Character Sketch

OR THE PEOPLE I FIND IN MY WANDERINGS OF THE BAY AREA

I have run into some noteworthy characters so far, people with interesting stories and unexpected pasts. I keep meaning to write this post, and then I meet another one. Darn, more characters! I grumble. How will I fit them all into one post? Well folks, I'll give you the best of the best according to people expert extraordinaire, Ray Gergen. (I feel like this is something I can safety yet pompously claim because of my major, Anthropology, and my passion, creating characters to act out on stage.)

Before we begin our tale, you my dear readers must be asking yourselves where do these characters come from? How do you meet people in the Bay area? I may have become braver. I have gotten over my fear of finding a free seat in cafeterias -- big spaces with lots of people but no friends and therefore no safe space to sit in. Now, I sit down willy nilly at any table I please, introduce myself and, actually, usually get a smile and a hello in return. And then, if I'm lucky, a story. The Indian girl who loves America because all her idols are from here: Jim Morrison (of The Doors), Pete Townshend (of The Who), Jimmy Page (of Led Zeppelin), people and groups I also love. The Chinese girl who ballroom dances competitively and shares a love of Blues dancing with me.

I may have become a better listener. (Thank you SIC roleplay training.) I find people just open up to me. And if I pause and listen, they tell me the longest stories on the train, on the street, anywhere. Like the women on the Bart train who was also an Anthropology major and who taught English in Eastern Africa for a few years. Or the lady who helped Judy and I pick wild plums off of a fraternity bush. She pushed and pulled the branches just right so that our harvest was quite big. She was so excited by the Shansi fellowship. "Sounds like life is good." she said, after hearing about my 2 year's worth of future plans.

[Of course, Judy is of Tamara and Judy, my Canadian friends whom I adventured with often, to places as diverse as Napa valley and the Cheeseboard Collective Pizza Shop. They have returned to Canada, leaving me to press on alone. They are certainly missed in Berkeley.]

San Francisco also seems to be a pretty friendly city, especially compared to London, which considering how reserved the Brits are with strangers, isn't saying much. But London is the only other city I've cut my teeth on.

How do I know SF is nice? Two complete strangers have complimented me, in seemingly asexual, genuine ways. Once on the Bart train, while I was doing Chinese homework, a manish boy upon exiting the train, for I was sitting next to the door, told me that "You are so awesome!" The passenger next to me smirks "He took his time saying that ." True, too true. Just today, someone else complimented me on the Led Zeppelin patch I have on my messenger bag. After these mystery people state their thoughts they simply walk away. Friendliness or blunt and pleasant honesty? Either way, it's nice.

And you cannot forget my daily run-ins with the residents of I-House in the halls, at the front desk, in the elevator, in the Great Hall, in the bathroom. I've met an RA who took the Japanese version of my summer, beginning Chinese class and quit. Whenever we run into each other, we commiserate about the seeming lack of pedagogy in summer intensive language classes and cheer each other on in our personal struggles to master an Asian language as native English speakers. (He continues his study in his free time.) The Cyprian, who studies in Lebanon, and fluent in Arabic, explains Arabic texting to me: "we don't use Arabic script, we use letters and numbers" Why numbers? "Each number represents a sound English doesn't have." He confessed that his handwritten Arabic was rusty. "I can't think in Arabic. ...I haven't taken a class in Arabic, other than Arabic literature classes, since 9th grade." It has all been in English. And my friend is a graduate student. [Basically all the graduate students here are doing research, and it's all in some kind of engineering or law.] And of course, my favorite are the linguistic conversations. People love knowing about Chinese grammar or just practicing their colloquial English. In exchange for me playing teacher, I get to hear free lessons in topics as interesting as Finnish grammar and Dutch law versus Dutch practice -- apparently two very different things, because "Even thought things are illegal, we just don't care that people do them". Very unAmerican indeed: we care even when there isn't a law against the behavior.

Oh the things you learn when you pause, listen, sit by a new face.

p.s. I found a great and truthful guide ready to shed light on my fellowship: Dr. Seuss.