“Should gay people be allowed to teach children?” is a contentious question in jurisdictions around the world, inflaming the passions of people on all sides of the debate.  Now that question has come to roost in the notably authoritarian city-state of Singapore, where homosexual acts are still penalized by Section 377A of the criminal code.

On Saturday, Otto Fong, a long-time friend of mine and a science teacher at the venerable Raffles Institution, posted an open letter to his colleagues outing himself as a gay man.  In this letter, he writes that, “in order to reach my fullest potential as a useful human being, I must first fully accept myself, and face the world honestly.  I have lived long enough to know that what I am is not a disease, an aberration or a mental illness.”

The Raffles Institution is a 187-year old independent boy’s secondary school whose alumnae include Lee Kwan Yew, the founding Prime Minister of Singapore who to this day is carefully listened to as the father of the country. 

Otto’s letter quickly caused a stir.  The website received hundreds of hits in the first 48 hours and despite his only sending the link to the letter to his colleagues, it quickly made its way to his students who have been posting messages of support and encouragement.

By publicly coming out, Otto risks his professional career and reputation, and could find himself shortly unemployed.  The executive board of Raffles Institution is reportedly meeting Monday morning to discuss what actions they should take.

In the last decade, the Singaporean government has made some strides in loosening restrictions on gays and lesbians living there.  But laws prohibiting homosexuality are still on the books, threatening any gains that these citizens may feel they’ve achieved.  The former Prime Minister made headlines in April when he called into question the validity of criminalizing homosexuality if being gay is indeed a matter of nature and not of choice.

In December 2005, Otto and his partner of seven years visited me and Tawn in Khrungthep.  After toasting the holidays and their happiness, I posted a picture of them, arms interlinked, on my blog.  A few days later, Otto asked if I would remove the picture as they were concerned about the professional damage it could do to them.  A year and a half later, I’m very proud to see that Otto is now ready for the world to see him for who he is.

How can you help?

Despite its staunch independence, history has shown that Singapore likes to protect its international image and reputation.  That is one reason that despite the anti-gay laws, Singapore has been actively making the island a more gay-friendly place.

None other than Lee Kwan Yew spoke about the influence of the rest of the world when commenting about why the eventual repeal of Section 377A was necessary, when he told Reuters on 24 April 2007: “I would say if this is the way the world is going and Singapore is part of that interconnected world – and I think it is – then I see no option for Singapore but to be part of it.”

You can help by reading Otto’s open letter and leaving your comments of support.  The more support he receives, from both local and international sources, the more difficult it will be for his employers to take Draconian measures to punish him.

Update as of Monday, 2:26 pm Singapore Time

It looks like Otto has removed the open letter from his blog site, for reasons that are unexplained.  It will be interesting to learn more about what has transpired.  In the meantime, thank you to all of you who shared your support.

Update as of Monday, 3:31 pm Singapore Time

A third party with inside knowledge at Raffles Institution reports to me that the school is on Otto’s side and his job is apparently not threatened.  The open letter was removed at the request of the Ministry of Education.  If true, this would seem to be a victory.

The connecting flight from Seoul Incheon to Khrungthep was delayed two hours because of “aircraft connection”, whatever that may mean.  I think it means that the aircraft arrived late.  Thus, my arrival in the Big Mango was at 1:55 am Saturday morning. 

Right: Our delayed plane finally pulls up to gate 49 at Incheon airport.

Our aircraft was an Airbus A330, which was maybe at 40% capacity.  Everyone spread out, with many taking a row of four seats to themselves and having a bed.  I had a pair of the seats on the side of the plane, so had some room to spread out and recline. 

The bright side of my early (late?) arrival is that immigration and the baggage claim are not very crowded at that late hour.  After sleeping for several hours, Tawn very kindly woke up and drove out to the airport to pick me up.

Getting back into the groove wasn’t too difficult.  We were up by 9:00 and out running errands by 11:00.  The first stop, since we had no milk in the refrigerator, was breakfast at Au Bon Pain.  The location at the J Avenue shopping center (a three-story strip mall on Soi Thong Lor) is right around the corner from our new condo and it is turning into quite the social hub for us.

