Buddha at City Hall

Visiting from Shanghai for about a year... A beautiful addition to San Francisco's Civic Center... A wonderful example of cross-cultural exchange of art... But is it eco-friendly? What was the cost to the planet to get it from Shanghai to San Francisco?

Small is Beautiful

Wren is keen to hire a small car for this trip, and I'm hoping she won't go to extremes. Certainly, a smaller car is likely to guzzle less gas, and be in keeping with the eco-conscious nature of this journey. Too bad there aren't too many hybrids for rent yet -- my friend who owns one says he gets 600 miles to the gallon. Another friend runs his Jetta on bio-fuel, and is stocking up gallons of re-usable cooking oil in his garage - but I suspect we won't likely be re-fueling at restaurants.

Eco-home in the Panhandle?

[Note on rotating this photo: I have not found a way to rotate photos on this blog. I rotated it on my Blackberry before emailing it to the blog -- but that rotation did not 'stick' and the photo uploaded side-ways. My last resort was to download the photo to Picasa, rotate it there, and then upload it to the blog. This worked -- but defeated the purpose of taking a photo with a Blackberry (which is: to post the photo directly to the blog).]

Here is somebody's temporary "home" on the Panhandle in San Francisco. A caravan of three shopping carts, piled high with blankets and sundry belongings; nearby, a camping chair. No electricity, no plumbing - leaving a very light carbon footprint.

If this were an earnest attempt to live off-grid in the city, would that make it laudable? And otherwise, is it laughable? or perhaps sad? or it just is what it is.

PS. After sitting on a bench nearby for a while, I summoned the courage to go and talk to the owner / keeper who I'd seen seated on the grass when I passed by. I was starting to surmise that these were the belongings of several people, who rotated 'guarding' them so as to free the others up. Kind of like communal childcare, or car-pooling. When I poked my head back 'round the shopping carts, however, he was asleep in a sleeping bag.

One Week to Take-Off

The Eco Art USA road trip is due to start in about a week, and is scheduled to last about two months.

Wren (the artist) and her daughter Imogen (who is joining for the first three weeks) arrive in Los Angeles from the UK next Tuesday, August 3rd 2010. They plan to acclimate there for a day or two, and then drive up to San Francisco. From SF all three of us will head North to the Solar Living Institute in Hopland, CA.

After that, well, plans are subject to change. "Originally" (two days ago, say), Lake Tahoe was on the itinerary -- Wren wants to visit some green homes there -- but as of yesterday we have a reservation at Phantom Ranch, at the bottom of the Grand Canyon, for August 15th. Whether or not we make it to Tahoe will depend on how long we spend exploring the art scene in SF and visiting the Solar Living Institute.