLIN

Notes from my moleskin:
-No one drinks water
-Everyone drinks beer
-People of actual color live here
-Over 35: No English
-Under 35: English 
-Germans follow every rule unquestioningly, everyone else jaywalks
-So much bad modernism
-Wide boulevards
-Not as many Nikes
-Hipster girls have this signature early-80's bowl cut, very cute


Cities have existed throughout history not just as places or destinations, but as characters, contributing to the public dialogue in and of themselves. They speak their own language to the people who inhabit  them, sometimes shouting, sometimes whispering; sometimes a laugh can be heard, and often their painful history can be felt. Berlin, more so than most other cities in the past century, has endured an immense amount of pain in its short lifetime. The scar which runs through the city is demarcated by a red brick path, winding in and out of roads, through buildings, forever dividing the east and west side of the city, despite that the neighborhoods that once stood on either side continue to meld together in typical gentrified fashion. Surely the legacy of the Wall will never be forgotten in the divided city, but each year that passes puts it deeper into the cultural consciousness, healing the scar little by little. 

The city’s memorials douse the pain of the War in an eternally apologetic tone, leaving the many new young urbanites with a tone of placid remembrance. The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe is one such place adorned with a profound reverence that I haven’t seen in any other site. Walking through each of the rectilinear cement formations placed evenly apart, one is met with a quieted solitude which silences the hurried thoughts of city life. The wordless space was designed to allow the visitor to experience her own emotions amongst the crevasses between blocks. The memorial acts as a blank, lifeless city for the dead, an empty canvas for which each visitor paints his feelings and thoughts upon them, perhaps to be at ease for just a moment. To me, the space served an even larger purpose, carrying with it the burden of representing a memorial for memorials. Children played hide and seek in the narrow alleyways, couples kissed in the shadows; these demonstrate not that the memorial isn’t being respected for what it is, but that it is so elegantly designed that it has woven itself into the natural urban fabric of the city. I found my silence there. 

In a high school Creative Writing course, I once wrote a short story called “The Difference Between East and West Raccoons.” It was an extended metaphor about the Donner Party, shown as a gaze of raccoons who leave their burning forest in the east to travel to a promise land in the west. Most of the pack didn't make it to their destination because the pain they endured en route drove them to madness as they ate each other in rapacious desperation. My ultimate message was to show the fatal demise of believing in a non-existent promise land, how this changes people into entirely different characters with an evolving motive, how there is a remarkable difference between these raccoons from their humble beginnings in the east to their vicious selves in the west. They are no longer the same raccoons once the few remaining survivors reach the forests of the golden state. 

Today this piece means something else to me. The history of “east and west” has graced world history time and time again: the New Frontier of the American West, the dominance of the globalized western culture, "conflicts in the Middle East". Historians (namely from the West) have twisted the meaning of these dichotomous cardinal directions into whatever the Present deems formidable. The West can be the beacon of culture and innovation, while the East can be exotic and mystical, despite that neither holds true. 

When riding my bike through Berlin, my adventure partners kept telling me with repetition: “Now we’re in the East”, “Now we’re in the West.” These two sides, once divided by an ocean of turbulent politics, are now joined together, but insist on differentiating themselves. I ask: what is the difference between East and West Berliners?

Berlin is surely a city that is between identities. The fantastic cultural influence of the city and the increasing affluence of the country at large are increasingly positioning Berlin as the leading city for the creative class of Europe. 20-somethings from Spain and Turkey flock to Berlin in search of jobs, stimulus, and affordability; this is the hyperbolic “west” they seek. Those outside of the city consider it a wellfare state, sucking the resources out of the affluent surroundings. Some Germans I spoke to were wholly resentful of Berlin’s media-celebrated cultural richness, despite that the city can’t seem to pay its own bills. Regardless, I leave the city feeling perplexed by what it wants to be, but amazed at what it is: a young, rebellious, vibrant metropolis that deserves to be spelled here as boldly as it lives: BERLIN, I  give you a resounding smile, a pat on the back, a slap on the ass, for all you’ve been through you’re still amazing the world. You may not be so poor anymore, but sexy you are still. 

