When the Almond Tree Blooms

It's a sunny Saturday morning in Fruitvale. A bit of chill still hangs in the air. I take a walk down to Fruitvale and Foothill to find something to eat. I pass a senior citizen outside the Posada de Colores retirement home. He greets me with a nod and a smile as I walk by. At the corner, the laundromat is already open and I see families dragging enormous sacks of clothing inside. The taco truck is still closed. On the other side of the street, day laborers gather in the Kragen parking lot, hoping for some work and a bit of pay to send back to families in Mexico, Guatemala and beyond. Picky shoppers crowd around big crates of corn that have just arrived outside one of the many produce stores that line that stretch of Foothill between Fruitvale and 35th Avenue. A dozen workers breakfast on rice, beans, pupusas, tacos and tamales outside the 'Pupusas Mi Lupita' stand. I go into a restaurant to order a licuado to soothe my hunger and still-unsettled stomach. Back at...

Hi Folks, I'm back in Oakland, I arrived late last night. I'm tired. I posted photos on my Picasa photo page. Come take a look: http://picasaweb.google.com/rfadam/QueLindaEsNicaragua# Last time I posted, I was about to leave for the Las Penitas beach not far from Leon. The short trip turned into more of an adventure than I had imagined. I took a bus from the centro near my hostel to a small mercado in the Subtiava barrio , where I boarded the bus to Las Penitas. There was a really annoying drunk on the bus--at 10 AM in the morning, he and his two buddies were already out of the minds from cheap aguardiente . He kept asking me over and over whether I was going to surf at the beach, so eventually I started ignoring him. The road to Las Penitas, like most roads in Nicaragua, is undergoing repairs and improvements, and on one of the spots under construction, our bus broke an axel. We all got off and waited for the next bus, which came, already full, in about ten m...

Clothes on the line, my backyward The plum tree Plums! In my earlier post, I was lamenting the fact that I was in Oakland instead of out on a wilderness trail. Now, a few weeks later, I am still sitting here in Oakland, this time listening to the various firecrackers and other incendiary devices the neighbors are igniting in preparation for July 4th. I am getting ready to leave on a camping trip tomorrow morning. I am excited to get out of town, but overall, have been very content to be in the Bay Area during what amounts to a five week pseudo-vacation from the elementary children. In the past few weeks, I've been working at the Park Elementary garden in Hayward two to three times a week, usually for four to six hours. I've also helped out with the high school program as well at Tennyson in Hayward. On my sometimes lengthy lunch breaks, I've been savoring the tastes of Hayward: Mexican hoagies, and burritos and aguas frescas from Chavez Market. On my other days,...

Photo: A rare Bay Area thundercloud, sour orange tree in my backyard in the foreground. Sometimes, when I become engrossed in a particular work of fiction, I feel as though my reality is somehow merging with the fantasy world being presented on film, paper or television. This has become the case with the HBO television series, The Wire . Recommended to me by a friend and former co-worker, The Wire came highly regarded, a must-watch. And so it has become for me, as I near the end of Season 4. Recently, The Wire concluded its final episode of Season 5; since I don't have HBO, I wasn't able to watch Season 5 as it aired on television. This may have been for the best, since I haven't made it through Season 4, and The Wire is certainly not the show where you can skip seasons or even episodes. I've watched every episode, from Season 1, in order. When I seek entertainment, like many other people, I am often looking for an escape, to leave my reality and enter into...

I realize it's been a while since I've posted, so I thought I'd fill in those of you who read this on some snippets from my life of late... Books: I just finished a fantastic book called Lost City Radio, by Daniel Alarcón, a Peruvian-born author who now resides in Oakland (and from his description of the neighborhood, probably not far from me). I'm not really in the game of writing literary reviews, but I would say the book is an excellent, though at times, difficult read. The story is set in a fictional South American country that bears many similarities with Peru: a dry coastal capital city, a mountain region and a jungle area. The book delves into the violence and disappearances that tore the country apart during a civil war. Of note, the author does an incredible job weaving recollections into the storyline. I highly recommend reading in; in fact, I bought the book, so if you're in the area, you're welcome to borrow it. Hikes: I've spent some t...

This weekend, we've had a rain storm, so I've taken the opportunity to rest up after another long week. Unfortunately, that means there will be no chance to take pictures, though. I was lucky last week to have my friend Chris visit from Boston. About three years ago, Chris, Anthony and I did some exploring in Oakland. I had just moved here from the Peninsula, and didn't know the city well. For some reason, we ended up heading east on International Blvd. looking for a place to eat. The only one open at that time in the evening (it wasn't really late, maybe around 7:30 PM) was a restaurant called "7 Courses of Beef", which was the only English phrase on the sign, at least. Not the most fortunate finding, since the three of us were nominal beef eaters and each ended up ordering the only item not containing beef on the menu, which if I remember right, was Pho with chicken. The food was fine, the restaurant was an experience of decor, plants and fish tank...

February 4, 2008: Nervous about Super Tuesday, but hopeful that Obama can pull it off and eventually get the nomination. Slightly pleased that the somewhat more respectable McCain is leading over the deplorable Romney (even though I don't have much love for Republicans). Current Book: "China Road", Rob Gifford Current Song: "SF Anthem" Traxamillion and San Quinn First in an installment. I hope to explore East Bay neighborhoods and take pictures. I'm not attempting to interview people to get the pulse of an area, but rather capture the images that strike me and hopefully create a visual sense of the community. I plan to do this a couple times of month. Let me know what you think. This being one of the few sunny, rainless days we've had of late, I decided to spend part of my day off walking through some Oakland neighborhoods instead of doing housework or studying. I live near High Street and 580, in Maxwell Park. I headed west, along Brookdal...