We needed to remember that it happens more often than we think:people coming together in the name of change.You remind us of this.Reminiscent of Aquino, Mandela, and the Reverend King's message of peace, you remind us that when the enemy is injustice, wrongdoing, and evil, the Good come in all colors, shapes, and sizes; that bystanders will participate, the unjustly silenced will once again speak, and the wrongly beaten will rise up. You remind us how a change that we truly want, can be obtained; how a democracy we may have lost sight of, can once again be brightly seen; and how complacency need not prevail in our country, that we can be uplifted by challenging us to remember political education, civic duty, and voting power.You remind us of this.
On behalf of Filipinos, Filipino-Americans, fellow Americans, and those who yearn for and seek justice, peace, and freedom, thank you Mr. President, for reminding us what we're capable of.
Shawn and I were gonna leave for Canada early Tuesday morning from
Seattle. Instead, we decided to hang out at the the famous Pike Place
Public Market where fish throwing is popular. I guess it was fun to
watch people play catch with fish. Maybe the appeal is that fish
shouldn't be thrown.
We woke up this morning to lightning storms. We had
left the drapes open so that we would be woken up by sunshine. But it
wasn't so. It was raining and shawn and I didn't bring an umbrella nor
any real jacket. We got to leave Portland
at around 10. With us: two hitchhikers: Helen and Regina.
We decided to drive up the 101 to Cannon
Beach. It's at the
edge of Oregon,
kinda. The drive was really cool. there were trees everywhere and
most of the time a single lane road, but no traffic. There were these awesome flowers, too.
We got to Cannon Beach
at around noon and it was cold and drizzling and foggy.
Cold Cannon Beach ooohhhhh Haystack Rock!
Not so big, Shawn can lift it with his hand!
There was some
giant rock that we were looking at called haystack rock. We walked down a cold damp and foggy
beach, with surprisingly a lot of people. Visibility was not 100%
because of the fog. The sand was soft though it was freezing cold, it was
actually a pretty good walk and a pretty interesting time. We headed back
towards town to get some clam chowder at some place called Ecola Fish.
HELEN JUMPS FOR JOY! RYAN tries to jump
We had decided that after getting chowder there, we would go to another
restaurant 40 miles away to Astoria, where they filmed GOONIES. Of course, when we that idea crossed Helen's and Regina's mind, they had no idel what the hell Goonies was. Boo on that, I say, Boo on that.
Then, we headed towards Seattle. Here's a pic of the Space needle at night (helen's cam). and some fountain (helen's cam also).
Once here, we checked into Helen's hotel, and then went to find some food.
We got to take the monorail to downtown and tried looking for food.
In our quest, we found a gyro place in between downtown and Chinatown. It was really really good and cheap.
We took the bus back to the hotel.
Now I'm here, trying to fall asleep so that Shawn and I can wake up tomorrow.
We're going to drive to Vancouver tomorrow
and hope the Seattle rain does not follow us to Canada.
Shawn and I made it to Portland okay. We figured out that my
car can go about 31 miles to the gallon. It was a long stretch, but we
got it done, and pretty good timing with all the stops and slow downs and
detours we had to make.
During the stretch, we made a quick stop at Dunsmuir to have lunch at a Cafe
and Bakery. Shawn had a buffalo burger and I had some weird sausage
sandwich called the Godfather. I didn't know exactly why it was called
that. The town itseld was a weird dead town, like the kind where
tumbleweeds would be, but we didn't see any. At their "third street
promenade" they had a pizza place open and the cafe and bakery.
After lunch, we tried to go to the church down the street, but it was closed.
So, we decide to just keep on going towards Portland. Then we drove all the rest of
the way through a very windy 5 freeway. We had planned to do a video clip
that pretty much welcomed us into Oregon,
but shawn didn't press the record button.
We arrived in Portland
a little after 7 pm, went directly to church because we were running late for
7pm mass. It was cool because there were actually some Filipinos there.
Then, by 8 pm, we were at the Doubletree in Portland,
picking up Helen and Regina
for dinner. We went to a hipster part of town (think echo park and Silver Lake).
We went to a restaurant called Por Que No which turned out to be really awesome
place for some hip Mexican food. It was funny seeing white dudes make Mexican
food, as funny as seeing Mexicans prepping sushi...Overall, the food was great.
Anyway, we then made it to a couple of bars. Helen was intrigued by the
bars that had stripper poles in it. It made for an interesting atmosphere.
We then got donuts at a place called Voodoo, where they name the donuts
weird names so people like Helen can giggle and make jokes about it. So
she bought a cream filled donut called the cock and balls and had the lady put
my name on it. As you guessed it, the donut was in the shape of a penis and
testes. In any case, there were the jokes made, of course, because of my
personalized cock and balls with my name written on it.
Now, we're all trying to get some sleep at the Hotel. We're going to wake
up early tomorrow so we can drive to Seattle.
Shawn and I left Los Angeles at about 4 pm yesterday afternoon
on our first leg of our many legged trip. There were no hassles and
traffic was a breeze. We did, however, encounter flies and Koreans at a
Mcdonalds. "Would you like flies with your order?". I say no.
Please no flies with my Burger...
Upon exiting off of the 13 freeway, I mentioned to Shawn that I was getting
teary eyed. The last time I was in Berkeley
was a few years ago, for Holly's wedding. We stopped in front of our old
apartment on Warring Street and just stared. It looked the same from the outside. We called Jamie
to share the moment with him. His advice was to go upstairs and knock on the
door. But that was too weird.
La Burrita was waiting for us, 5 dollar dinner that could fill any stomach,
even mine. The sights and smells reminded me of old times, jogged a few
jokes in shawn's head and it was great. 62 degrees in Berkeley... Nice cool weather after driving
through central Cali
at about 99 degrees on average.
Kevin was kind enough to let us crash at his place in the north side.We spent the night catching up, but only for
a bit. After some storytelling and a few trivia questions from trivial
pursuit, we went to sleep so we could leave early for Portland. A bit of sad news...It's dead week on campus. There are no students to watch on Sproul. But
this should not stop us when Friday comes.
Portland is our
longest drive. We will meet Helen there and we will probably enjoy all that
Portland has to
offer... which, at this point, is a great unknown. But we have high hopes
that it will be cool. Ah, what a great start to what we hope is a great week that will
culminate with a wedding filled with great times.