København

Notes from my moleskin:

-everyone is blonde

-everyone wears Nikes

-I can’t tell if anyone is gay

-everyone is white

-lots of shawarma food

-7-Elevens are everywhere

-slot machines in bars?

-Carhartt everywhere

-the honor system prevails

-freakin expensive

-beards are not in (or have they not arrived yet?)

-people are nice in ways I didn’t know existed

-doesn’t get dark until 10:45 PM

-sun rises at 3:30 AM

-Irish girls bring out the fun

-playing the Macarena in bars is acceptable 

My first impressions of Copenhagen were nothing short of a mild disappointment. My expectations of the city were calibrated for the lively, cosmopolitan energy I experienced prior to coming, and my arrival was a bit anti-climactic. The city can feel bland at times: the prevailing 19th-century constructions that line most of the streets create a curtain of red-brick Haussmann-like repetitive dullness. Racially, the city is homogenous: white, blonde, handsome. The local culture is so pleasant, it would seem everyone is sedated; zombies medicated into a state of complacent friendliness. It took this skeptical American several days to understand that there are entirely different social paradigms here. Just lock your bike’s back wheel to the frame; no need to chain it in maximum-security fashion to a pole. People will trust your word without much questioning. The honor system prevails. Nothing made my pessimism more evident than when it was contrasted with the convivial demeanor of Copenhageners. I am aware, however that several factors shaped this impression: a) most locals thought I was Danish (see: everyone is blonde; everyone is white), and b) having come out of another harsh Scandinavian winter, the general mood of the city during the season of 19-hour daylight is a palpable mixture of relief and bliss. 

Taking these first impressions, I was quick to say the city is too homogenous, both in built form and social climate. A small city in a very small country. Once these premises are accepted, however, I was able to relax in this surprisingly open and fluid city. 

The gay scene in Copenhagen is quite small, but I was informed this was because there was little need for the separation of sexualities. Many locals prided themselves for contribution to a city that embraces a mixture of so-called “minorities”— code for gay men and anyone who’s skin tone is darker than than the “2” on my toaster. This made things especially difficult for me because I had to recalibrate my gaydar to the “Euro” setting, which is undergoing maintenance at the moment. Back in San Francisco, someone may not look gay, but I can smell it on them. 

From the outside, Copenhagen is viewed by some as the “hippie city”, not because of its terribly liberal or open vibe, nor because of any lax treatment of marijuana sales (outside Christiania), but because the people are slow, participating in a  pace of life that is lazy and relaxed, and high fashion is not a common sight. The general garb appears functional and comfortable, without seeming too Freshman-in-college (think solid sportswear, not sweatpants). 

All in all, what struck me most is that this is a city where nothing has happened to them. There isn’t really any cultural trauma to live with, as you might see in Berlin or New York, and their worst period appears to be the “motor invasion”, a period from the 40’s-70’s in which the country’s affluence brought an influx of cars to the city center. The city is clean and orderly and functioning. Its people are content with their lifestyle, but they seem to have no idea that getting a Master’s degree isn’t free most other places. 

Copenhagen, you were good to me. Thanks for teaching me to relax. 

New York City

New York is a colossally massive city, and summing it with a generalized, sweeping judgement would be an error that millions have already made before me. What can be said about the city is that it is America’s city, for better or worse. It is the emblem that represents American values at their most extreme, a magnifying prism that separates the fibers of our society into neat primary colors on a subway map. Which line are you? New Yorkers will insist that they are the least American, they will dogmatically differentiate themselves from “them” and cite their cosmopolitan urbanity, their superior transit, their intense approach to vertical dwelling a defining separator from the perceived slow, homogenous suburban landscape that most Americans live in. What I see, however, is precisely what Americans want, although it may not be evident at first sight. 