On our last visit there we ran into Fluck, Tawn’s university friend to whom he has lost contact, and Bobby, his Singaporean boyfriend.  Then Saturday we ran into Pim, Tawn’s high school friend who lives in our new neighborhood, who was traveling with her three-year old daughter, Tara.

Tara always plays a little shy at first but warms up quickly, so we had breakfast with her and her mom.  Below: Uncle Tawn and Tara play patty-cake.  You can’t see this in the picture, but Tara has her fingernails painted pink.  She told us that her toenails were pink, too.

The next stop was the new condo: electrical work is being done now, so the most noticeable difference is the many holes in the ceiling and walls where new lines are being drawn.  Given that the walls are concrete rather than built with studs and drywall, it is strange to see some of the trenches that are dug into the concrete to hide new conduit.  Below: new wiring is installed along the exterior wall overlooking the pool.

The wood floor is almost completely installed except for parts of the bathroom and the kitchen.  The marble bench, shelf and floor has been installed in the bathroom and plumbing is complete.

Left: Tawn in the new bathroom.  The tiles are completed.  Behind Tawn will be a vanity and marble countertop. 

Above that will be a framed mirror on the wall with a sconce on either side.  To the right of Tawn will be the toilet area, with a wood cabinet hung on the wall above the tile.  This will be for toiletry storage. 

You can just see the marble bench in the shower, on the right side of the picture.  The plan is to have a floating glass wall separating the shower from the rest of the room, to minimize the visual barriers.

The floor is covered with protective paper, but the marble floor tiles have already been installed.  Just behind Tawn’s legs you can see where the herringbone wood floor will continue in from the bedroom, forming a “dry area” just a step above the rest of the bathroom floor.

Right: In the kitchen, the cabinets have been removed and new cabinets have already been completed at Khun Guang’s factory. 

After visiting the condo, we went to an electrical fixtures store on Soi Thong Lor to look at ceiling lights.  The distance between the concrete ceiling and the framed dry wall is only 6 cm, so we need a very shallow fixture.  We’ve purchased one sample, a recessed “eyeball” fixture that uses a halogen bulb.  Unfortunately, none of the florescent fixtures will work in this narrow ceiling.

We also went to Emporium and purchased our kitchen appliances: SMEG induction stove top, hood, and oven.  We have continued to reevaluate whether an induction stove top is necessary, but have concluded with the amount of cooking and entertaining we like to do (especially given how much our current kitchen has constrained us on both accounts), we want to be well-equiped rather than regret having inadequate appliances.

A refrigerator will have to be purchased, too, but we’re still debating what size to get.  There is a three-drawer Mitsubishi model that looks like a good use of the space.

So as to not let the socializing wait too long, Tawn and I met up with some friends for dinner at Thon Krueng on Soi Thong Lor.  The food is quite good and the prices reasonable there, plus there is a fun gelato shop just a few doors down, making for a pleasant dessert option.  Above: Roka, Todd, Tawn, Justin, Vic and me.  Ken is taking the picture.

And what to do on Sunday?  Well, Paul is in town as is Bill, so there are visitors to see today.  It is good to be home.

I’m sitting in Seoul Incheon airport after a pleasant enough 11-hour flight from San Francisco.  Asiana Airlines is a pretty decent way to travel, if you’re going to travel economy.  I was in a trio of seats in the middle section of the plane (a 3-3-3 layout) and the seat between me and the lady on the other aisle was unoccupied.  To top it off, the lady sitting in the seat in front of me didn’t recline her seat at all during the flight.  (Which is a little strange, considering how vertical Asiana’s seats are in the fully upright position.)  So I was actually able to cross my legs!

Unfortunately, my connecting flight is delayed by at least two hours, so I’m going to have some time to kill here.  On top of the 8+ hours I spent here ten days ago!

How do you like the new profile picture to the left?  (For those of you subscribing to an email update from my blog, you’ll need to visit the blog here in order to see the picture.)  Ryan and Sabrina’s friends Gordon and Rita served as unofficial photographers for their wedding, giving them a second pair of people shooting the event and providing them with much better coverage than having just one or two photographers.  Given that they and many of their friends are avid photography buffs, it isn’t too surprising!

