Where to start on San Francisco? Without a doubt, my favorite part of the city was Chinatown. Wonderful alleys to wander, with infinite interesting details to frame.
The mixture of the common and the unusual was a delight. I loved the cross of the cultures to be found in Chinatown. Seeing the different languages made me feel as if I were traveling abroad, and I found myself surprised when I would enter a store or a restaurant and someone would speak to me in English. In the two years I lived in Italy, I developed some deep-rooted associations between traveling outside my culture and language: If it’s not my culture, they won’t speak my language. It was interesting to see this assumption tested so obviously in a US environment.
The sights, the sounds, the details, and the textures of Chinatown made it my kind of place. We found ourselves wandering here, for at least a little while, on most days of our trip. I just wanted to drink it all in with my camera.