New York is money-obsessed, it is driven by an increasingly accelerated momentum toward power and influence, and it certainly succeeds at this. American values, whether we like it or not, are not driven by dreams or hope or community, but by money, and this is something to come to terms with. 

We can think of nothing better to show our pride and resilience after the destruction of two towers than to build a single taller one, brighter and with more office space than ever before, and we like to call it “triumphant.” This is the ethos that Americans link to freedom, that New Yorkers equate to power. What they don’t see, however, is the prison they’ve built for themselves, codified in ever-growing castles of rich elite, looking down upon the minions as they trap themselves amongst the clouds of Midtown. What they don’t seem to realize is the commodification of a horrendous tragedy, the obliteration of solemn reverence in favor of loud bigness, and its so ugly it can only be American. Early plans from the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation included constructing a subterranean shopping mall beneath the 9/11 Memorial. 

Times Square was once a space for city dwellers to gather and celebrate baseball games and holidays, a civic space for the rich and poor. Today’s Times Square is a freakish imitation of itself, with jumbotrons so bright you can’t see the charade before you. It is surely a caricature of its own history, a capitalist’s wonderland in the theme park that is the island. 

 If the cities of the world were children on a playground, New York would be the loud, screaming bully, pushing the others around and insisting she’s the best there ever was. I’ve always felt that if you have to say it, its probably not true. 

Manhattan, and increasingly parts of Brooklyn, is the quintessential American ecosystem, teeming with imperatives toward constant spending in the 24-hour lifestyle. Neighborhoods are fetishized like fashion trends, and the excess populous of this real estate rush are pushed one stop further along the L-train every year. New York is in no way unique in its self-destructive gentrification, but it is certainly the best at it that I’ve seen. 

New Yorkers have an unabashed pride in their city, and rightfully so. New York is so many colors, so many wonderful chaotic happenings at once that its hard to believe they all exist in one place. From the monstrous verticality of Manhattan to more moderate-scaled Brooklyn, and everything in-between, there is so much to see in New York, and it certainly cannot be described as one thing, because it is so many at any given time. 

I only got a tiny slice of the city on this visit, and I both loved and hated what I saw, but it can be said that there is absolutely nothing quite like New York City.  

Day Off

Standing at the edge of Pier 7, amongst the chain-smoking casual fisherman, we looked onto our city, chatting about the formative impressions these buildings leave on us, the history of its development, and the subtle nuances of what is an ultimately arbitrary set of opinions regarding architecture. I could smell that lightly-slated air, which always reminds me a little of my father. Perhaps an image of my father doesn't appear in my head, but when I think of the memories that return to the house of my brain--fond guests who visit too seldom-- they involve my father. And the sea.
We strolled up Broadway, watching the slight differences that demarcate the change of settings: the lifeless waterfront luxury condominiums transition to strip clubs and dive bars named with unimaginatively obvious abstract nouns. "Atmosphere." "Urban."
Crossfade to ------------> Columbus Avenue.

We walk into a church, St Francis of Assisi Roman Catholic. The cacophonic clutter of honking noises and city chatter was silenced at once by the solemn hollow of the church. I sat in the third-row pew and looked up (something I do quite often). I love the meditative nature of churches. I was raised in a Catholic school, where prayer and worship in God's house was forced upon us twice a week. I am no longer Catholic, but I remember fondly the majestic wonderment of looking up during mass,  admiring the church's vastness, respecting its palpable influence to quiet my mind.

We emerge back onto the street feeling like we've cleansed our brains, only to dirty it again with mediocre hamburgers and ineloquent sexual innuendoes.