Anyhow, this picture makes me look really thin.  But also the dark suit makes me look like a funeral director!  Gordon and Rita took some really nice pictures and you can view their Flickr pages here and here.

In addition to being the type of house guest who cleans my friend’s apartment before leaving, I’m also the sort of person who washes all my dirty laundry before packing it for the trip home.  How crazy is that?

The last items on my to-do list were done: buy some See’s candy as gifts (inspired by Curry) and eat at Cha Cha Cha, the amazing Cuban restaurant in San Francisco.  Actually, this wasn’t my entire to-do list, but as much of it as will be accomplished on this trip.  Put the rest of it on the list for next month.

Monty and Dave were kind enough to accompany me from their place (the Tiki Pad) to the Mission District to hunt wildly for parking and eat at Cha Cha Cha.

The food was amazing, as always.  Ceviche, friend plantanos with black beans, bbq pork quesadilla, sauteed mushrooms, and a tri-tip steak.  A large pitcher of sangria made the entire evening mellow (which was why Ty was probably wondering whether I was half-comotose) and the best news is, they now sell Cha Cha Cha t-shirts.  This is truly something unique to wear in Khrungthep. 

Afterwards, I met Ty at Sweet Inspirations for some tea.  Finally, another Xangan who crosses over from virtual acquaintence to real one.  He’s a tremendously bright young man and a pleasure to talk with.  Here’s to hoping he has the opportunity to blog more frequently as I think he has a lot to say and a lot worth saying.

Since March, Ty has been holding onto a copy of Veterans of War, Veterans of Peace for me.  Ty’s partner, Paul Ocampo, assisted Maxine Hong Kingston in editing this anthology of “creative, redemptive storytelling – nonfiction, fiction and poetry – spanning five wards and written by those most profoundly affected by it.”  In addition to editing, Paul wrote one of the pieces, adding his perspective as a veteran of conflict.

This anthology grew out of the work of the Veteran Writers Group, which started as a one-day workshop in 1993 focused on Vietnam War veterans and eventually expanded to become this anthology.  Along the way, the definition of “veteran” expanded to include all those profoundly affected by war, from soldier to civilian, resister to refugee.

As a student, Maxine Hong Kongston’s writing was very influential for me.  Her 1989 novel Tripmaster Monkey: His Fake Book was a piece that as a communication major at Santa Clara University, I brazenly wanted to make into a student film project.  I told her as much when I had the opportunity to meet her after a reading at Fort Mason Center in San Francisco.  Despite her encouragement, I eventually realized the scope of my ambition exceeded my capacity.

Nonetheless, I am quite happy to have a copy of Veterans of War and look forward to some stimulating and thought-provoking reading. 

So tomorrow afternoon I hop on an Asiana Airlines jet bound for Seoul and, by Friday night, Khrungthep.  I may not have another entry until Saturday so kindly be patient.

Okay, I’ll admit it: I’m the type of person who, when I’m a visitor at someone else’s house, feels mighty tempted to clean up.  Chalk it up to the “leave an area in better shape than you found it” mantra my Brownie troop leader mother instilled in me, but I just have to tidy.

So in between editing a script for a new training video, having my weekly one-on-one call with my boss, and washing my laundry, I did some spring cleaning at Paul’s apartment.  Everything was dusted and thoroughly vacuumed, including behind furniture and underneath it.  Windows were washed and levelor blinds dusted.  Even the down comforter spent two hours draped over the ironing board, freshening up in the late morning sun.

Starting Tuesday I was back to work.  Paul’s place is quiet enough that I can get a lot done.  But I miss my larger screen and ergonomic keyboard.  This afternoon I need to pack before heading downtown for lunch with Monty and Dave.  Ty’s back from Hawai’i, too, so maybe we’ll meet for a drink afterwards.

This afternoon I stopped by Captain Submarine on Sacramento at Fillmore.  Samantha’s family owns the shop, so she and I ate lunch together and visited.  We both agree: San Francisco is a nice place to visit, but maybe not such a great place to live.  Just my opinion, though.  You’re entitled to yours.

Walking back from the Fillmore district along Bush Street, I was reminded how much I like the architecture in this city.  The Victorian and Edwardian houses are just gorgeous.  They look like gingerbread houses and come is so many colours (left). 

