San Francisco, Day 1

Good morning, everyone!

This is long. I apologize. Please remember that you never have to read the whole thing. The way I'm thinking I'll set this up is that I'll have more "Here's what happened in crazy detail!" posts, and then I'll have more "When this happened, it made me think/feel/do this" posts. Those second type will be a little shorter and maybe more interesting. These first type are supposed to help me remember what happened, too, and they're kind of more like a journal. So...GO.

Yesterday, I was all plucky and went to San Francisco by myself. Having dealt with Hannover trains and transfers and big transfer stations, I figured I'd be OK. I was trying to get to the Presidio, which was only going to require a CalTrain, the regional train system that got me up to San Francisco from Menlo Park, where I'm staying; a quick transfer to a MUNI subway/above ground train; and finally a quick walk and then a transfer to the Presidio Presidigo free bus shuttle. I knew all the numbers and stops, had googled mapped it the night before, and had google maps going in my ear via my headphones so it didn't look like I was being too touristy but so that I could still hear if I was going the wrong way (thanks again, Daddio, for that advice. Even if it did pertain to sleasy taxicabs). So, the point is, there may have been a bump or two, but this was generally supposed to be the easy day of the trip.

The first part of the trip went fine. I got on my double decker train with no issue--Double decker communter train, guys! I know I shouldn't be this excited, but I just think that is so cool. I got to ride a double decker regional in Germany with Uncle Wolfie, but that was a long ride and an expensive ticket. Amtrak's double deckers are only for long hauls.

It's when I hit San Fransisco that things got a little dicey. I wanted to go to a Walgreen's to get a Clipper card, which is a ticket that would get me reduced fares and could be used on all of the transit systems in the city. I got turned around coming out of the station, and almost walked into two or three homeless people, quite literally sprawled out on the ground in front of me, one leaning on a trash can. Everyone around me was OK with this. I was taken aback. Pittsburgh has homeless people, but from what I've seen they aren't that noticeable. Maybe, too, it was the fact that it was about 10:00 AM when I got there, and I kind of expected them to be up and doing things, not sprawled out asleep? Anyway, it was jarring, and was my first taste of the city of San Francisco.

I got myself turned the right way, and found the Walgreens I was looking for, got my card, all that. I left the building, and got back to the Caltrain station. I was supposed to take the N train on the MUNI light rail, but I realized I didn't know what stop to get off at. So I sat down on a bench and started figuring it out with my phone, trying to look at the MUNI website, and Google maps, and the Presidio website, but nothing was working on my phone. While I wasn't completely panicked, I was getting upset and nervous about all the people around me. I went and looked at actual, physical maps on the wall, and decided I looked too touristy again (a fear I have, since I think that tourists get attacked more than not-tourists), so I went back to my bench. I had finally decided I would just get on the train and just ride it until I was bored and then I'd go home, Presidio be damned, when I saw the most welcome of sights, a sight that brought warmth to my heart and joy to my belly:

A Panera was nestled just across the street from me, with the MUNI station right between us. I would never lose eye contact with any of my destinations, and I would be safe inside a place where people routinely check their phones and mutter to themselves.

I went in, got a bagel and some tea to give me something to do, and got my phone to work. I finally just put the addresses in my Google maps app, and of course, it started telling me where to go, and how many stops I had until I was supposed to get off. It even calculated the fare for me. I threw away my trash in the compost bin by accident (there were 5 to choose from. I was confused) and headed out.

Since my MUNI train left from CalTrain Station, albeit on a platform across the street, I thought it was part of the CalTrain system, and that the day pass I had bought before leaving that morning would work. However, as I sat and calmed down a bit, it occurred to me that there were fares prices taped all over the place, and everyone who came in was paying the conductor $2. So then I started worrying, because I only had $2.00 in cash, and if I was supposed to pay, I would need that for the ride home (I forgot about my clipper card). And if I wasn't supposed to pay, I would have wasted my $2. I kept waiting for the conductor to yell at me, but he was oblivious, and I didn't want to ask any of the other passengers what to do because they were all stoically and pointedly not looking at each other. So I just sat there and when my stop came, I got off. By the time I was leaving I was like 99% sure I was supposed to have given them $2, but then I was worried that if I paid on the way out I would still get yelled at and have to pay the fine, and being all Joe Cool had been working for me up to this point. So basically, I stole a ride. I'm sorry, MUNI of California.

I got out at the busy Embarcardero stop, and handled it like a champ, only balking once at the automated out gate, worried that since I didn't pay on the train I was going to be stuck forever. I wasn't. When I got out, there was a woman standing at the top of the stairs holding a sign that said "Lost Everything But My Dog--Please Help" and, of course, there was an adorable little dog, smaller than Sadie, with a cute little ink dog jacket on. It was chilly enough to need it, and it was kind of shabby. Everyone else was ignoring her, and I did too, because I was sure I was going to start crying if I didn't. A little further down, a woman was handing out free SmartFood samples--they have new foods and new flavors. A lot of people were stopping for the free food. I didn't, because I didn't have anywhere to put it. Beyond that, someone had set up a shabby looking shoeshine spot, and there were some piles of coats and stuff shoved in a corner, so I assumed the operator was homeless, or a homeless person lived there.

