San Francisco

What would you guess the population of San Francisco is? 5 million? 3 million? Well, it's actually just over 800,000. Yes, I was surprised too. This is a pretty small city that punches way above its weight in the world.

Although it's in the same state as Los Angeles, it really feels very different indeed. There is a friendly, personal, relaxed but lively vibe here, and it's the USA's most liberal city - George Moscone, the city mayor assassinated at the same time as Harvey Milk (see below), claimed that it was the fact that all different sorts of people have learnt to get along together in San Francisco that makes it the greatest city in the world. Well, I'm not totally sure about that (and I'm not sure how widely Mayor Moscone had travelled in Western Europe!), but San Fran is definitely a great city to hang out in for a while.

The core of the city is pretty much walkable (with a bit of stamina), and there is also reasonably good public transport. In addition to the MUNI system of rail-cum-tram lines and trolleybuses, there is also the BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) metro system which is one of the more interesting transport experiences I've had - it's very obviously of late 1960s/early 1970s design and build, and with streamlined stainless steel trains and platform tiling of that era, must have looked very futuristic when it was first opened. Now it, er, doesn't, but with plushly upholstered and carpeted trains, it's remarkably comfortable, and strangely fun to walk into what the future used to look like!

To my surprise, I've found myself a big fan of the North American system of numbering streets rather than naming them. Essentially, provided you can remember which way the numbering goes (e.g. in the Civic Center and Mission areas, 'Streets' run in descending order from 1st to 32nd, north to south like rungs of a ladder), it makes it impossible to lose your bearings. With my woeful sense of direction I don't usually like to venture anywhere unfamiliar without carrying a good map - but by just remembering the order of the numbering, I very happily went out to the Castro on my first evening from my hostel from the Mission without carting my guidebook with me and with no prospect of getting lost.

One thing I hadn't appreciated before coming to San Francisco is that it has a peculiar climate which is not what you associate with California at all. I'd been distinctly puzzled by a brief conversation I'd had with San Franciscans in New Zealand when they said something along the lines of "Oh it's great you're going to San Francisco... but the weather's quite cold in summer". And alas they were right, sort of. Bounded in on three sides by the Pacific Ocean, the city has an extremely temperate climate and also plenty of fog on many mornings which is slow to clear. This means that real cold in winter is virtually unknown, but real warmth in summer is by no means commonplace, and September and October are actually the warmest months. On average it's the coldest major city in the whole USA (Wikipedia tells me) during June, July and August. I just about managed to sunbathe briefly one afternoon, but my jacket was a welcome companion throughout the day for most of my stay - and walking along the waterfront towards the Golden Gate Bridge, the cool winds were positively bracing...

...But don't let that put you off going to the Golden Gate Bridge, San Fran's icon. It is some way out of town with limited (but do-able once you've worked out how) public transport. However I'd suggest leaving it till the way back and walking there along the waterfront (but do take some layers of clothing!!), because by doing so you discover the bridge's wonder slowly - as from afar it doesn't look all that impressive, but it really is. Up close you feel completely dwarfed by the immensity of the engineering achievement and in awe of the superb aesthetics - finished off by the orangey-red colour which may seem like a strange one, but somehow works really well. As an added bonus you get to see Fort Point, the impressive American Civil War-era fort which the Golden Gate Bridge was redesigned to span over rather then demolish.

 

The Golden Gate Bridge [picture pulled off Internet]

The city's other famous stellar attraction is Alcatraz, the former prison island for the highest-security inmates in the US penal system, decommissioned in the 1960s. I hadn't realised it's only 1½ miles away from the mainland by ferry crossing; this apparently made the (impressive) view across unbearable for some prisoners, because they couldn't bear seeing how close but unattainable free life was. But the distance was generally sufficient, due to treacherous currents and mostly icy waters; some would-be escapees who made it as far as the water drowned, while others actually gave up and swam back! The island is now a national park because it features substantial habitation by rare wildlife; however the main attraction is the truly excellent guided tour of the former, perfectly preserved jailhouse. Ít's all done by an electronic audioguide which runs constantly, telling you exactly where to walk to see the next point of interest, with narration by former inmates and former wardens - I haven't come across quite such a system before (i.e with a constant commentary and walking directions) but it was superb, much better than tagging along in a large annoying group trying to listen to one human guide. The actual cells, which were tiny with no privacy, are still in tact - including the punishment block which meant soiltary confinement in complete darkness - and you get to see mock-ups of how cells used to look with and without prisoners' personal effects. You also get to see an escape tunnel dug by prisoners with a stolen improvised electric drill (only used during music hour) and a spoon - they escaped the island, but drowned while swimming across; and the exact key sites during the "Battle of Alcatraz" armed escape attempt, in which two guards and three inmates died.