Speaking with Tawn this morning on Skype, we’re both ready to be back together in Khrunthep.  My flight leaves tomorrow early afternoon.  I’ll be back in the Big Mango by Friday night.

The beautiful weather of the first half of my visit came to an end by Sunday evening, with temperatures becoming more autumnal and the winds gusting as the fog rolled in.  More typically San Francisco, the days started out gorgeous but devolved as the day progressed.

Sunday morning I headed to Berkeley to visit Wat Monkholratanaram, the Thai Buddhist temple located on Russell at Martin Luther King, Jr. Way.  One of three Thai temples in the Bay Area, this one seems to be the most active and each Sunday has a talaat naat – a weekly market – where members of the temple prepare Thai food in vast quantities and then it is available to purchase for a donation to the temple.

Over the years, the operation has expanded in scale as well as in organization: the counters and plexiglass sneeze barriers look more permanent and are up to code, the number of tables has expanded, and the crowds have grown proportionately. 

I was hoping, vainly, that upon my return to the temple I would so impress the Thai aunties that serve the food when I broke out in some Thai.  No such luck: they are jaded with farang speaking Thai to them.  Maybe some of them weren’t Thai and didn’t understand me.  Others definitely understood me and responded in Thai, but there was no “Oh, you speak Thai!”  Instead, I received the standard concluding phrase used at this busy operation, “Next?”

My purpose in visiting the wat was to meet with Sandy, my high school ex-girlfriend.  (Shock!)  Yes, of the three girls I dated in high school and the one I dated in university, Sandy is the only one with whom I’m still in touch.  At her wedding, she introduced me to her husband as the boyfriend she turned gay.  Sandy and her husband are both doctors at Kaiser Permanente now, live in Sacramento (“just far enough away from my parents,” she explains), and have two children, a four-year-old girl and a six-month-old boy.

It was wonderful catching up with Sandy – and kind of funny to see how we simultaneously mellow as we age while still remaining ourselves!  Sadly, we were so busy chatting that I forgot to get my camera out to take a picture of us. 

For those of you who are familiar with the temple, it looks like they have done some expanding and have plans for further expansion. 

The area to the left of the food stalls, where the people selling desserts were located, has been extended back to Oregon Street.  It appears they’ve purchased one of the lots behind the temple, tearing down the fence and creating a garden.

Additionally, there are architectural plans (right) posted for a Buddha pavilion that looks like it will be built partially on another adjacent property.

Some of the notes explain that the temple has been doing these Sunday morning markets for almost thirty years as a fund-raiser and they seem to have raised enough money to make this expansion.  The pavilion will be constructed in Thailand and shipped to Berkeley in pieces and assembled there.  I’m planning on visiting the temple again in October with my family, so we’ll see if there is any progress by then.

Sunday afternoon Lilian took me to see Avenue Q, the Tony Award-winning musical that was concluding its run in San Francisco.  Quoting Wikipedia:

Avenue Q is a Tony award-winning musical that was conceived by Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx, who wrote the music and lyrics. The book is by Jeff Whitty. The show is largely inspired by (and is in the style of) Sesame Street: Most of the characters in the show are puppets (operated by actors onstage), the set depicts several tenements on a rundown street in an “outer borough” of New York City, both the live characters and puppet characters sing, and short animated video clips are played as part of the story.

Also, several characters are recognizably parodies of classic Muppet characters: for example, the roommates Rod and Nicky are versions of Sesame Street’s Bert and Ernie, and Trekkie Monster is based on Cookie Monster. However, the characters are in their twenties and thirties and face adult problems instead of those faced by pre-schoolers. The characters use profanity, and the songs concern adult themes. A recurring theme is the central character’s search for a “purpose”.

It was really funny, with clever songs and a strong anti-political correctness themes, illustrated by the song, “Everyone’s a Little Bit Racist”.

In the evening, Lilian and I drove down to San Jose to meet our group of friends for dinner.  Anita had driven down from San Francisco, too, and we were joined by Brad and Donna and their children, Eric, Albert, and Maggie.  Samantha and Jimmy were not able to make it.

Right: Chris with Brad, Donna, Evan and Cara.

We had a fun time catching up, although it would have been nice to have more time.  These visits are always so rushed.  Evan and Cara are getting to be big children now, second and first grades, respectively.

Below: Lily and Chris with Anita and Eric.  Somehow the picture of me with Albert and Maggie didn’t turn out.  Maybe Lily will email me her version?

Monday concluded my official vacation, although I’ll still be in the US three additional days.  A holiday here, traffic was light and everyone was out and about enjoying the final day of a three-day weekend.

At 10:30 I was over at Jordan and Wilford’s (left) place south of Market – a bright airy space that they’ve done a nice job with – and we headed out to Ella’s on Presidio and California Streets.  So nice to enjoy brunch in San Francisco again, especially their chicken hash!  There was a bit of a wait, but that gave us more time to catch up.  Wilford has a blog that features only photos taken with his iPhone, hence the name “iphone iblog“.  Clever, huh?

We continued after lunch to the Ferry building to do some browsing at Sur la table, stop for a coffee at Peet’s, and sit on the waterfront enjoying the great view and warm sun.  Lots of catching up to do and it was nice to connect with a younger couple – it provides some perspective on the journey that Tawn and I have taken over the past 7+ years.

After a brief stop at a small backyard barbecue that Anita was throwing, I headed to San Mateo for a final meal with Ryan and Sabrina.  Sabrina’s sister Nathalie (her maid of honor) and Ryan’s cousin Peter joined us for Vietnamese pho at a restaurant near their house and near an office building I used to work at.

After dinner, we visited until eleven o’clock, finding some interesting connections between two of their guests and me, all tying back to the SF Int’l Asian American Film Festival.  It is a small, small world.  Below, Chris, Nathalie, Sabrina, Ryan and Peter with steaming hot bowls of pho.

So now it is Tuesday morning.  Time to return the rental car, get a few loads of laundry done, start tidying up Paul’s apartment, and time to get back to doing some work.

The main event, the main reason for my being here in San Francisco, was to attend Ryan’s wedding.  Ryan is one of my closest high school friends and during school and uni we played a very important role in each other’s lives at critical times.

Ryan married Sabrina, a San Francisco native who, when I first met her a little more than a year ago, I knew would become Ryan’s wife.  They are that kind of perfect for each other.

Ryan asked me to be one of his groomsmen, along with another high school friend, Sam, and his college friend Gerry.  There are several high school friends and family members who read this blog, so I’m going to include a fair number of pictures.  For those of you who don’t know the parties involved I hope you enjoy them nonetheless.

Right: The ceremony took place in Sts. Peter and Paul Church, which faces Washington Square in San Francisco’s North Beach neighborhood.  It was a gorgeous day with a gentle breeze, clear blue skies, and temperatures in the mid-20s.

Friday night we had done the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner.  It was an opportunity to meet a few of Ryan’s extended family members.  Through fate and circumstance, Ryan is the only person I know personally who had lost all his immediately family by age 28.  As such, it was especially meaningful to have some family members here including his auntie from Melbourne (who was dismayed to learn that I had been to Melbourne twice and had not called her) and cousins from Phoenix, Los Angeles and Toronto.

Saturday morning I joined Ryan and the other groomsmen at a hotel room near the airport to prepare.  This way, everyone was tuxed properly and accounted for, minimizing any nerve-wracking “where is he?” moments.  There I saw my new best friend, Gwynneth, whom I had met the previous evening at the rehearsal.  She is the precoscious four-year-old daughter of the best man.

Below from left: Gwynneth announces that she is a princess and that she loves the color white; Gwynneth and her parents at the church, struggling to keep her eyes open after I told her she blinked in the first attempt at the picture; Ryan and Gwynneth conspire before the service.

Since I was in the service, I didn’t get any photos of it.  But it was beautiful.  The bride and groom had prepared their own vows and had memorized them.  It turns out that the length pauses that came across as Sabrina’s near-crying-hold-back-the-tears moments were in fact her furious attempts to remember the correct order of her vows.  But it came across beautifully.

Immediately afterwards, the bridal party took four simple pictures in the church: one with the wedding party, one with all of Sabrina’s family members, one with all of Ryan’s family members, and then a group shot in which the entire audience crowded together in one half of the pews and the photographer (using a very wide angle lens) took a shot from the pulpit.

Above: Ryan and Sabrina pose with Sabrina’s family members.

After a small reception downstairs in the church where people had an opportunity for individual photos with the bride and groom, the wedding party piled into a limosine and we headed to Golden Gate park for picture-taking.  There were some very nice settings, including Shakespeare’s Garden located just behind the Academy of Sciences.

Below: Sabrina and Ryan posing in the park.

Not too surprisingly, things started to get a little silly on the limo ride from the park to the restaurant, below.  And we didn’t even have any champagne open.

The reception was at Zen Restaurant in Milbrae, where we had the entire restaurant shut down for our party of 240 guests.  The menu was extensive and the food very good – click on the picture to the right for more detail – and I was impressed with how Sabrina and Ryan made the very politically and morally astute decision not to serve shark fin soup in consideration of how inhumanely it is harvested.

An hour before the guests arrived we held the tea ceremony, a Chinese tradition in which the bride and groom serve tea to the elders in their family and the elders then give them lai see – the red envelopes with money inside.

One theme that continued for the evening and which I thought was handled very tastefully, was keeping the memory of Ryan’s parents alive.  They were mentioned a few times, including in a slide show of Ryan and Sabrina’s childhood pictures.  Also during both the service and the reception, Ryan’s auntie from Melbourne stood as a representative of his parents.

Above: Ryan and Sabrina serve tea to Sabrina’s grandmother.

The evening was packed with events.  In a break from the traditional structure where there are speeches, then everyone eats, then there is entertainment, the events were paced throughout the evening.  A little food, some speeches, a little more food, some entertainment, a little more food, then something else.

Left: One of the three dresses Sabrina wore at the reception.

Even before food was served, Ryan and Sabrina had their first dance (they had taken some classes so it turned out beautifully) and immediately at the conclusion of the dance, they broke into a second number from Grease!  Very nicely coreographed and apparantly a response from Sabrina’s brother’s wedding two weeks ago in which her brother and her mom had rehearsed a swing number without telling anyone but the DJ in advance.

This is a very fun and competitive family he’s married into!

The speeches were a big part of the evening, with Sam, Gerry and I each making a speech, all of which were very heart-felt and well received.  I quoted D.H. Lawrence: “May you have the courage of your tenderness” as a conclusion to my speech in which I told Sabrina that I had always known Ryan would marry her, but that I had not known her name until he first told me about her, and I did not recognize her face until he first introduced her to me.

Below: The bride’s ladies and the groom’s men.

As the evening continued, the momentum picked up.  Unlike most Chinese wedding banquets where as soon as the last course is served, all the old folks pack up, they instead got up and packed the dance floor!  Things continued all the way up to 11:00, the time agreed upon with the restaurant to shut things down.

Below: The painfully shy ring boy (is that what they call them?), also named Ryan, finally came out of his shell during the reception when Gwynneth took charge of him and dragged him onto the dance floor by the hand.

Ryan and Sabrina cut their beautiful cake mid-evening, a tasty way to top off the celebration.  I loved the flowers they chose, too – a very elegant yet stunning arrangement for the tables.  As Tawn always says, it is good to add some height to a room decoration.

Ryan and Tawn and I went to Vietnam together a year ago February, returning to Ryan’s hometown of Saigon for the first time since he fled in 1977.  That experience, as emotional as it was, re-cemented our connection from early high school.  It meant a great deal to me to be able to stand with Ryan on this important day.  I wish Tawn had been able to be with me, but I know Ryan and Sabrina felt his support even if he was not.

Friday morning I dropped Paul off at the airport.  He’s heading to Bangkok to visit his girlfriend, Aori, meaning I’ll have the place to myself for the next week.  (Party at Paul’s!)

Afterwards, I stopped by the AMC Metreon 15 theater, which used to be the Sony Leows Metreon until AMC bought the Sony Leows theatre chain.  The theatre is now run by several former colleagues and employees of mine and I particularly wanted to stop by and visit Joel, the union projectionist who taught me the craft of being a motion picture projectionist some 19 years ago when I first started working at a movie theatre.

