cable car, coffee flavor and seagulls

Waiting at the cable-car stop, which was at the bottom-end of a long slope near San Francisco Bay area, I felt a little bit chilly even though it was in the middle of August. Maybe, inside this foggy town, this kind of cold summer was not special, but seems to be a part of everyday life. It was in the evening, and I was standing in the long line waiting for this famous cable-car going over steep slopes ranging north, south, west and east, whatever.

Some people in the line sipping on cups of coffee, which apparently they took from the Starbucks located in front of this stop. As usual in this cold evening, the Starbucks kept giving off the familiar roasted beans flavor. Then, I decided what I would do. So, turning back and checking how many people coming after me, I found not so many were there and I just left from the line and came to the Starbucks. Until I sipped on my cup of coffee, and took my first bite out of a marble pound cake, some seagulls were flying and mewing above people still waiting for the cable-car. The evening came deep at the time, and the gulls looked like swimming in the sea of orange twilight.  

San Fransisco, California.

a restaurant on an island in a pond

Sometimes , I saw a couple of horses in the Cambre forest at the weekend, especially in autumn. Of course, they were not the wild ones, and it was doubtlessly strong probabilities that when seeing horses on Sunday, sunny afternoon, you would also find several horse-carrier bonded firmly with tails of large sized vehicles.

I was just running around the main road, which was extended just like number "8" shape in the forest, and one of its two loops had a relatively large sized pond at its center. This pond was so large that it had its own island, again at its center, on which a casual restaurant was located and I heard that it had a good reputation through the Internet. 

The problem in here was that there was no bridge to reach there. Running around the pond, and wondering how people would react if they face the unchangeable fact that they might have no mean to reach the restaurant, but prepare to swim, after making a reservation. So, I just had a sigh of relief, when I found there were two rafts, fixed at piers, waiting for the season opening, maybe, at the beginning of the next spring, when all ices on the pond will be broken and melted completely.
 
 Here was in the Cambre forest, Brussels.

vineyard and swimming pool in the bourgone

It was in the middle of summer, several years ago. At the time, my GPS was suddenly frozen and oddly stopped catching signals from a satellite. I drove my beloved blue Peugeot 207 on a highway going to Beaune from Dijon, where I never came before, thus, doubtlessly I was a new comer knowing nothing which exits or routes I should go without my mighty GPS. So, quite naturally, I had no choice but took first exit I found after having lost any GPS-signals, and entered an unknown small town in the Bourgogne region.

The town was located between gentle hills covered with quasi-ever green, most parts of which were, of course, vineyards. I drove around this small town for looking for a parking space, where I stopped my Peugeot in order to figure out what was going on with my GPS. The town was so small that in fact, I hardly found any parking lots, so, made a short stop on a small open space in front of a high school. 

To say precisely, it was in front of the school's outside swimming-pool, so, while waiting for my GPS coming normal after completing shutdown and restart operation, I just listened to joyful cheers of students enjoying their swimming lessen in the summer afternoon. I felt dry and gentle breezes coming from my car window, and they also went inside an old three-story apartment next to the high school, opened its windows widely.

Here was in the small town, Bourgogne, France.

near the central station in winter

Several years ago, I was walking around the central station of Copenhagen city, looking for nothing particular, but just enjoying pieces of winter scenery of this northern harbor-city, after checking-in a business hotel near there. It was in the middle of the Christmas holidays, so, I hardly found shops, stores, even restaurants opened around the station, and as a consequence, people waiting for a train, coming from the station for passing the time, soon went back to platforms with empty hands. 

On the other, the historic amusement park, Tivoli Gardens, located literally next to the station, was opened and endlessly attracted families with little kids, even after dark and flakes of snow falling. While walking around the historical old town, its harbor, the main shopping streets and the solemn palace, I finally came to feel chilly and hungry, so, naturally looking for any cafes or restaurants, hopefully for having Danish local specialities. 

An hour later, I was in the restaurant, the Hard Rock Cafe, which was all I found in this city under cover of this snowy night, and I was warmly welcomed there by the cheerful Danish staffs. While waiting for my tender steak, I sipped beer from a glass, then, remembered that one of my colleagues at the time collected Hard Rock Cafe's T shirts printed local logos, when traveling around the US or foreign countries. 

Here was in the winter Denmark, still I saw snow flakes kept falling.

remnant of arizona twilight

At the end of the summer, I was just running along with an ever lasting straight avenue next to Phoenix airport, listening to the local radio news with grabbing my well-used portable radio. It was, of course, in the evening, 'cause running under the daylight in here was not an option, doing so, maybe, would easily make any runners extremely thirsty within minutes. Even in the evening, the breeze was not nice, but so warm that I felt breaking a sweat soon after coming from the hotel I checked in near here, and slowly starting jogging. 

The remnant of the Arizona twilight was getting mixed of light orange and dark water-blue just like colors in the not-so-deep sea. At the airport, small lights from several airplanes looked like stars at dusk. The straight road I kept following was not the never-ending straight, so, I finally found a slow curve to turn to the right. At the corner, there was a gas station, where a man in middle age with a worn-out baseball cap tried to fill the tank of his pickup truck with gas, and next to it, the franchise restaurant, Ruby-Tuesday, was there with a vividly red signboard on its front. A couple of families of four were waiting for their tables around the parking, and several kids from different families seemed to invent new game to play there. While running, I listened to the radio and noises kids made for passing the time. 

