Trapped at Berkeley : A Long Walk in San Francisco

Ok, I know I haven’t written in a very long time. College has gotten pretty intensive, so it is very difficult to find time to write daily posts. Nevertheless, I will continue to try to keep this MovableType updated as often as possible.

For the most part, this week has been normal - in the fact that I got assigned tons of work. On Tuesday, I went to my Math 1B lecture (155 Dwinelle, 2-3:30 PM) and was, again, disappointed by my professor’s horrible teaching methods. Consequently, I found myself dozing off numerous times during the lecture, but I was not alone. I was comforted by the fact that, during the periods that I was awake, I looked around and saw numerous other individuals taking a short nap. Perhaps they realized that listening to the professor wasn’t going to help…

Immediately after the lecture, I was faced with a tough decision: it was lunch time and I was hungry, but I needed to get to my Engineering 77 lab (1109 Etcheverry, 4-6 PM), which would start in 30 minutes. I gave in to my hunger and stopped by the Terrace Cafe, where I purchased a rice bowl. I had barely eaten half of my meal when I realized that I was running out of time. I hurriedly disposed of my meal and ran off to my lab, only to discover a note posted on the classroom door: the lab had been canceled. Understandably, I was both disappointed and angry, especially the latter. I was disappointed because I had been looking forward to seeing Berkeley’s computer facilities, but I was angry because I had to interrupt a perfectly good meal (for which I had paid WAY too much) and because I had to run to get to the classroom. Oh well, the next lab would be on Thursday…

But before Thursday came Wednesday. I ditched my Chemistry 4A lecture (100 Lewis, 9-10 AM) because I felt tired and somewhat sick, but I did get out of bed to come to my Math 1B discussion (7 Evans, 12-1 PM). I took a rather simplistic calculus quiz during the discussion and was bored out of my mind for the rest of the class. After my discussion, I walked across the hall to get to my Engineering 77 lecture (10 Evans, 1-2 PM), which I found mildly interesting. Afterwards, I returned to my dorm and had dinner at the Foothill DC.

Thursday, I ditched my Math 1B lecture (missing class is becoming a habit for me…) As a result, my first class that day was at 4 PM. Managing my time well, I left my dorm at 2 PM to go to the College of Chemistry library, where I used the Merck Index to finish some of my pre-lab work. After accomplishing that task, I walked over to the Terrace Cafe where I had lunch and burned some time by reading my Chemistry 4A laboratory manual. At 3:45, I left the Cafe and headed towards my Engineering 77 lab. When I arrived at the class, I felt immediate disappointment: the lab facility was just a bunch of networked Dell workstations running Windows 2000. I had definitely expected something better from the college that had invented BSD. Nevertheless, working in Windows did not slow me down too much; I finished my work in 1 hr and left the class.

I met Shufei at 6:30 for dinner at the Foothill DC, and as we were eating, there was an earthquake. It was pretty cool. The entire cafeteria went quiet, and everybody froze. I wonder what the non-Californian students were thinking…

I barely got any sleep that night, since I had to prepare for my Chemistry 4A lab on Friday. I ended up sleeping at 3 AM, which was a bad thing to do, but I couldn’t help it. I woke up at 7 AM on Friday and proceeded to get ready for my 9 AM Chemistry 4A lecture (100 Lewis). During the lecture, I alternated between faint consciousness and sleep, but I was (amazingly!) able to jot down some notes on molecular bonding.

I returned to my dorm and sought the help of a fellow Chemical Engineering major at Bowles. I had been stuck on one of the questions in my pre-lab, but with the help of a peer, was able to solve it. Cooperation rocks!

My Chemistry 4A lab went pretty smoothly. We worked in pairs, and I partnered up with Kevin Lee, another Chemical Engineering major who happened to be in most of my classes. We did two experiments: one involved the capture of hydrogen gas in a reaction and another involved calculating the atomic mass of a solid using a calorimeter. The greatest thing about those two experiments was being able to handle 12 M HCl. That stuff burns water! I wonder what it’ll do to human skin…

After we performed the two experiments, we did some glasswork in preparation for next week’s experiment. Everyone was given two glass tubes. Using those two pieces and a Bunsen burner, we each formed a right-angle piece, cut a short piece, and pulled a capillary. We fire polished all of our glass and annealed the pieces in a flame. And with that, our day was finished…

Which meant the weekend! Today, I woke up at 11 AM and got ready to go to San Francisco. Just as I was about to leave my dorm, though, Shane Vigil signed online. Since I haven’t talked to him in a couple of months, I decided to delay my trip for awhile to talk to him. Shane and I talked for a little more than an hour, and during that period, Jillian, who’s in Rome now, also signed on for a quick chat. When I was finished with both conversations, it was near 2 PM. I was about to cancel my San Francisco trip since I had not planned on leaving Berkeley that late in the afternoon, but for some reason I convinced myself to go.

I arrived in San Francisco around 2:45. I headed towards Chinatown and passed through the Chinatown Gate. I was totally surprised by the amount of people in Chinatown. It seemed as if some large celebration was going on, since there were exhibits and other things going on. As it later turned out, the Moon festival was occurring.

I worked myself free of the crowd and exited Chinatown towards the Financial District. There, I walked to the base of the Transamerica Pyramid and admired its wonderful architecture. From there, I headed north towards Coit Tower, which I could see in the distance.

After a few miles’ walk uphill, I arrived at the base of the tower. I paid the $3.75 fee to take the elevator to the top, where I was able to get a panoramic view of the city. It was stunningly beautiful. I took some pictures with my cell phone’s camera and headed back down. However, I made sure to note the direction towards Lombard Street as I headed down, because that would be my next stop…

But before I went to Lombard Street, I needed to get some refreshment. There was a snack truck parked at the base of the Coit Tower, but its prices were way too high. I decided to walk around a little bit, and I found a liquor store one block away from the tower. There, I paid $1.69 for a liter of Sprite, or approximately 1/3 the price the snack truck was charging. Once I quenched my thirst, I headed towards Lombard Street - or more specifically, the famous curvy section of it.

What most people fail to realize is that that section of Lombard Street rests upon the side of a hill. In fact, that was the whole reason for the curvy section in the first place: to stagger the slope of the hill so that early vehicles could safely descend it.

When I got there, I decided to have a little fun (or more appropriately, exercise). I walked up and down the hill using the stairs adjacent to the road. It was quite a hike, but it was really rewarding to see the road from above and from below.

By now, I was really hungry. I had originally planned to eat in Chinatown, but since the Moon festival was going on, most of the restaurants were packed. I ended up returning to my roots =). I decided to eat at In-N-Out.

Getting to In-N-Out, though, was a problem. Since I was in a section of San Francisco that I had never visited before, I needed directions. Luckily, I had packed a map of San Francisco into my backpack (which was kindly donated by Shufei). With that map, I found out that the In-N-Out was only 4 blocks away, so I quickly headed in the appropriate direction.

Since I was hungry, I bought a small meal of three 3×3s for slightly over $10. Eating one hamburger at the store and packing the rest into my backpack (like last week), I headed back towards Market Street, where the BART stations were located. However, this time, I didn’t use a map. I just walked towards the Transamerica Pyramid, which I knew would be a reliable landmark. Interestingly, I ended up at the Powell BART station, which I have never used before. Nevertheless, it was like any other BART station: it promptly took me back to Berkeley.

Below I post some pictures of my San Francisco adventure:

Alcatraz: