People watching

Shoutout to the early-risers. As I type these blog posts out on (weekday) mornings, I greatly enjoy the view out of the window of people who are up as early as I am (about 6:30 AM is when I begin typing). Some are on their way to a slogging commute, and others are simply walking their dogs. Whatever the reason, it’s a kindred spirit of people who wake up early, an empathetic bond.

I just wish some of them would get their heads out of their smartphones. Look around! Take in the morning air! Listen to the birds!

The quiet hours in the morning radiates a calm that I relish very much. The theatre of the color change as the sky turns from dark to light is rather magical. It’s best observed with a cup of coffee, or whichever morning beverage of your choice. The only trouble is getting up early, because it means going to sleep early as well. I’m lucky to have a choice; I have two hours to myself before I even have to think about leaving for work. Kudos to those who must get out of bed at an ungodly hour because of work. You folks are the true morning warriors.

Yesterday’s morning sky was slightly ominous as there was an orange tinge to the morning sun. Alas, the smoke from the wildfires burning to the east have finally made their way to our coastal enclave. In what has sadly become a yearly tradition, wildfire season brings horrible air quality to much of northern California. Good thing we’ve been accustomed to wearing masks, thanks to the COVID pandemic. I guess it’s time to mask back up whenever I’m outdoors again.

Somewhat coincidently, my Coway air purifiers alerted me to needing to change the odor filter. In the process I’m reminded of how important it is to have this purifier, because the HEPA filter - not due for a change for another six months - already looks kind of horrible. It’s definitely doing the job, and I’m counting on this thing to get me through fire season and beyond.

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Morning, California.

Well this is not good!

I opened up the blinds this morning to an intensely smokey sky, immediately knowing that it’s not the usual fog we get here in San Francisco, an ominous sign for what’s currently happening in the Bay Area. As I’ve written on Monday, the region is experiencing a historic hot weather pattern, combined with freak thunderstorm conditions this past Sunday. This uniquely combustable mix have finally cracked open the gates to hell as the lightning have lit several wildfires that are burning right now. Evacuation orders are in affect for areas in the Santa Cruz mountains and Vacaville, some homes have already been destroyed; and lest we forget, we are still in the middle of a bloody pandemic.

This is not good at all.

Slightly better news for San Francisco is that the heatwave is largely over for us; we’re solidly in the 70s during the day (some of us would say that’s still rather hot, spoiled brats) while rest of the Bay Area continues to suffer through high 90s and 100s that will last for the rest of this week. Surely that’s not going to help the fire-fighting efforts, and judging from what I’m reading on the news, we’re only in the beginning stages of containing the many blazes in the area. The governor of California have declared a state of emergency, which is somewhat hilarious because haven’t we been in a sort of state of emergency since early March?

2020 cannot get any more weird and horrible if it tried, and try it will: there’s still more than four months of the year left, and November elections are looming in the horizon. At this point it’s probably better to be prepared for the worst than holding to an optimistic position that things will only improve from here on out, that surely this is the bottom. I have no doubts that all of this will pass and we’ll get back to our preferred normal, but any thoughts of a fast resolution should be out the proverbial window by now. I certainly did not think that we’ll be sitting here in August facing another school year of remote learning, and yet here we are.

Right now I can only pray that the wildfires aren’t going to get much worse, and people in the area will be safe.

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My constant companion.

China is working hard to be green

I’ve now gone home to Guangzhou for the past five Januaries, and every single time, the city amazes me with how much it has advanced in quality-of-life aspects. I can remember back in 2016 I could barely breathe the air it was so choked full of smog; had similar conditions occur in San Francisco, we’d be advised to stay indoors, and classes would be cancelled. Fast forward to now, air quality in Guangzhou have improved so much that I have no problem spending two weeks there.

Mind you it’s still not the cleanest of air. I’d compare the current Guangzhou to a particularly bad air day in Los Angeles: not ideal, but very livable. The city government - and I’m sure the same is true for every major city in China as well - understands that smog and pollution is big issue, and it’s doing everything it can to address it.

On last year’s trip, I was utterly surprised to find the entire public bus fleet in Guangzhou have switched over to pure electric, a hefty undertaking that eliminates a huge source of emissions from the surface streets. The smug of you may say what good are electric buses if the power supplying those batteries comes from dirty coal that China is stereotypically known for. Well, bad news for those of you: Guangzhou is powered by nuclear energy.