Here was in the middle of summer night heat, Phoenix, Arizona

chimney with weathered crimson bricks

Coming to the outskirts of Lille, I found the chimney of the old fabric factory rising into the sky, covered with weathered crimson bricks. I heard the factory was closed a long time ago, maybe for decades, hardly used for any business for a while. Then, when the town-council, some businessmen and developers somehow found and agreed with its potential, it was re-constructed or re-developed as a middle sized outlet-shopping mall, while being preserved it's old fashioned facade with the symbolic sky-high chimney. It was a decade ago, and on its grand opening day when the factory-mall was officially given a new life, I could imagine that a crowd of people around here were coming, walking and shopping like kids as if entering their dreamland for the first time in life.
 
Just several years later, I found people in here actually preferring to walk and window-shopping more slowly than used to be. As a consequence, several tenants had already closed its stores, and never comes new ones. Still the sky high chimney was there, and I could see it from my car window, while driving for a while to go home.

Here was the outskirts of Lille, France

inside the tree

The sky was becoming dark, and the fog was coming with light rain. So, we all missed orange and water blue in the twilight in the evening. At five o'clock, instead, the lights of myriad buildings around here came on, and these were just like numerous fireflies glowing in the sea of Tokyo city.
 
Inside the tower newly built a year ago, the interior was so chic that we all came to think that even the staff, the middle age woman, trying to clean up the floor of cafe area with a small vacuum chicly. Why we thought so? 'cause each staff wore a slightly loose uniform designed by a famous designer who someone said learnt his basic-style around Scandinavian countries.

Countless people kept coming to the tower just like rain falling endlessly tonight.
This tower was named "sky tree", and I was walking at the downtown area of Tokyo, while it was still drizzling.

the moon and an ordinal life in rockville

I just walked down an ordinary street to go to an organic grocery to get a bundle of small white beets, which I did not find a super market near here. While walking, I found the evening moon over the downhill, and the moon was, as usual, quite white in the glass-blue and light violet sky. At the time, the breeze was a little bit cold, but hardly came through my wind-breaker. The cars passed me, and I just followed each red tail-lamp. It’s usual, of course, but what I mean is everything was so ordinal life in here.

This downhill used to be my routine jogging course, so I came here and went down the hill many times. Sometimes, I saw fellow runners who never knew me, but bowed slightly as we passed each other. Sometimes, in the spring, I found brown rabbits came to eat lawns in the small gardens around the houses. Sometimes, I remembered something my colleague said, coming after participating in his first half-marathon race somewhere I did not know. He tried to keep listening to the music, "Eye of the Tiger", while running, ‘cause he thought this rock’n surely made his adrenaline overflowed. But in reality, he was easily exhausted after passing15km.

After I moving from here, these stories were just in my memoir when finding this picture. Now, cars may pass this street, some people go down the hill, and sometimes, the moon comes in the evening.

Here is Rockville, Maryland.

crafted glasses and a cup of coffee

I was literally in the middle of the evening twilight, around May 20, when I walked down the main street in Corning, New York state. The breeze in May was nicely dry, but sometimes a little bit cold, so I covered my upper part with my black northface windbreaker. Entering the street, I caught of the sight of some people taking the temporary tent-shops away, and clearing the tables on the street. Obviously, the street had seemed to be busy at some points on the day, because of the town festival, offering nicely crafted glasses as a specialty in here.

Walking along the street in the afterglow of the glass-fest in the town, I missed an opportunity to enjoy crafted glasses, but saw some Asian people still making fried noodles on the street, which smelled quite good. There were some shops showing beautiful colorful  glasses on the showcases, and I also found some pizza restaurants, where some locals biting a large piece of cheese pizza.

I hardly found a café walking for a while, but finally found a small shop which seemed to be a shop selling souvenir glasses, but its signboard showed a cup of coffee. When I tried to look inside the shop, the old man suddenly standing beside me said “hello” gently. He asked me if I was interested in the glasses or a cup of coffee in the shop, and I said I could hopefully have the latter. He smiled and said sorry to me that he had already closed his shop today because of the fest, but I can come here from 7:00 next morning for a great cup of coffee I’ve ever had.

I walked to the same shop tomorrow morning, and sipped nicely smelled hot coffee, seeing the crafted glasses shining with the morning light.

Here was Corning, New York

sports hats

Walking around a theme park like Disneyland or Legoland, always I’ve had a certain difficulty of looking for topics, or even how and what I would write about, and for what. I don’t know why, but it is surely difficult to get a certain image of what I’ve encountered there, for example, in the course of my family vacation in this winter, especially with my son, of course.

This is the only story I can tell with a certain image, in the theme park, Disneyland.  

It was a rainy day in this winter, which may or may not be rare in here, Orlando, Florida, but the temperature on the day was a little bit unseasonably low at the time. In the evening, I and my son were rushing to one of restaurants in the park in order to be safe from the rain, and at the time, we both wore sports hats. In the restaurant, a female staff near the entrance door kept distributing a menu-card to each customer who happened to enter. When I said “hi” to her handing me a menu, she smiled us and said, “This is second time I saw you both”. 

With a big question mark on my head, I asked her how she could know that. Actually we came to this restaurant in the morning for a coffee break, but I thought both of us did not stand out from myriad people in the park, who were so diverse and coming from literally all over the world to enjoy themselves with ones of the most famously known and manufactured characters, at least in terms of business. She smiled again and said “Because you wear sports hats with a big “Legoland” logo on the front”. 

On the day before, we enjoyed the interlocking plastic bricks theme park, Legoland Florida. 

Orlando, Florida, all I can do is just walking around the theme parks. No brainer.