We stood before the Sentinel Building, basking, if only briefly, in the rusted copper masonry that clads its beautiful face. But from where we stand, I can only help but notice the emaciated sidewalks it stands upon. All of a sudden, the building looked as though it were suffocating, choked by the sewer of cars that surrounds it, sucking its life and energy out. A world-class restaurant sits at its feet, and yet no street life seems to exist on this historic corner. What was once a proud and respected sentinel for the Paris of the West seems now small and sad, dwarfed by the out-scaled spike of the Transamerica tower.
Poor buildings!  All these poor buildings! I say widen those sidewalks, plant the trees, encourage the lingering and spontaneous interaction that once danced amongst these streets. I say, stop choking these buildings! Let them breathe, for God's sakes! Let these buildings breathe!"

Later, we dodge and swerve amongst the perpetual madness of the shopping district. If that trendy, ridiculous word, "Manhattanized," had any relevance or context, this would be it. Everywhere: Walgreens, Starbucks, Gap, Bank of America, Diesel, Forever Twenty One, Seven Eleven, La Boulange... And where can I sit?
Nowhere to sit, silly! How can you shop while sitting?!

We found our way to an inconveniently hidden public space atop a luxury mall on Sutter, and again, looked up. Here before me were the houses of another god, no gothic spires, but communication antennas atop these so-called churches of capitalism. We had, around us, a cross section of San Francisco's history, displayed by the mixing and squeezing of architectural styles throughout the years. Some towers whisper, while others shout. Some buildings conceal the flow of money and power, while others seem to have no poker face at all. But for all their brashness and pride, for all their tactless machismo, they nevertheless contribute to the splendid variety of this wonderful city.

Her

I'll admit I had a bias walking into the theater. Having only seen one trailer of it, and listened to a few raving reviews, I was surprisingly negatively biased. Knowing the basic premise beforehand, it tapped on a personal opinion that is of hot debate in 2014: this is the debate behind antisocial behavior and its link to modern technology, ranging from social media to video games. 

First, I liked this film: for its aesthetic beauty, for Joaquin Phoenix's adorable character. But I mostly liked it for the imaginative premise that truly questions the paradigms that define modern-day relationships. Joaquin's character struggles with the perceived stigma of maintaining a connection with an operating system. The viewer can see his internal judgement as he sorts through the unspoken voices that might say: "that's not a real relationship, you're insane." 

Today's comparable stigma might be the advent of online dating. Most people who have met someone online, myself included, have felt a little judged for doing so; if not from those around us, at least internally. I suppose my insecurity for online dating surrounds my age and my principles: I'm young, aren't I? I should have no problem meeting new people! or: Modern society is too disconnected! Between the never-ending stream of unread emails being alerted on smart phones, to the antisocial media consumption spread across an ever-growing number of personal devices, can't we just meet each other organically anymore?

I think I've arrived at a middle-grounded opinion on this. I'm continuing to believe that, yes, it is totally acceptable to meet people online, because we are living in a world where we may not always have the time or resources to meet someone in the "organic" fashion, so why not use these lovable/annoying electronic devices to our romantic advantage? On the other hand, I think there is a deeper, more destructive nature to our ongoing secluded usage of online services, video games, and other antisocial behavior.

In this fictitious city of Los Angeles, amongst the millions of people walking amongst each other, everyone's alone, talking to an inhuman device tucked away in an earpiece. This is a somewhat familiar sight to urban dwellers of the new millennium: stand at any busy intersection and count how many individuals are consumed in a text, talking on the phone, multitasking as they walk, busy with something else that's clearly more important than the physical world around them. What's disturbing about this phenomena, especially as it is presented in Her, is that it goes contrary to the fundamental mechanisms of urban society as we know it. The delicate interwoven connections that form the fabric of a community are based on the daily human interaction, even if its nonverbal. Jane Jacob's "eyes on the street" are one example of how a healthy community has the ability to self-enforce street-level crime simply through the ongoing movement and lingering of people on the street, a sort of "ballet of the sidewalk" as she calls it. What is to happen if we have no need to simply walk and look around, focused and undistracted? To ask the larger question (and this might succinctly sum-up my babbling here): What is the point of living in a city, if not for the people in it? If we continue to become atomized individuals, ignoring our physical context in the space around us, what's the need for such space at all?