 A cell at Alcatraz [picture pulled off Internet]

Unlike for the most part Los Angeles, San Fran seems to do public space well in the form of both parks and civic squares. Golden Gate Park (slightly away from the city centre but handily a MUNI line runs its entire three-mile (!) length) is the city's flagship park - it's huge and heavily covered in trees, to the extent that you could probably lose yourself in it for an entire day, forgetting you're in a city. It attracts lots of outdoorsy types for all sorts of activities, but it's also justifiably popular for picnics and general lounging around. In the city centre, between the Mission and the Castro, Dolores Park is also a very pleasant and popular spot for hip 20- and 30-somethings to lounge around or maybe have a kickaround - if you're fortunate enough to actually get June weather warm enough - and it seemed a great spot for people-watching. By way of squares, Union Square is a pleasant place to take a rest (or use as a meeting place), lined with department stores, even if it seemed a little soulless compared to some of the great European plazas. Probably more impressive is the Civic Center area which notably includes the United Nations Plaza, with monuments and engravings marking the formation of that organisation in San Francisco in San Francisco in 1945

The centrepiece of said Civic Center area however is City Hall. I wasn't particularly expecting to be blown away by the building's architecture, but I truly was - it's absolutely vast, with (I read later) the fifth largest dome structure in the world, and incredibly grand in a Beaux Arts style. It's equally impressive and imposing inside, with lavish marble walls featuring ornate classical carvings and a grand main staircase, and you're free to walk in and wander around. It's a genuine must-see on those grounds alone. However of course the original reason for my interest is that it was the site of the assassination of Harvey Milk, the world's first openly gay politician to win elected office (as a City Supervisor, the equivalent of a city councillor in British terminology) and gay rights hero, as well as Mayor George Moscone, by a mentally ill fellow Supervisor. There are statues commemorating both inside. (If you don't know the story of Harvey Milk, go and see at once the amazing and essential film "Milk" with a fantastic lead performance by Sean Penn.)

 San Francisco City Hall [picture pulled off Internet]

The Castro is of course San Fran's main gay district, doubtless made much better known (including to me) by thel film "Milk". It's a very concentrated one at that - the 'scene' there is concentrated into about three blocks, albeit that there are houses all around with predictably gay-heavy populations - and it has more of a sense of physical gay community than anywhere else I've wandered. There are public noticeboards full of gay-related posters, and the site of Harvey Milk's camera shop which became the unofficial gay community centre is currently empty but commemorated with a full windowfront display. The various shops in the area included the inevitable sex shops but also a huge and rather wonderful gay bookshop, and what appeared to be a shop for gay dog-owners. Honestly. Lately on my travels I've managed to blag myself a few free gym trials by lying through my teeth about my residence status ("Yes I'm a resident here... I'm a university student, studying International Relations") - in SF I got myself into a gym on Castro Street, which belongs to one of the major chain providers but is blatantly a gay gym. I've never seen so many tight-fitting designer gym outfits. :-) It's also the only private gym where I've seen a noticeboard with posters exhorting you to get a syphilis test... and with one open communal shower area, complete with signs telling you not to have sex in there. I won't miss that last bit.

