September 19, 2002

A time and date check shows the dateline to be a Thursday in July in San Francisco, 2002. The prompter on the notepad for the day reads: "As a last resort on a trip, ask for directions." My friend and I are sitting on a bench in a park one block from the Grant Street gate to Chinatown. We are resting from a hard, needless climb up on the highest hills in San Francisco. The real reason we are resting is because I remembered a shortcut from downtown to Chinatown.

The park has changed from the 1980s. Back then, around the block at a Chinese joint offering takeout orders of dim sum dumplings, a couple of bucks purchased a nice picnic lunch. Now six or seven bucks makes a small ding on the cash register in the same place. After a short rest, we walked through the gate to become part of the throng of tourists shopping for bargains.

Thursday is marketing day for the citizens of Chinatown. Grandchildren lead the crumpled ancients from grocery market to grocery market to stalls of dried mushrooms and tubs of live turtles hidden from the hordes of visitors. Try these descriptions, please: "the implacable oriental faces of the weathered ones" or "the inexorable movement of the ancient ones." Comes close to the sight of frail solemn grandparents guided so carefully by youngsters who might be great-grandchildren instead of grandchildren. If words are exchanged, the exchange is too quiet to detect in the hubbub of the market. To peek in the shopping bags would be too serious an invasion to risk.

One set of directions I do follow is Fromer's guidebook. In the Guide To San Francisco, page 63, the book states, "The New Asian Restaurant serves the best food in Chinatown." Fromer's misses noting that 95 percent of the customers at lunch are Asian locals. Nor does the book explain that the busy restaurant refuses credit cards at lunch. Once the routine of ordering dim sum dumplings from waitresses unable to speak English is mastered, the method of payment doesn't matter. All the Chinese needed to translate is to point on the menu, or point at a steaming dish of dumplings on the cart. The New Asian, by the way, doesn't suit the Betty Crocker palate. The Chinese are very clean. However, the adventure of eating shark fins instead of chicken might be too much the first time.

Later, I was taught a lesson on adventurous eating. One night in the Thai restaurant, a ginger-flavored soup made from giant prawns and a red pepper used in Thailand to singe the fuzz off the Buddhist monks' heads turned my mouth into an inferno. An inferno that'd make Zoro the flaming sword eater think he'd been slipped a branding iron. The reaction was so intense, I dreamed I sat on the sunny side of the bullfight ring in Acuna, Mexico, drinking straight jalapeno juice, too broke to buy a bottle of Corona beer. The gastric attack struck so fierce that dissolved bicarbonate of soda hitting the boiling caldron of my stomach solidified.

On another jaunt, in contrast, we found a Persian restaurant dedicated to cooking such delicate food, Persians must be akin to stove fairies or light-fingered kitchen nymphs. The roast lamb turned from a spit onto a deep red sauce of pomegranates and walnuts made such a fine touch that a serving in the right place could bring world peace. Nut flavors and maybe ginger enhanced the marinades. The waitress stood poised about six feet from the table, ready for command. My napkin slipping off my lab caused such a flurry of attention, I felt I'd committed a major insult to the management.

We used city buses for long rides and climbing the hills. Using public transportation gives a city flavor to a country guy. Makes us smell of chlorinated water and carbon pollution mixed with burnt grease off a hamburger grill. The hotel was also effective at calling cabs. Years ago, the then mayor cut licensing requirements for taxi drivers to solve a shortage of cabs. His honor should be remembered as the father of four-wheeled rocket ships. Took half a dozen rides before we learned we could be anywhere in the city in 20 minutes, make the first curtain calls, and still have time to read the billboards in front of the theater. On one ride, the back seatbelts lacked buckles; in frantic improvising, we knotted the webbing into a surcingle and still had a tough time staying on board.

The ascent to Chinatown tabled my shortcut plans. Be hard to convince a chicken fried steak man how good those Persians and Chinese cook. Fromers did a good job showing us around. I am sorry I missed the opportunity to clock one of those rocket ships on the straightaway, but to use a stopwatch, you have to be brave enough to keep your eyes open...

September 19, 2002

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