While this might seem like overcautious speculation, consider this: on a  recent evening on Muni, a man pulled out a handheld gun on a half-full train, and no one else noticed. Police footage revealed that the man in fact whipped out his gun in full sight, holding it for less than a minute, and then concealed it again. Meanwhile, a train full of distracted people, absorbed in texting, reading, and music, sat blissfully unaware of the danger just feet away from them. 

Now that I've successfully gone off on a relevant tangent, I'll bring this home. What I'm getting at is that we must try to understand that good old fashioned human interaction is necessary and required for human beings, and that nothing can replace that. We may satisfy some social needs through semi-intelligent operating software, but what we biologically need is to look into one another's eyes and feel empathy for each other. I walked into Her expecting to see a plead against the organic chemistry of human connection, but what I got was something quite different. 

I still continue to online date, but my ultimate fantasy is meeting someone on a crowded Muni train: we bump into each other, say the obligatory "excuse me," and then embark on some witty conversation about transit service, and the organic chemistry plays on...

Betty

Sitting across from her at a cafe spot, I was tired and maybe a bit cranky. I've learned over the years, however, to not let my mood get the best of me when I'm with her; I've acquired the ability to shut off any part of me that's impatient with the pace of conversation.

We held hands on the way there. They felt like delicate moist paper, the same as they did when she held my hand on the soccer field, waiting to go run off to Zoo Camp in Santa Barbara. She somehow still remembers that my team was the Anteaters. 

Amidst my selfish internal hankerings, I suddenly looked up into her eyes as she was speaking, and a switch went off in me. I realized that all I wanted to do was hear her talk, and I would just listen. I could take in the 92 years of collected stories, absorb the immense social changes she lived through, and just imagine the sea of memories she swims in! I could swim with her, riding the waves of a time I never knew, of a grandfather I never met. I was suddenly swelling with infatuation for this woman before me, who mothered my mother, who scolded me once or twice, but always told me I had the best hugs. 

Often I feel overwhelmed with the life I've already lived. If I concentrate hard and survey the canvass of my life carefully, there are so many interactions, so many connections I've made with people, places, and things. Glazing over all that can make 23 years seem like a waste. But to imagine that life four times over fills me with an overwhelming sense of admiration for her that I want to hug her for the rest of her life. 

Empathy

Amongst the rush and tumble, the speeding momentum of the streets that push me along, walking past thousands of fellow dwellers all day long without considering their humanity, I was stopped by a man, and I looked into his eyes, suddenly reverent, and I felt a momentous calm wash over me. These eyes I’d looked at before, even at length, but never quite so deeply. As the idiom goes, I was lost, stuck in the mesmerizing hypnosis of the flaring greens and blues of his irises. For a moment my heart fluttered, and I felt him, his entire existence, and I could see that he was like me. Somewhere amongst my swim in the sea of passionate emotion in his eyes, I reached the edges and climbed up and out, and so I walked on, looking down to avoid the eyes of other men. 

Of Order

Standing in front of the Parc Wyndham 55 hotel on Ellis Street, I look up in awe. Scaling the building upward with my eyes, I am supremely mesmerized by the repetitive simplistic pattern of brown-tinted bay windows set amongst a skin of beige blandness. The sheer size of the building is a thing to remember-- its wide, hefty massing isn't shy to hog up the airspace around it-- but the paved sameness that shapes its identity is so profoundly awesome that I wince at the sight of it; frankly, its an ugly building. Its ugly to me because it ignores its context, in both scale and style, and it is therefore disrespectful to its elder neighboring buildings. 55 Cyril Magnin was the brash "new guy on the block" (and he's literally sitting on the whole block) in 1983 who's looks were forgettable but he insisted in being liked.
The hotel is also ugly because it is an inelegant display of the post-modern take on order. Sure, it is a departure from the modernist functionalism that produced oversized glass boxes (see, World Trade Center), but to me it is both rich in apathy and poor in the humane charm that makes its neighbors so timelessly lovable.

