Ok, on to other exciting things. Another thing that never seizes to amaze me are the homeless. I see some incredible sights: like today there was a man in a tent under a bridge that I walked past but he didn't fit entirely in the tent so his feet were sticking out of the side and he was either sitting or lying inside but a rug covered the entrance and his face. Totally motionless. Was he dead?
ANOTHER thing: everyone is super friendly. Whether they want something or not. Especially the older folk, but not always, are all "Hello", "Good Morning" "You have a wonderful day" from the bus driver to people just walking past, to storekeepers etc.. Sometimes they want change or a cigarette but honestly, it's the minority that asks. OK. Not everyone. The Chinese are terrified of Bee and give us a wide berth, all the while muttering balefully to themselves. A couple of ladies jumped off the bus when we hopped on, obviously not wanting to get any closer to Bee. It sort of makes me want to go "BOOOOO!!!"
Well, to be honest, I'm a little discouraged. Nobody is reading this blog. At all. So maybe I'll stop writing. We will see... :{... Kinda takes the creative wind out of my sails.
HI Giulia I am reading you blog with great interest. The photos are great and you have always written so well. When I first moved out to CA form Texas, I lived in Oakland for several years, not all that far from where you are now ( 40th Street ) Sometime I will tell you about discovering monkeys living wild near Lake Merritt. Oakland is a well kept secret. Keep blogging
ReplyDeleteThanks mystery person! I was about to give up, but then I discovered that I hadn't made myself discoverable on search engines so I thought, what the heck, I'll stick with it for awhile longer and then I found your comment. Obviously I'm still learning this whole blogging thing but your comment came just in time and it was awesome! Thank you....I just LOVE this area too. I look at other obvious newcomers (hipsters, millenials and whatnot) now with suspicion and distaste, muttering under my breath "go away, don't stay"!!!! hahahaha I'm so silly. But it DOES disturb to me to see the rate of "beautification" that is currently obvious around my area in West Oakland... Again, thank you and I'd love to hear about the Monkeys and any other gems you can think of....
DeleteThey were very small monkeys allowed to live in the trees around Lake Merritt Park near the little zoo that was there then. We read about them and went down to see them taking peanuts with us. They were hard to find, but we did and were able to coax them down into some bushes by the path where they took peanuts from our hands. Other people walking past asked if they had escaped or something, but we told them about reading about and finding them. Some of the other people said they had walked those paths for years and never knew. We heard later they had to be re-caged after some problem or the other with somebody, of course.
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