Wisdom For One Dollar
A figure in a box found in San Francisco's Chinatown that is supposed to represent the Chinese philosopher Confucius. If you deposit $1.00 a card is printed out with some of his sayings printed on it as the figure moves and talks, saying 'why don't you share some more of your wealth and I will share more of my wisdom?'.
Welcome To Chinatown!
The main street of San Francisco's Chinatown (Grant Avenue) with welcoming decorations for its Autumn Moon Festival.
A Lion dance In Chinatown
A Lion Dance is performed in San Francisco's Chinatown accompanied by two cymbal players and a very young drummer playing a very big drum. The performers were there as part of Chinatown's Autumn Moon festival.
Traditional Dress At The Autumn Moon Festival
A double portrait of a couple dressed in traditional Chinese clothing at the Autumn Moon Festival in San Francisco's Chinatown.
A Busy Place At The Autumn Moon Festival
A crowd of people that were both stopping and passing by this booth that was selling colorful whirling decorations at the Autumn Moon Festival.
Flowers, A Ship, Happiness, Enjoyment
Street art found on a wall in San Francisco's Chinatown.
Chinatown, 1889
This is street art from Chinatown, San Francisco which refers to the year 1889. That time was difficult for Chinese in the USA because a law called the 'Chinese Exclusion Act' was in force which barred further emigration of 'laborers' to the USA from China and made it difficult for Chinese in the USA who left the country to return. Thankfully that law has been repealed.
Buddha On The Street
This is a street painting of Buddha with a stylized image of San Francisco's skyline on his chest found on an old building in the city's Chinatown.
In The Asian Art Museum (I)
A stairs in the interior of San Francisco's Asian Art Museum which is housed in the city's former main library building. The museum has one of the most comprehensive collections of Asian art in the world.
In The Asian Art Museum (II)
In The Japanese Tea Garden (I)
A Buddha statue in the Japanese Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco. This bronze statue was cast in Japan in 1790 and at almost 11 feet (3 meters) high is probably the largest statue of its kind outside Asia.
In The Japanese Tea Garden (II)
A view of the garden with a stone lantern on the left and a pagoda and metal lantern on the right with dwarf trees planted in front of them.
In The Japanese Tea Garden (III)
This is the Peace Lantern which was presented to the United States in 1953 having been bought with the donations of Japanese school children as a symbol of Japanese friendship with the USA. It is made of bronze and weighs 9,000 pounds (4082 kilograms).
In The Japanese Tea Garden (IV)
Looking back at the Japanese Tea Garden from the grounds of the neighboring de Young Memorial Museum of art. The building shown is the tea house.
San Francisco's Cable Cars (I)
San Francisco has the last manually operated cable car system in the world. Cable cars operate by gripping a cable that runs under the street to move the cars on routes that include going up and down San Francisco's very steep hills. Once used for ordinary transportation the cable cars are now mostly used by tourists who account for the majority of the seven million cable car rides a year. This photo shows a cable car at the end of a line being turned around manually on a turntable by the car's gripman. The gripman operates the controls of the car which brake it to a stop and restart it at cable car stops along its route.
San Francisco's Cable Cars (II)
The conductor (on the left) and the gripman of this cable car manually turn their car into position to make another trip through its route. Aside from moving the car the conductor primarily collects fares and keeps the passengers in order while the gripman operates the controls of the car. The tracks that the car came in on are in the left in the image with the slot that holds the cable that moves the car in the middle of the tracks.
San Francisco's Cable Cars (III)
The conductor points at someone on the full cable car. From where he is pointing it may be that he is telling someone to move who is standing in a reserved area that the gripman needs when he moves the cable car controls. In the conductor's left hand is a hook which he uses to adjust cable car system controls that are under the street by the orange cone.
San Francisco's Cable Cars (IV)
The cable car from the previous image is finally moving down the tracks after being turned around and then loaded with passengers. The car is being pulled along by the moving cable which is under the street in the long slot that is midway between the tracks for the wheels.
San Francisco's Cable Cars (V)
This shows the controls which the gripman uses to attach and detach the car from the cable that runs beneath the street. Also shown is the nearest control which is a brake pedal. He is also responsible for ringing a bell using a rope in the car's ceiling.
San Francisco's Cable Cars (VI)
A gripman smiles as he talks to someone during a break at the end of the cable car's route. In a few moments he will ring the car's bell, adjust the controls and begin another run of the cable car.
Inside A Skyspace
This photo is from a type of room called a Skyspace constructed on the grounds of the de Young Museum in Golden Gate Park in San Francisco. This particular Skyspace is called 'Three Gems'. The purpose of this room, according to its creator James Turrell, is to render the immaterial nature of light tangible by making changing light effects from a hole in the ceiling and a concealed lighting system.
Dancing In Golden Gate Park
Every week an informal group gathers in Golden Gate Park and dances, just for fun.
A Peace Sign From The Love Tour
San Francisco was a center of the hippie movement whose high point was 1967's 'Summer Of Love'. That year and the hippies are now largely confined to history but some entrepreneur has a tour company showing tourists the sights of that era in a hippie style painted VW bus. The bus was stopped in traffic when a woman tourist smiled and sent a peace sign my way as I photographed the bus.
The Golden Gate Bridge (I)
This looks north from San Francisco to Marin county. The large building in the foreground is Fort Point which was built in 1861 to protect San Francisco and ships carrying gold from the California mines. It was closed in 1900 but left in place when the bridge was built in the 1930's.