Cities, at their essence, are the attempt to create order on earth. While medieval settlements laid their streets in an organic respect to the land they called home, the pursuit to modernize urban life brought on the linear grid, indiscriminately imposed on the sweeping topography of hills and peninsulas (see, San Francisco). Godfrey Reggio's Koyaanisquatsi aptly visualized this with cross-cut scenes of Manhattan alternated with the face of a microchip. Both are obsessively orderly, attempting to tame the erratic chaos of their dwellers, be it electricity or people. And while the street grid is just one display of this attempt to rule and regulate, it is in buildings that this is manifested skyward.

I am a man who has found love in his city, for cities at large, and I love them for all their orderliness. But sometimes I yearn for the rainforest, to stand at the foot of goliath oaks and hear the chaos, smell the irregularity, and feel the splendid disorder that keeps them living so marvelously.

Piano

My fingers do a dance, here and there, making a sound as each of these five legs press down on their standing; a pretty sort of sound though...

they play about, with a motivation of their own, showing off perhaps, and it would seem that they enjoy this, liking the eyeballs that catch them, it is a courting maneuver between the body parts to see who shall be joined in a holy wedlock of sensory unification.

the ears tune in, paying close attention to a whole new dimension of this exchange. the noise-- music, perhaps it might be called-- streams so fluidly that its a wonder how these hands ever learned to play.

Knowledge

I walked this earth alone.
I let the lightning strike me,
the wind, knock me,
the rain, beat me down, until I was a sorry bludgeoned creature. 
There were others, 
alone as well, 
and as well beaten and hurt.
We walked this earth together, 
and what we found was that we were stronger as a collective
than we were separate. 
And it was only together that we discovered
lightning could be harnessed,
and wind could be used,
and rain could cleanse. 
And we were well with this knowledge.

Freshman Scream

The scream began to build up inside of me, festering, gathering, preparing. I look around to see if anyone's there and I see an old woman somewhere I'm not sure where but she's there and I run, holding my mouth with one hand, gripping my hair with the other, imagining this scream well before it occurs, how it might sound, what it might look like, and I'm still searching for a spot alone. I can feel this scream's wants, desires; I suppose it shall birth and then split off into many tinier screams, or perhaps it might explode before me in bright colorful sparks! But alas, my spot reached, above the lake, I throw off my hat, raise my head to God or someone, and out comes this energy, channeled into the scream, nothing moves but me, and I can feel the air around me cary this scream, pulling it out of my throat and into the Big World, and when its all done I sit, panting, watching this scream travel on into the big unknown, and soon I cannot even remember it.

The Café

In an urban environment that lacks the once-plentiful public spaces, there are few remaining venues for critical discussion. Town squares and plazas were once the hotbeds of civic involvement, where citizens would gather to spark the conversations of government, politics, and daily affairs. England had the pub, short for "public house," where men could not only speak freely, but could listen to the literate citizens read aloud the news of interest. In France, it was the coffee house that hosted this informal gathering, and served as an arguably more democratic space, given the [relatively] sober nature of coffee and the openness to both men and women. Skipping a great chunk of American history, we have landed ourselves now at the ideology of "caf é culture."

Cafés have spread their way around American cities in several waves of success and failure over the 20th and early-21st centuries. Unfortunately, through a warped perception of coffee's function and the design of the places which house it, many Americans today perceive cafés as spaces of either solitude or pharmacy. The former is a sight familiarly characterized by Starbucks' innovative wifi service and interior design that favors the lone blogger sipping her latté. The latter has resulted in the grab-and-go coffee fiend that makes quick runs to his coffee shop to get his fix for the next few hours. While neither is inherently detrimental to society at large, an opportunity is often missed to engage in a discussion with a stranger or catch up with a friend. And then there is third-wave coffee...

