Chinatown

The Chinese New Year parade is the weekend after next, and the Flower Fair was yesterday, but I went to Chinatown today. It was even sunnier than yesterday. Despairing of finding parking (what do you mean $3 for 15 minutes?) I drove all the way back to the Embarcadero to park there and walk back to Chinatown. I walked down Grant Avenue and back up Stockton, taking in the culture. There were a lot of people, mostly locals, but it wasn’t really crowded. I thought the decorations were amusing; the buildings all had colorful facades and names like “Golden Harvest Investment Company.” I stepped into some shops - a few of them sold things that smelled like fish food and looked like dried worms with the eyes on.

I bought little noisemaker firecrackers children were throwing, six boxes for a dollar, and silently threw about half a box before returning to say they were useless. The woman who sold them to me tested them out and gave me five boxes of a brand that worked instead. I tasted several samples of tea in two tea shops, and visited a kite shop. In one of the tea shops I gave a box of noisemakers to some kids there.

On my way back I stepped into the second branch of You’s Dim Sum on Stockton for a light lunch. The menu is only in Chinese without illustrations so they just briefly told me what they had and I ordered stuff I was familiar with. Many large shops sold a lot of Chinese imports cheaply. I bought a “lucky bamboo” plant as a gift for Aliza and Raanan to thank them for hosting me.

After exploring Chinatown for a couple of hours I successfully navigated along the scenic marina road back to the Exploratorium, but it was closed on Mondays. I really messed up the order here: I should have gone to Chinatown and the Exploratorium yesterday and to Golden Gate Park today. I spent the better part of an hour following the scenic road around until I found my way back to Golden Gate Park. Though there were fewer cars there today I parked in the same spot as yesterday just for fun, and did the walk to the Japanese Tea Garden.

That Tea Garden was a real bad tourist trap. It wasn’t very big, and some of the tea shops in Chinatown or any good Japanese restaurant have at least as nice an atmosphere. I would have been a nice section of park if they didn’t have the gall to charge $5 for it! I walked around in there until I got bored of it and left within 15 minutes. I went over to the Conservatory of Flowers but that too was closed on Monday. However, there was a group of musicians jamming out there to a strange reggae-like tune, so I hung out to listen to that for a few minutes.

For dinner tonight we went out to Sumo, a Japanese/sushi restaurant that is my hosts’ “family restaurant” to which they take all their guests from Israel. Everyone knows them there. I had a combo meal with grilled salmon and teriyaki beef, but I thought the one I had in San Jose was better. I said goodbye to the boys because tomorrow I fly.