DeeKnow’s Grotto

We made it to San Fran after the ungodley 4:30 sleep eviction this morning to catch our flight. Made it with loads of time to spare (must be Jamies good influence). If it had been up to me I woulda slept in and taken a later cab.. sweating it all the way there in case I missed checkin.

We spent the whole day pretty much wandering round the down-town sites, maritime museum, lunch at fishermans wharf, up to the tower (cant remember its name) thru China town and back along Market to our hostel (which is a cool old retired hotel) in the Tenderloin district. 

San Fran is just the same place of contrasts it was last time I visited. One thing that disturbs me about it is the volume of street folks (90% of which are black, the rest teenage or retirement age europeans). There is a significant homeless problem here, obvious as hell if you take a couple of wrong (or right?) turns when walking between tourist hot-spots.

Last time I read an article in a local paper describing the cities solution for the problem. Every few months they round all the homeless up and load them onto buses (Nazi style) and ship them out to low-cost housing in the 'burbs. Problem is they like/want to live in town so eventually they all drift back into their favoutite sleeping shelters in the centre of town.

I have no idea what the solution to the problem is, no doubt drugs is an issue, but without them alchohol would fill the gaps. The truth is there's an awkward balance in the brotherhood of homeless that seems to work as a community. Sure they get beaten up for crack money once in a while, but they dont all look miserable. There's some perverse element of choice involved there.

8:43:03 AM