Greetings, from the real world. Or California, which is maybe not exactly real world. I haven’t quite finished college yet, in case you were wondering, but I’ll spare you the details of my haphazard degree plan here (you can ask my parents all about it, I’m sure they’d be thrilled). Brief Summary: I have relocated to beautiful Monterey, California and I now shop for my own food, clean my own bathroom and enjoy the myriad benefits of living outside the college housing bubble (CSA produce, swimming in the ocean, setting off the fire alarm whenever I please, to name a few).

Moving from Vermont to California is essentially moving to a foreign country, although not everything is different. Case in point, Monterey has its very own homeless-man-riding-clunky-bicycle-with-a-cat-on-his-head, just like Burlington. Who knew this was a national phenomenon. But calming presence of cat-bike-man aside, California comes with its own sort of culture shock, mainly in the realm of transportation. Never before have I seen a higher concentration of people bound and determined to commit vehicular homicide on their way home for dinner. Last week I drove to San Francisco to pick Macky up from the airport and the 1.75 hour drive morphed into a three hour nightmare because:

A. My iPhone overheated and I got lost. (According to the google machine, this means the temperature inside the car hit 113 degrees. Just saying…)
B. Clear road signage is clearly something only prioritized in the midwest.
and
C. Just…never, ever try to go anywhere in California at 5 pm, especially if you are driving stick shift. It’s a terrible idea. The only good news is that after crawling 10 miles in an hour and fifteen minutes, I became quite proficient at shifting from first to second, over and over and OVER again.

And, then while sitting in class earlier this week, I witnessed a collision right outside my classroom that occurred because not one but TWO (TWO!!!) pick-up trucks tried to run a red light AT THE SAME TIME. One was turning left and the other was going straight, so they T-boned straight into another. See photo. Don’t worry, everyone was fine, but geeeeesh, people, what gives.

Commuting by bicycle in Monterey also has its share of hazards, although, admittedly it doesn’t hold a candle to Argentina in this department. At first, I was excited that the Monterey Rec Path connects my house to campus. I won’t even have to deal with cars, I thought naively. Little did I know what awaited me.

The problem stems from the harbor seals. Not the harbor seals themselves (don’t get me wrong, the seals are awesome), but rather tourists who are looking at the seals. These are the kind of people who think it’s acceptable to walk down the middle of the path while looking out to sea and waving a camera about. These are the people who veer squealing, toddlers in tow, from one lane of traffic to another when they see a particularly cute seal flop onto a rock. And then, worse, you have people who do all of the above while riding 50 pound cruiser bikes rented from the nearest not-really-a-bike-shop-but-here-have-a-crappy-bike-and-go-nuts kind of place. There are tons of these faux bike shops here. In principle, I don’t have a problem with them, but I went into one to pump up my tires the other day and the guy, who insisted on doing this difficult task for me, had clearly never seen a presta valve before and proceeded to tell me that there was something wrong because my tube was no longer attached to the valve, and then he had the nerve to look at me like I was deranged when I explained that this is because THERE IS NO TUBE. This encounter rather soured me on the subject. Also, these are the shops that rent out gigantic, four-person, path-hogging pedal buggies, and for that I will hate them forever.

The other problem is hipsters. I’m kind of a hipster myself, in the sense that I wear knitted beanies and, you know, write a blog. But hey fellow hipsters, here’s some advice: if you can’t ride a bike one-handed, a 1980s road bike with downtube shifting is not for you.

And then there are the people who defy category, like the aforementioned cat-on-head guy, who to his credit can actually ride in a fairly straight line given the circumstances. And the dude (he was most definitely a dude, and I am now qualified to say) who is towing his girlfriend in a burly while she strums on a guitar and sings to everyone who passes them. Welcome to California, ladies and gentlemen.

As if that weren’t bad enough, there are still all the usual hazards that plague rec paths the world round: runners and roller skaters with earbuds, dogs (oh god, the dogs), skateboarding teenagers, skateboarding fathers holding two year olds, etc. It’s an utterly terrifying environment, which explains why I like it so much. I could always take the road home and spend my time dodging kamikaze BMWs, but I prefer the path. The people-watching is infinitely better. Plus, there’s nothing quite like riding back from class along a shoreline dotted with pelicans and frosty white caps, while harbor seals sun themselves on rocks and whales spout in the distance. Sometimes, when the fog is rolling in, you can hear the sea lions barking out on the wharf. Barking sea lions, spouting whales–everyday I get to ask myself “is this my real life?” The water might be 40 degrees and the headwinds might coordinate perfectly with my class schedule, but when it comes down to it, I’m pretty sure I’m living in paradise.

Editor’s note: I just realized I have been spelling San Francisco wrong for, like, my entire life. (The Francisco part.) That is now corrected, so Mom, you can breathe again.