Setting aside the perceived pretentiousness and class-defining entry fare (a $4 coffee is fair for its quality but hardly inclusive), there are several wonderful things at play in these artisanal cafés. For one, waiting a few minutes for one's coffee to be made immediately slows the pace of the entire transaction, and often allows for the sort of lingering and gazing that lend themselves well to increased social interaction (even if its nonverbal). Second, some of these cafés are smartly choosing to withhold a wifi service in an effort to discourage the anti-social behavior that the Internet often pulls one into.
The emergence and popularity of communal seating in these establishments is a testament to the humanistic need for closeness and socializing. We are often so starved for public space that the opportunity for interaction-- or rather, the chance of interaction-- seen in these surrogates are met with often wild success.

While I would rather see more true public spaces in American cities, I applaud the efforts of third-wave coffee houses to create spaces of community interaction and potential civic engagement, even if it is on the smallest scale possible. It is important to remember, however, that these are not true public spaces, as are most parks, squares, and plazas,  and they are in fact emblematic of the cross-pollination of public interest and private enterprise, but perhaps this is the best we've got for now.

Atomic Dream

I am on the beach, large swells approaching me in progressively greater heights, each breaking a bit closer than the last. The dark sky roared, stirring and churning on itself; I am a digestive chime in the vast stomach of the world.
As the greatest of all tidal waves climbs its way up to the heavens, shaping its body upward, it crashes unexpectedly soon. Fighter jets soar from behind me, dropping small bombs into an angry ocean. Turning to look, I can see that I am standing on a land under attack.

A flash breaks, a sudden luminous presence so bright that the world around me instantly vanishes from sight, and I am thrown.
My body, now just a light material object, is helpless in the air as the blast throws me, and I can feel it becoming undone.
Each one of my molecules I can feel disintegrating, as my precious limbs separate from me...
And at once I am dematerialized, only leaving my consciousness suspended somewhere in a timeless state, leaving me to think: "That was it."
And with those words, all of life's turmoil and anxiety simply vanished, and it was a spectacular feeling.

Park Thoughts

As I sit in front of the skyline, displayed in full from atop Dolores Park, a flurry of thoughts pass through my head.

How can I have starred at this scenic view for so many hours over the years, and still find some stimulation? How do I notice new things each time?

I watch the black cloud of swarming birds move about the airspace, sometimes weaving in and out of the open-air steeple of Mission High. I survey the landscape from high above, my eyes follow the cluster of buildings that bunch together in the eastern neighborhoods, and begin accumulating in mass and bulk as they approach downtown.

This is the divide between town and city, and somehow I love them both.

The town is some Medieval settlement, with humble buildings huddled close together,  church spires penetrate the uniform height limit. The city stands boldly, fronting its gazers from all directions, demanding attention from all. So many of these buildings are brash and ugly, only a few are elegant, with an air of nobility. 

Sometimes I imagine a disaster-- like an earthquake-- dissolving the giants to dust in selectively random succession. The town would remain intact, resilient in a sustained quaint density, while the brash city would crumble like Rome.

Sometimes I imagine a different disaster, that relentless construction and wealth raises the city to limits unthought. Skyscrapers rise swiftly, towering over their predecessors. Maybe a new city rises, or a city within the city. Maybe they'd be glassy and thin, with sleek protrusions to define a new skyline. Maybe they'd be ironclad, shiny but stoic like the giants of Art Deco. Maybe they would destroy other buildings around them, crushing the Old with a defiant New. 

I wish I could be with the birds, flying over the city. I could watch San Francisco from above, swooping over the hills, in and out of the fog, above rooftops and through narrow alleys, to and from those monstrous towers, watch it grow or crumble.