As you might have guessed, I now have a little Polaroid camera. It's awesome, I use it a lot and here are some of the one's I've taken. Looking at these makes me think about having a community and how important it is. Whether it's a family community, a community of friends away from family or a creative community. We are all social creatures and need some type of grounding for our place in society and to know that we are not alone. I feel that these Polaroids always five me a sense of community because people share them, feel them touch them and take them. Just having the camera out brings people together and creates a little community.
2018.07.07 - A Walk Through Castro
I dropped off a roll of film today at Photoworks SF in Castro, then I meandered around the neighborhood and got lost down a few alleyways and one way streets. The Castro has so much beautiful and unique architecture mixed with a bountiful amount of palm trees. If anyone knows me, they know I love me some palm trees.
I also came across On a Hazy Morning this week, while I was looking through different photography websites, both a great way to learn and waste mountains of time. They are a pretty rad couple that live in the Netherlands and are a serious creative team. I really liked how they used different colors, hues and shadows in their photos. So I went out today to try to see if I could get a similar look and feel not only in the photos, but also in the editing as well.
7 Best Views of San Francisco
This is hands down the best seven best views of San Francisco.
Read MoreSunday 5/23: Day Five
After having a quite night after graduation, I woke up quite early and headed over to the Wharf. I headed up to my Dad and Ben's room to see what they were doing. They were just getting ready for their day, so I asked them if they wanted to get some delicious food and go into the city for a bit, which they enthusiastically said yes. We all quick hopped into the car and headed on over to Mr. Holmes Bakery, one of the coolest places and bakeries in the city, Lombard Street and Coit Tower
Then after seeing all the touristy spots downtown, we still had some time left over so we headed out to Outer Richmond to see the Legion of Honor and all the houses at Sea Cliff. We climbed up the windy roads, through golfs courses and mansions until we finally reached the top. After reaching the top and driving around for a bit, we found parking and decided to get out.
After we finished exploring the Legion of Honor, we had to drop Cam off downtown on Embarcadero to meet a friend. after we dropped him off downtown, Ben and I decided to head back to the Wharf to see what was going on. We found everyone hanging out and we all decided to go to Haight. Now the Haight is the hippie district. This is the place where the summer of love happened in the 1960's, where Janis Joplin, The Grateful Dead, Jimi Hendrix and many others lived. Its a pretty interesting place filled with hippies, homeless people, head shops, record stores and everything in between. .
Then after Haight we all headed back to the Wharf to hang out for a while and catch up on some sleep. Once we got all well rested we went out into the Italian district of North Beach, which has amazing Italian places around every block. We however decided to go to Tony's, which is the best spot to get pizza in North Beach. We waited in line for a while, sat down got our pizza, calzones, and sandwiches and start to feast. After finishing eating, we decided to do one last trip up to Twin Peaks to see the sun go down and the city before even left the next day.
Saturday 5/22: Graduation Day
So this was the "Big Day," the reason everyone was here to see me graduate from USF. Graduating was a weird feeling- it just seemed like one more routine thing I had to do. The significance was totally lost on me, it still is right now as I write these words. It will probably hit me in a few weeks when I'm at home doing dishes or something, and I'm going to crumble into a sobbing ball of emotions, but for now we're good.
It was wonderful to see all my family once I came out of the ceremony, and they were all waiting for me with praise and leis. It was surreal seeing all their faces in SF and at my graduation- that's when it started to hit a little bit. I took many pictures with everyone, exchanged a multitude of hugs, and accepted much praise and congratulations. I ended up graduating cum laude with a GPA of 3.7 and a degree in International Business with a minor in Chinese Studies.
I have to wait a few months to receive my actual diploma in the mail. Once I have it, it will be the most expensive piece of paper I own. By Far. So I need to buy a really nice frame, just to make sure I don't loose it.
Now back to the big festivities. After all the picture taking and hugging, I taught my aunt how to hail an Uber for half the family for brunch at Sweet Maple, which is in my opinion the best brunch in SF. We all packed into the remaining car again and made our way over to Sweet Maple. We parked, walked over to find out that we had about a forty five minute wait, which is not bad at all for Sweet Maple. Sometimes it can reach up to an hour and a half to two hours. Half us headed over to Japan town while the other half waited at the restaurant. After poking our heads in and around Japan town and then quickly making our way back to the restaurant, we were seated fairly quickly. We ordered coffee, lattes, mimosas, Bloody Mary's, omelettes, crepes, french toast, and their famous "Millionaires Bacon". This Bacon in UNREAL- thick cuts of bacon that are drenched maple syrup, brown sugar and a variety of peppers, then baked until it is properly caramelized and ready to devour.
After brunch we made our way back to the Marriott to go into our food comas and recover from our feast. We all napped for quite a bit, then decided on heading over to Grandview Park for the sunset, which is by far the best view in the entire city. It has views of everything. You can see downtown SF, the Golden Gate Bridge, ALL of Golden Gate Park, The Pacific Ocean and many more. It simply has everything.
These are the stairs leading up to Grandview Park. They start out at the ocean move their way up to land, then the stars and the moon, ending with the sun at the top.
After we climbed up these stairs we made our way to the top, which literally feels like you are on top of the world. The sunlight dances off everything it touches and blankets the city in a serene layer of light, making for a stunning view.
After we finished at Grandview Park, we headed over to El Rancho Grande on Divisadero to make everyone go through the rite of passage of eating a California Burrito. For those of you who don't know, a California Burrito is a burrito filled with a meat of your choice, guacamole, and french fries. It is absolutely amazing and this place is my favorite spot in the city to get them. We all head over and all practically order the same thing, a California Burrito. We grabbed our chips and beers, then proceeded to find seating. We all sat down, started eating our chips and made our way over to their amazing salsa bar. We got a good variety of salsa and munched on chips for a while. Just as we were about to run out of chips, our burritos came, and it could not have been better timing. We all took off the foil and dove into the burritos. I could not have asked for a more perfect day.