I can’t even imagine San Francisco doing something similar, switching the SF MUNI fleet to electric. I’d be shocked if such a thing happens within the next twenty years.

On this most recent trip to Guangzhou, I found the city have begun a massive garbage sorting campaign. Propaganda was absolutely everywhere, and residents are now required to divide up their garbage properly before throwing out into the corresponding bins. Perhaps it’s bad on my part, but I honestly never thought I’d see the day that people living in China would have to sort their garbage like we do. With so much land and landfill, it’s far easier to simply lump it all together and haul it out - as it has been done for as long as I can remember.

Everyone sort of expects China to be this gross polluter, with its cities filled with smoggy skies. If Guangzhou is any indication for the rest of the vast country, then China knows it’s got a problem too, and it’s doing something about it at a pace and scale that’s impossible in the West.

I look forward to many days of clear blue skies in future trips back home.

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There’s a fire in the sky.

California is burning. Again.

Merely a year after the devastating Napa fires of the previous October, Northern California is once again engulfed in plums of dangerous smoke. Unseasonably dry and and windy conditions compounded the fiery conditions that started in the city of Paradise. By afternoon on the same day last Thursday, San Francisco - some 200 miles away from the epicenter - was already covered in a haze of orange.

The smokey calamity up north was joined by another blaze down south near the city of Malibu. Hundreds of thousands of residents from both Malibu and Paradis were forced to evacuate, and the structures lost amount into the many thousands. Deaths, too, in the tens and climbing; those unlucky few unable to escape in time.

With the ‘Camp Fire’ barely contained through much of the weekend, the air quality in San Francisco made outside activity untenable. Grumble as we may about being stuck at home on what was to be a nice long Veterans Day weekend, just shift perspective to the families that have lost homes in the fire: everything you’ve ever known to be secure and solid, gone in a flash. Suddenly our situation isn’t so bad at all.

I don’t think there’s any way possible to be mentality prepared for that kind of misfortune. Home insurance will no doubt cover most of it, but the strength and energy required to rebuild absolutely everything is something I can’t fathom. What was once quaint and vibrant neighborhoods are rendered into apocalyptic ghost-towns; where would you even begin?

Those of us fortunate enough to not be materially harmed by the ongoing fires in California owe it to the karmic gods to assist our neighbors in their time of great need. I urge you to donate whatever you can to the various verified GoFundMe campaigns dedicated to the cause. I fear we’re going to need each others help frequently in the years ahead as climate change produces more and more extreme weather events.

God bless the brave firefighters and first-responders ceaselessly working onwards.

Smog-filled afternoon sky in San Francisco on the same day the fires started in Paradise.

Interesting weekend

This past week leading into the weekend was interesting indeed.

Due to the smoke and fallout from the Napa fires engulfing the San Francisco atmosphere, classes - and therefore work - at State got cancelled from Thursday evening on until Monday morning. Due to my peculiar work schedule, it meant I only worked three hours on Thursday, and had the entire Friday off. 

It couldn't be helped, the air quality in the latter parts of the week was awful. I've been to China and even then it's comparable only on the worse days. The city was covered in a fog of dust, turning the midday sunshine into an amber orange you'd only find during sunset hours. Upon opening my front door, it smelled as if the entire city was having an outdoor bbq. On my commute I catch a glimpse of the new Salesforce Tower, and with each passing day last week it kept disappearing into a thicker and thicker smog. On Friday the building vanished entirely. 

Air quality didn't get better until Sunday. Naturally, I stayed indoors for the whole duration, less a few hours to run some errands.

In that time I managed to finish the third volume of 'The Last Lion', the biography of Sir Winston Churchill. Some 3,000 pages later, I don't think I shall endeavor to read another biography of that length. Not to say it was a bore; Churchill was a great man who led his country - and the world - through a time of unprecedented evil. Due to his circumstance of having been aristocratically born at the end of the Victorian era, living through the two World Wars, and witnessing the twilight of imperial Britain, Churchill is a unique character positing a fascinating study of the period. 

Conditions are much improved today, and good news up north the fires are for the most part contained. By the end of this week normal skies ought to resume for us San Franciscans.