Monthly Archives: August 2012

Post #77: Plane Spotting at SFO

Post #77: Plane Spotting at SFO.

Two industrial smells have always inspired me: one is the smell of a freshly printed book or magazine (a smell that reminds me of my Dad, even to this day), and the other is jet fuel.

I love the smell of jet fuel in the air. It’s a smell filled that triggers equal parts memory and imagination. I remember Mum piling us kids into the car in our PJs to go pick my Dad up from airport after his business trips. Being at Nippers on Sunday mornings at Eloura Beach, watching the 747s fly in over Kurnell. Winding down my car window on my way to uni, inhaling deeply, hoping that the next trip was not too far off. It’s a smell I connect with impending adventure.

Airports are infinitely interesting to us. So when we’re not actually travelling, we love to visit them. The American has been an avid plane spotter for decades, and used to memorise the timetables of the major airlines in days before the internet. I love planes, but I also love the emotional element experienced at airports. We’re both travellers at heart (in the non-Gypsy sense of the word). It’s a shared passion.

The fog starts creeping in over SFO.

Yesterday, we spent the day out at SFO, San Francisco International Airport. From our regular vantage spot near Millbrae Bart, we watched the comings and goings of beautiful pieces of machinery. It was high tide, and consequently there was only a hint of the salty smell of marshland to mix with the jet fuel and cooling breeze. The breeze mitigated the sun’s strength on my skin. Local pelicans circled above the water, eyeing their prey before belly-flopping onto the surface of the water in a most ungraceful manner. I wondered if they were ever successful with a strategy like that. There was a slight haze in the air, the fog creeping in over the mountains above South San Francisco. Mount Diablo stood watch over the bay, rising out of the haze on the eastern shore. We threw a baseball around in between the notable landings and take-offs.

Air France arrives while Mt Diablo looks on.

Planes in, planes out. Planes up, planes down. The technological and engineering side of the airport is beautiful, and seeing the A340-600 glide in is one of my favourite experiences. It’s the most perfectly proportioned plane ever made. But for me, the real beauty in airports is the human experience. The farewells with tears, the arrivals with tears. Flowers, balloons, handmade signs and the biggest hugs imaginable. The expectant looks on the faces of those waiting for loved ones to exit, craning their necks to see if the person with the red suitcase is their wife/husband/brother/sister, the squeals of delight when they see them. It’s seeing people awkwardly pass the time until their flight with their loved ones in the food courts, the final wave goodbye as they enter security. It’s the longing on the face of the weary traveller who doesn’t have the welcome/farewell their cabin mate does.

The opening scene of the movie, Love Actually, is one of my all time favourites:

“Whenever I get gloomy with the state of the world, I think about the arrivals gate at Heathrow Airport. General opinion’s starting to make out that we live in a world of hatred and greed, but I don’t see that.It seems to me that love is everywhere. Often, it’s not particularly dignified or newsworthy, but it’s always there – fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, husbands and wives, boyfriends, girlfriends, old friends.

When the planes hit the Twin Towers, as far as I know, none of the phone calls from the people on board were messages of hate or revenge – they were all messages of love. If you look for it, I’ve got a sneaking suspicion… love, actually, is all around.” — Love Actually

I love imagining where these people are going, and where they’re arriving from, or heading to. Is it an exotic destination like Singapore or Abu Dhabi? Or something a little less interesting like Boise, Idaho? What’s their relationship? Is this a happy trip or a quick jaunt for business? How long has it been since they’ve seen each other?

The airport is a place filled with as much happiness as it is sadness. And I love that.

Up, up and away.

Credits: I’ve been playing around with Pugly Pixel‘s tutorials this week, so you can thank her for the snazzy looking photo arrangements!

Post #76: The Brown Twins of San Francisco

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Post #76: The Brown Twins of San Francisco.

The first saw them about a week after I moved to the neighbourhood. They sat by the restaurant window, dressed in matching outfits of animal print. Twins. In the few seconds it took to walk by, I was taken. They were intriguing, vivacious. Instinctively, I wanted to know more about them.

I returned home and told the American. He said, “Oh, those twins? They’re famous. Everyone in San Francisco knows them. They even have a Wikipedia page.”

The Brown Twins: Marian and Vivian, dining at their reserved table at Uncle Vito’s Pizza in San Francisco.

[Source: SF Chronicle]

That was my first introduction to the Brown Twins. Since then, I have seen them at least weekly, usually dining at Uncle Vito’s and sharing a small pizza. They always dress elegantly, and have more than 100 matching outfits to choose from. Even mid-meal, their lipstick is immaculate and never is a hair out-of-place. They’re icons: plenty of locals and tourists alike have stopped to pose with these grand old dames who do everything together.

The Twins have been turning heads in San Francisco since they relocated from Michigan in 1970. At their one-bedroom apartment on the crest of Nob Hill (a building most notable for its role in Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo), they sleep in matching single beds. Neither of them married, but they did once date twins they met at a twin convention in Milwaukee.

A food reviewer for The Chronicle a few years ago summed up the San Francisco pair this way: “These two ladies with their elegantly arched brows, full-blown coifs and tiny, tailored suits, embody a spirit that makes the city so distinctive.” — SF Chronicle

San Francisco icons.