This sense of gay community was certainly evident at the San Francisco International LGBT Film Festival, which was taking place while I was in town. I saw a compelling Norwegian film, a gay teenage coming-of-age story, called The Man Who Loved Yngve - this has won multiple awards elsewhere and I'd definitely highly recommend it. I also saw a documentary called Beyond Gay: The Politics of Pride which examined the partying and the issues in staging Pride festivals in both liberal and less liberal parts of the world. It showed footage from Rio de Janeiro where there are a staggering 2 million participants; but also from Warsaw where anti-gay protestors virtually outnumbered marchers; and from Moscow of an organiser getting his head kicked in by a baying mob, in this city where all permits for Pride marches are rejected by the Mayor and attempts violently suppressed by the police - they eventually managed to march about 20 metres [sic] with a rainbow flag in an anonymous part of town, which they considered a relative triumph. Plus we met the Jamaican gay activist who's seen 13 of his friends homophobically murdered. It was a sobering but deeply inspiring film.

San Francisco is also a city that defines itself heavily through its art scene, with several major museums  and plenty of small galleries, and I'd recommend MOMA, the one I had time to get to, as somewhere to spend a morning.

SF also seems to be one of those places where you can expect to see strange, random things. On Powell Street, there was an aged busker playing several verses of, er, "God Save the Queen", on a peculiar hand-made stringed instrument wired up to an electronic speaker. In the plaza outside City Hall on a weekday morning, I observed a large open-air step aerobics session. And one early evening, a rather inebriated but perfectly friendly elderly local guy struck up a conversation with me about the tolerance of San Francisco and life's ups and downs - I could forgive his untimely drunkenness as he was heading home from a wake for his best friend's son who'd been murdered. OK, so that last detail darkens the happy anecdote somewhat...

One slight surprise is that San Francisco does not seem to be much of a 24-hour city. My observations and those of fellow travellers from my hostel were that generally both bars and clubs (even on Castro Street) seem to be closed by 1.45am, if not earlier. Mind, if you want to be able to go out at all, for goodness' sake make sure you take photo ID (which for me has to be my passport as I have no driving licence) - one night I forgot, and got both myself and my two friends thrown out of the bar we'd gone to as soon as I tried to order. The fact that I'm really obviously well over 21 (the minimum drinking age), and that I only ordered a soft drink, both cut no ice. Well, they always have been much more uptight about drinking on this side of the Atlantic.

I really liked San Francisco for sure - I'm not certain that I really loved it though, even though this feels like a heretical thing to say. As I've discussed with other cities, it's often hard to pin clear reasons to your emotional reaction to a place, although I suspect that there was something about the Americanness of the city which just doesn't quite do it for me like the top European/Asian/Australian cities I've been to, even though it's fascinating to have seen it. I'll let you know though what I think of the US cities I'll be visiting on the eastern side - watch this space...

Lastly, some more general observations of California:

• Generally speaking the customer service is superb, in shops and even on buses. I suppose it makes sense that you get this in the home of capitalism...
• LA and San Fran are both seriously ethinically diverse places. Both .cities have non-Hispanic whites as a minority population, and in LA whites full stop are a minority This is probably something that negative stereotypes of the US regarding its lack of worldliness overlook - like many national stereotypes globally, probably based much more on perceptions of small-town than big-city life.
• The "soccer" World Cup is significantly more visible than you might expect. Some of this is clearly due to the loyalties of immigrants (or their descendants) from places better known for their interest in football - when Mexico defeated France, Mission Street outside my hostel came alive with multiple cars hooting continuously with their cheering occupants waving flags - but not all of it. At breakfast one morning three Americans were gripped by the USA v Slovenia match, even if one of them did think the opposing country was named "Slavia"...
• Something that I found mildly infuriating is that prices are almost always quoted exclusive of the sales tax that is normally payable. Apart from deceiving you into thinking things are cheaper than they are, most prices are round figures exclusive of sales tax - this means that the inclusive price is rarely a round figure. You therefore quickly accumulate large quantities of small change - which you can't even prepare to get rid of with your next purchase because you don't know exactly what you'll need to pay until you get to the checkout...
• Oh, and banknotes are all the same size and colour. This is less difficult to deal with than confusing coins - except for visually impaired people, who I believe I heard a little while back have won some sort of court order against the Federal Government that this infringes their rights. Good for them.
• It is a challenge to be a backpacker here and not put on weight - portions of food-to-go and snacks tend to be large to say the least. And California has the healthiest population in the US...