Red and gold everywhere , shiny things , small interesting things , useless things,some quite useful things . Somewhere a band playing the traditional chinese trumpet and some people enjoying the popular perl tea , in this summery afternoon , when the air is light and the shine is bright , i could smell the afternoon , i felt the same thrill as i felt when last time i went on a daytime trip with my parents to delhi in india. those golden days !!
Now, Because of some unexpected work , me and td had to leave early from office to drive till SFO. The work got completed within 1 hr. what next , either we could have again left for office or else you know , we could have just lingered bit more on the streets and enjoy the afternoon . so thats what we did ! we left our car in a public parking lot and thought of walking and exploring the place.
I had been to SFO for like 4 times before this , but never on a weekday . and the places i had seen were mostly tourist places. it felt so different on the middle of a week . Its like more filled with people than car(which is the normal situation here where i live in sunnyvale).Normal people like me or u , walking , crossing the road. some hurrying to office and many tourists enjoying the city in their roofless tour buses.
Imagine , a girl from a far far away land , visiting this place , which is not her home country too , and with these tall sky hugging scrappers , strange people, people from all walks of life . some pretty faces, some hungry ones., but it all seemed to fascinate me . my heart wanted to take in everything , every sight , every smell , every taste . i am like this experience hungry person , who is been left in a strange beautiful place.
They say its one of the best place to live in . and i couldn’t deny it. The amazing roads , the people , the weather , i liked everything.I have always believed this that to really experience a place , you need to let go of all inhibitions and explore it . being a tourist is the only option for many of the people like us . as time and money both are difficult to afford for exploring everything . but again what is the point of earning if we cant do the things we enjoy ? I enjoy being a common person among the crowd in a new place, eat at a small joint on the road side not some fancy high end restaurant , walk and observe things , observe the people around me , try to make out what they would be thinking , try to connect the dots to bring the unknown picture to life in my own way … That is my way of knowing a place .
So after a tasty lunch at Raavi ,one of the indian pakistani restaurant out there,we decided to have some street shopping experience in the streets of chinatown . The first thing you see when you enter the streets are the red balloons which are casting the sky everywhere and people selling all types of stuffs , starting from strange looking herbs to marble made cookwares. i saw an erotic small miniature sculpture too in one of the tiny shops 😮 .Cashmere scarfs and gowns , colorful handmade bags ,small trinkets and much more beautiful ,and interesting things were adorning the shops with their liveliness , which made me nostalgic about the melas(carnivals) that happens in my hometown.
There were small eateries selling traditional chinese pastries and fast food too.One of it was really interesting . If you have ever eaten a Dosa , which is a popular south indian dish , you would know. so it was basically ice cream with nuts in a wrapper made up off Dosa!!. it was really amusing to see our own old dosa being transformed in such a innovative way 🙂
We then walked till Pier 3 where we bought some coffee from peet’s coffee and Tea and took a break from our explorations. People were hurrying to return back to home from office .many were waiting for the ferry ride back to home. how they travel each day to and fro office in these ferries is another new thing i got to ponder about. while returning back to our car ,we went through a small park.Td was really amused by the park in the middle of the city. it was more of a dog’s park. I absolutely love dogs and i could see variety of them there .The park was well maintained.and we happily strolled there for some time ,marvelling at the statues out there.
So Finally my happy afternoon with td and the cup of pearl tea in my hand both ended , with me being rejuvenated to again start on this race of life.
our small trip thus came to end with an off road drive to one of the scenic spot on the way to half-moon bay .
td : “what are u thinking “
me : “mmm nothing .. just this place is taking my breath away . 🙂 “
“Gimme some more breaths ,
i wanna breath this new air,
i wanna taste this new dew ,
i wanna hug this new cloud ”
i wanna see this new leaf ,
i wanna love it all , love till i cant love anymore ”
P.S : I was standing on one side of the road waiting for the cable buses.Suddenly a small boy in one of the tourist bus waved at us , and i waved back .
Some day i was on that bus , now slowly i am transforming into the people from the other side of the bus. 🙂 happily !! not a tourist anymore , i guess.
namrataTanmay
yehzindegi 