Familiarity

After having spent a few days wandering through the city by foot and public transport I feel we are becoming more connected than most tourists ever do. The conversational exchanges I have been witness to may make some nervous, but they bring a sly smile to my face. I enjoy being here.

Welcome to the West Coast! It dawned on my today that I will essentially be setting foot on all 3 coasts of the United States in these next 3 weeks-- the western, the southern AND the Eastern. I am a lucky individual. Anyhow, we arrived at the Pacific Ocean, San Francisco version this afternoon and an immediate sense of relaxation washed over me. The past few days were restless but the views today made up for all inconveniences we faced the days before. Waves crashed before us, wind-bent trees stood ahead, and a homeless man complimented me on my hair (despite the frizz!).

And Brit chased some gulls around :)

Our chosen volunteer service here in San Fran is helping out the volunteer center with advertisement for the Board Match, an even hosted to bring volunteers interested in participating with organizations that need help. We have been assigned a few random streets throughout San Francisco and are expected to visit businesses/localities to place fliers and/or posters about the event. It's a lot of walking... and we even had time for a nice, long stroll through Golden Gate Park. The cloudy/rainy weather entitled us to a quiet visit.

We took a break after visiting a few shops so we could organize our distribution.

We finished up that route and decided to head home, but being unfamiliar with the public transit throughout the city, we ended up spending over an hour on a bus route that could have had us home in about 20 minutes. Oh well. We ended up seeing the Golden Gate Bridge all lit up! By the time we have truly become familiar with the ins and outs of the city we will have moved on to a new one. It's the joy of traveling. I would like to mention that our way of doing things feels much less tourist-like than other vacations have, and the beauty in experiencing the city first-hand is not comparable to a quick in-car overview of historical sites. The mutters of crazy people, the snares of pet-cemetery like dogs, and on-the-spot rap performances on the bus are much appreciated.

It's time for me to take off so we can go out an explore the city on a Friday night. I love all-night transit!

xoxo.

P.S. Be sure to watch my web albums for photo updates. I'll be uploading more when I get a chance. And for Pete's sake, leave me a comment or two on the blog. I know you're reading...