[Source: SF Chronicle]

The Brown Twins are celebrities of a very different nature. They adore having a chat to people on the streets and posing for pictures. They’re great ambassadors of the city of San Francisco, and have featured on numerous commercials and television programs. They even have a Flikr pool devoted to photos of them and musical theatre troupe the SF Follies has immortalised the twins as part of their cabaret act.

They remind me of “old San Francisco.” Going “downtown” in your classiest attire. Hats, gloves and all. — Paris Hotel Boutique

Marian and Vivian love a glass of red with their pizza.

[Source: SF Chronicle]

I have only met them a few times, but one of their best assets is their sense of humour.

The Brown twins, Vivian and Marian, are window shopping [at Macy's], dressed identically and carrying matching little red bags. They love the city and the [Christmas] season, they are saying. They talk together, one finishing the other’s sentences.
“We came here from Kalamazoo, Michigan,” Vivian said. “It’s too cold in the winter and too hot in the summer there.”
“Oh, yes,” Marian said, “The rest of California is nice, but San Francisco is paradise.”
They like the December weather here.
“All you need is a good wrap,” Vivian said. They have matching coats, of course.
“They call this faux fur,” said Marian, “But I call it fake. That’s spelled F-A-K-E.”
They laughed. They’d gathered a little crowd and posed for snapshots with visitors from Millbrae and San Bruno.
– SF Chronicle

These ladies have a gravitational pull. They love life, and it’s hard not to be affected by their Joie de vivre!

I often regaled the stories of the Twins and what they were wearing during Skype calls home. And when my family came to visit us last year, they were delighted to meet the Twins right where I said they would be: at Uncle Vito’s. And these saucy ladies were in fine form!

My 6 foot 2 sister (kneeling, because we struggled to fit everyone in the shot if she was standing) with 5 foot 1 SF icons Marian and Vivian Brown, at Uncle Vito’s. July 2011.

Recently, I had been wondering why I’d not seen them around the neighbourhood. Then I read in the SF Chronicle that Vivian had a dementia-related fall last month. She had to be admitted to a 24-hour care facility, and has been there ever since. Marian is only able to visit her twice a week — a painful division for the women who have spent the majority of their lives in each other’s company. From all reports, Vivian’s dementia has reached a stage where she will never be able to return to their home to Nob Hill.

Marian dines alone at Uncle Vito’s ever since her twin, Vivian, was admitted to hospital.

[Source: SF Chronicle]

It’s a sad state of affairs. Many have offered their support to the Brown Twins. People have paid for Marian’s daily meal at Uncle Vito’s, my local pizzeria. Others have provided transportation and/or cab fare for Marian to visit her sister in hospital. One person even provided burial plots for the Twins, after Marian had expressed concerns about them being separated in the afterlife. And the Jewish Family and Children’s Services are collecting money on their behalf (irrespective of the fact the Twins are protestant) to provide a home for the twins to live out their golden years together. It says one thing about San Francisco: we care, and we all want to give back to the Twins who have given so much to this city.

The Brown Twins: as San Francisco as the TransAmerica Pyramid.

[Source: Field Notes from a Noticer]

This week, I’ll stop by Uncle Vito’s to slip the waiter a card for Marian and some money to cover her favourite meal: a personal pizza, glass of red and slice of chocolate cake. She and her sister have been such an integral part of the fabric of my San Francisco, and I want the chance to tell her how bright my days are whenever I see them.

Post #75: Walking California

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Post #75: Walking California.

I love picking streets for our regular urban hikes and seeing where they take us. Today, the American and I picked California. We are well versed in what California looks like on Nob Hill, so we joined California at Polk and headed toward the ocean.

Walking up California Street.

Storybook houses.

I would feel like a movie star if I were living there. Good type can do that.

Ornate Victorian ladies.

One of my favourite apartment buildings in the city. California at Laguna.

Hidden ladybugs!

A beautiful attic apartment.

Flowering viney things. Very San Francisco.

We traversed California through the other side of Nob Hill, Pacific Heights/Lower Pac Heights, Laurel Heights and the Inner Richmond. California is a great street — certainly more interesting than Geary — with surprisingly diverse architecture. There’s the ubiquitous Victorian terraces, art deco apartment buildings and concrete blobs from the 1970s. There’s even some ranch-style structures that would be more at home in the East Bay, but I admired their chutzpah.

I’ve heard good things about Pizzeria Delfina. It’s on my list.

Love the signs around this city.

Yarnbombed bike stand outside the Jewish Center.

Sutro Tower before @KarlTheFog gobbled him up.

One of my favourite coffee shops in The City. It has no name, but you can find on California at 8th Avenue. I dug their lattes and laid back Avenues vibe.

Recently, I bought new shoes. I have been wearing them in, and today I decided it would be great to take them walking. Not the best idea. Two rather large blisters, a horrendous #1 Muni ride home and an unhappy Bec. But if I didn’t have blistered heels and have to wimp out and catch the bus home, then we wouldn’t have seen this: