“Oriental Art” Store

During a conference this weekend at San Francisco’s Fishermen’s Wharf, I took a stroll to get some fresh air and descended down the rabbit hole of tee shirt shops and tacky tourism. I have lived in or near San Francisco most of my life and never go to Fishermen’s Wharf…for good reason. Except for what amounts to a Cirque du Sealion, the loud unstaged performance of marine life at nearby Pier 39, and a few walk-away crab stalls, there is little authentic left here. A. Sabella’s , the historic seafood restaurant just closed after 85 years. But if it is authentic “Oriental Art” you seek, Fisherman’s Wharf may still be for you.

When you travel, you both take them and leave them. I think about this as I sit on my deck at home scraping Costa Rican mud off of my boots. Who knows what is in this stuff: maybe anteater scat, or some seeds dropped from the bill of a three-wattled bellbird that will plant themselves in my garden, thrive and perhaps (oh dear) eat my cat.

I took a hike through Costa Rica’s Monteverde Cloud forest with Danilo Wallace, a park ranger born and raised in what is now one of the world’s foremost rainforest preserves.

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