After lunch I made my way to my home for the week. I'm staying in the lovely apartment of Valerie and Ketan, their 6 year old daughter Kaliah and the slighty deranged if incredibly cute cat Shanti. The balcony/decking overlooks much of the city and my sleeping quarters are my idea of heaven (a futon - great for my bad back - I know, I sound about 70 - next to huge 'patio' windows - I much prefer allowing the sun to wake me, its less of a shock to the system). They are the same age as me, great fun, relaxed and very welcoming. Valerie directed me to the finest burritos at Poncho Villa and after lunch I met Idexa the tattooist based at Black and Blue who will be doing my tattoo next week. We have now met twice and although I have not seen a design I have absolute faith in her. She's a very sweet German woman who has a fabulous portfolio of work (I will post photos of the whole messy bloody process as soon as I can - just to warn you !!!)
The area I'm staying in, the Mission district, is a vibrant colourful area. There is a large hispanic population and the stores reflect this. There is also a huge mural project/culture here. The most amazing art work, some done by experienced artists, some by children or community groups, can be found all over the place. I have taken dozens of photos and will blog them as soon as I can. The work just blows me away. Wait until you see pictures of the Womens Centre - WOW.
I have started working on San Francisco Pride. I visited the staff as soon as I arrived and then agreed to do a couple of days work this week. It is a huge event, I mean massive, beyond anything we have in the UK. I am aware that I am in for a huge shock on the 25th and 26th when I see it all take place. I've been given a lot of responsibility, which is fine, I get bored easily and would rather be busy and under pressure, it will also be an incredible experience. I saw the site plans today and we started discussing the whole assembly process, building of the stage, delivery of equipment, who's responsible for what. I figure that I'm going to need a couple of days to recover when its all over. There are no huge stars in attendance, well by my reckoning and knowledge, not being from here (the headliners are En Vogue, I hadn't realised they were still going , BETTY, who did the theme music for the L Word, Third Eye Blind, I've no idea, and Kimberley Locke, an American Idol contestant), some of the non-headliners look pretty cool though. It will be such a fabulous event, I'm incredibly excited and promise to take lots of photos. I have a production meeting all day on saturday which will be pretty intense I'm sure. Its never dull on KP's travels !!!
Maxine, who I met through the Craigslist website ('Blog' isn't allowing me to add links at the mo - bugger - will have to do that later), met me after 'work' on thursday. She took me on a driving tour of the city. What an amazing place, there are so many different neighbourhoods, all full of their own unique personality, non have become ghettoised, they are back to back with one another and it makes for a fascinating place to explore. We drove over the Golden Gate Bridge, through the Golden Gate Park, slowed down as we went past the strip clubs (!!!!!),through Chinatown (the most interesting, intriguing, colourful,densely packed one I have seen, drove down streets so steep that as you went over the crest you couldn't see the road in front of you -like driving off a cliff, made our way through the fog to highest part of the city, got hit by another car ....... no kidding, it kind of bounced off the passenger side , maxine ; "are you ok .... good, its like bumper cars in this city", both cars drove off !!!! She's a wonderful tour guide, a mid westerner originally she is extremely passionate about her new home. She also offered to have me on the back of her motorbike as she takes part in the Pride March as part of Dykes on Bikes (imagine ..... 600 motorbikes, all ridden by women, some topless - heh heh - leading the biggest Pride parade in the world) , sadly I will be hard at work on the main stage at that point, but how amazing would that have been !!!
I met up with Fi (my friend from Scotland - she worked with Gwen and I at the Pod), crepes and beer were involved, I was the only one piggish enough to have dessert, coconut, ice-cream and rum crepe, I wasn't expecting the waitress to set it on fire !!! We happened across some great live music, had some more beers and then headed back to her place. She is interning for a puppet company. The office, rehearsal and living space is in the same building, the sleeping quarters are literally little cells up ladders in the rehearsal space. Its bizarre. It was wonderful to spend time with someone who already knows me, no need to explain where I come from, what I'm doing, to run through my work history (that always seems to occur for some reason), we could talk about people we BOTH knew. Such fun, such a nice change, fab night all round.
posted by KP @ 7:44 AM
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