I spent the next hour looking for a bus stop that doesn't exist. I walked a two block radius about 5 times, all because my GPS couldn't make up its mind and kept telling me I was 500 feet to the left. I'm pretty sure all of the business people eating at the outdoor cafes thought I was insane. There was a ton of construction around the place where I was supposed to go for the Presidigo bus, and no Panera for me to hide in and figure things out. After about 45 minutes I finally got my phone to download the Presidio website, and there was a huge "SHUTTLE STOP MOVED" alert on the front page, which I somehow missed in my scouting the night before, or forgot about. Of course, I read the map of the move wrong, so I was going the opposite direction when I saw the bus zoom by, late to its pick up. On the plus side, I knew what the bus looked like now, so I could keep an eye out for it when I found the actual stop, which was three blocks down from the original spot. On the down side, I was about five blocks away from the new spot.

I missed the bus by about 5 minutes, which meant I had about an hour to wait for the next one. I considered just calling it a day at this point; the city was so loud, and everyone was so involved in themselves, and I kept passing homeless people, and all I could think about was my $2 cash and my half-eaten bagel and how pitiful it would be to give them that. Very few seemed to be begging, too, which made me wonder if they had just given up or what; most were just sprawled out sleeping. In the park that I waited for the bus at, there were two or three groups of homeless just sleeping, with carts full of their stuff. One guy had luggage, and I saw a woman sleeping with a dog that looked like a skinnier, smaller, brown Sadie. And no one seemed to be paying attention. This was around the Embarcadero, which seemed like a huge tourist attraction, and right across the street from the Hyatt or the Wyndam or something, and so I was just really mad and sad that people just walked around and ignored the 5 sleeping homeless people right outside of their tourist picture. Of course, so did I. It made me feel really helpless, which made me feel worse, because if I felt helpless, how did these people feel? Oh, it was a spiral of guilt that just kept on going, making me feel worse and worse about the whole morning. I sat down in the grass and mulled about it for a while, getting grass stains on my pants, and then feeling guilty that I was mad about grass stains on my pants when the poor little brown dog was starving to death.

Eventually, I decided that I would wait until noon; if the bus didn't come by then, I would go home.

The bus did come, and I made it to the Presidio around noon. I'm glad I went; it was really calming and relaxing. There were almost no people there, or at least it seemed that way, and there was so much open green space that I finally felt like I could breathe. It was my kind of nature, too: well groomed, paved sidewalks, landscaped hills and man-made ponds. I stayed there for about two hours; I walked up to a scenic overlook to see the Golden Gate Bridge and the Bay; I think I saw Alcatraz. I walked down and back to the Palace of Fine Arts, and just spent some time sitting and decompressing. I was able to relax. My phone was dying, so as soon as I had gotten on the bus, I had turned it off. I took some pictures, but they didn't really hit the quiet feel of the place. Apparently, I was sitting in Lucasfilm's garden and didn't know it. It was very pretty.

The ride home was uneventful. I just retraced my steps, picking up some free Smart popcorn this time, and despite going to the train, not the subway, section of MUNI, I got back to CalTrain with no problems. An old man on the train told me I looked pretty--"You are a fine looking young lady"--which was nice, although he was old and scruffy and possibly lecherous, so I snuggled up to the Chinese woman and her really loud son when we got off the train and followed them into the station. Honestly, that was the most direct conversation that I had with a person all day, minus ordering my food and giving two people directions.

When I got home, I told  Rachel about the two homeless women with dogs I had seen, and she told me that homelessness was a huge problem in San Francisco. We got pizza for dinner and drank wine (Well, I did) and watched Chuck while Rachel worked on a presentation for work. I'm kind of amazed by how much the day took out of me. Navigating downtown was really tough, tougher than I remember Hanover being. Of course, I'm sure I was crying the first time I tried to do Hanover alone, but for whatever reason then I felt like I could go up to people and ask for help. Ironic, since I always started it with "Entschuldigung, mein Deutsch ist nicht so gut. Sprechen Sie English?" Here, people actually spoke English and I felt like there was no one to help. 

Today, I was supposed to go into San Francisco again. I walked close to 5 miles yesterday, and my knee was giving me issues last night. It cost me around $18 to get around the city, and that was just with one transfer that I actually paid for (the one one the way home). I'm going back in on Tuesday, and like I said, yesterday took a lot out of me. I decided I'd stay home and read books about trains, and do this write up, which has taken me almost an hour and a half now, and possibly wander around Menlo Park. Tomorrow, I leave for Sacramento and the California State Railroad Museum. I'm excited; I signed up for a special train ride through a redwood forest (not the Redwood forest) on a Steam Powered locomotive with 1930s special riding car or something. Sunday, I might go back, or I'll find something else to do in Sacramento. I'll post some more pictures here of yesterday's Presidio trip! 

Thanks for reading! 
Bethie