Yes, my first job was as a movie theatre user at the AMC Sunnyvale 6, a cinema long since gone.  In my 15 years with AMC I did everything including being an usher, a projectionist, a manager, and finally was the senior and general manager of several theatres including what was the nation’s busiest (and is still regularly in the top 20), the AMC Mercado 20 in Santa Clara, CA.  I was also the opening general manager for the AMC Festival Walk 11 in Hong Kong.  Exciting, huh?

To this day, I’m always very interested in movie theatres and how they run.  When there’s a film problem at one of the cinemas in Khrungthep, I can barely resist the urge to offer to help fix it.

After lunch, Joel took me on a tour of the projection booth for their IMAX theatre, left.  I’ve never been inside an IMAX booth and it is quite impressive. 

The film is 70mm wide, versus the usual 35mm film, but the frames are arranged horizontally on the film (sprockets are on the top and bottom of the frame instead of the sides) meaning that the image resolution is significantly higher than on 35mm film. 

In the picture, Joel is holding a small roll of 35mm film next to the much larger IMAX film.  This particular print is the Harry Potter movie, which is being shown in 3D.  Because of that, it actually has two films, one projecting the left eye image and the other projecting the right eye image.  That’s a lot of film!

Below is a picture of the projectionists threading the film throughg the “brain” of the platter: the front of the film is in the center, is fed out through the brain to the projector.  It is then projected and feeds back onto another platter around a removable metal frame.  When the film is finished showing, it has essentially re-built itself onto another platter, and the metal frame can be taken out and the film threaded for the next showing, ending up on the platter it was on for the first showing.  Back and forth all day long.

The other thing amazing about the IMAX projector is the xenon bulb.  In a typical movie projector, the highly-fragile (and highly explosive) bulb is about 3500 watts.  The picture below shows a 7000w bulb used in some of the large auditoriums at Metreon along with a 15,000 watt bulb used in the IMAX projector.

That’s quite a bulb.

There’s a really good description about the entire platter and reel process used in movie projectors here.

This evening I have the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner for Ryan and Sabrina’s wedding.  There’s a lot of back and forth this weekend: rehearsal in San Francisco, dinner in Burlingame, prepare for wedding in South San Francisco, wedding in San Francisco, pictures in Golden Gate Park, reception and banquet in San Mateo, Sunday brunch in Berkeley, afternoon show in San Francisco, dinner in San Jose.

To make it extra fun, the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge is closed for the entire weekend for a construction project!

It is really nice to be back in San Francisco, yet this visit reconfirms the sentiment I’ve felt on previous visits: it is a nice place to visit, but it isn’t home.  I’ve been able to see a lot of friends over the first few days, have spent a fair amount of time driving (the way people drive here seems to be a good metaphor for American societal values as a whole – super agressive in a “race to the red light” sort of way, but really in their own little worlds and not paying attention at all), and have eaten moderate amounts of food that I miss.

Left: First stop on my arrival was Macy’s Union Sqare and a quick lunch at Boudin’s: clam chowder served in a sourdough bread bowl.  You can argue that there is better clam chowder elsewhere in the city, and maybe even better bread, but the two are a classic combination that really capture some of what’s great about San Francisco and Northern California’s culinary heritage.

Yesterday I met up with Fiona, a university class mate whose wedding Tawn and I attended several years ago, but with whom I had lost touch. 

Thanks to LinkedIn, we were able to reconnect and made plans for lunch.  Fiona and her husband have an adorable son, Dominic, and just gave birth to a second son, Zachary. 

Dominic has the best of both his parents’ looks and has the longest, waviest eyelashes.  I think you can just see them in the picture to the right. 

Dominic was a little shy at first, but soon warmed up after he saw the box of Thai desserts I had brought him to try. 

Fiona and I had fun catching up; it is amazing how people’s lives progress.  Since graduation, Fiona has been working in Human Resources for a high-tech compnay that actually is a customer of my company’s.  Little did I know!  

I’m glad that there are an  increasing number of technologies available to help us stay in touch – and reconnect – with  friends. 

Below, Dominic, Zachary and I pose for a picture after lunch at Willow Street Pizza in San Jose.