5a Group 2

An Ordinary Place by D.J. Waldie

This was story of growing up in a suburban neighborhood called Lakewood in Los Angeles County.

Author, Waldie describes his home, his community with fond memories of a working class neighborhood consisting of 40% of the population being under 14 years old. All young families. This area was criticized by the news because of it's rapid growth. Five hundred homes a week were being built which made it an affordable neighborhood for the working class.

The reading made me think of when I moved Petaluma in 1992 from San Francisco and I felt as though I had become a suburban dweller but, it was nice to move into a tract with young families and things in common.

My favorite line was: "Perhaps, like me, they've found a place that permits restless people to be still." page 150

I never realized how quickly tract homes could be built.

Almost Home by Gerald Haslam

This story was of a young man growing up in northern Bakersfield when Bakersfield was in it's prime with oil production and cultivating. He had fond memories of the land before the Isabella Dam was built and stopped the flow from the high sierras through Kern County.

My favorite sentence or quote is actually the title "Almost Home" page 153 this brings back childhood memories for coming home from a long road trip from San Francisco to New York and back. When we would be getting close to home I would say to my father "almost home daddy" and he would reply "almost home Dolly". It became our family tradition.

The author appears to be saddened from how the town was once flourishing and now has become stagnant. The author wrote one line that summed up the whole story; "Despite the absence of buildings, the nearby fields and hills are as developed as Downtown Bakersfield" page 155. By this statement he meant the land created jobs by it's natural resources it provided such as oil and agriculture.

I always thought of Bakersfield as a stop between here and Southern California and never knew it was an oil producer years ago.

My Little Saigon by Anh Do

This is a story of a young refugee girl from Vietnam now living in Orange County in an area called Little Saigon. This area become home to many of the "boat people" fleeing Vietnam in the 70's. They chose this area for the warm climate and flat land for building but mostly because they had each other. The familiarity of other Vietnamese made so many stay and call that area home.

My favorite sentence was; "Tradition survives. But it is a delicate balance." page 162

The author speaks so proudly of her Vietnamese heritage and this city Little Saigon allows them to keep their culture with all the store selling traditional foods, dry goods and service available in their native tongue.

I never knew there was a Little Saigon in Southern California, I had only heard of all the controversy over San Jose wanting an area's name to be changed to Little Saigon.

The Nicest Person in San Francisco by Derek M. Powazek

This story was about a 17 year old boy's adventure in San Francisco for the day while his father was in a business conference in Berkley and had no idea his son had taken his BMW and driven to San Francisco. This young man loved the diversity, the phychadellic shops, the hookers in teh Tenderloin and the Mexican burrito shops that makes San Francisco such and eclectic city. Now the author lives in San Francisco because that trip made him fall in love with the city.

My favorite sentence was; "I'd do anything to get up to the Big City." page 165

This story made me think of the first time I cam to Petaluma by boat up the Petaluma river from San Francisco and fell in love with the small town feel and then moved year 2 years later.

I never realized that Haight Street crossed Market Street as the author wrote and I grew up in San Francisco.