CCSF Outreach at Sunday Streets Bayview, April 9, 2017

Carole Meagher, Donna Hayes, Elgy Gillespie, and Danny Halford with the SF community.

Below right:  Danny Halford introduces Student Ambassador Ayesha Shabbir and Board of Trustee President Thea Selby.

Student Ambassador Zacaria Palacios with a cookie I made.  I'm so grateful when anyone likes what I make!  See my Veganista blog.  http://mynameisveganista.blogspot.com/2017/04/vegan-cookies-appreciated-by-peers-and.html   

Elgy Gillespie is covering this event for the ESLetter in her very energetic, humorous way.

Elgy Gillespie (ESL instructor) Danny Halford (organizer), Tom Temprano (member of Board of Trustees) and I pose for the really nice guy representing Bottleshae, Winston Tam.  Tom Temprano had come after the  ribbon-cutting at the re-opening of  the LBGT center.

I like the way Zacaria moved down to the height of the little girl he was talking to.

Not pictured is Ellen Wall, whose name came up because she's been a big supporter of CCSF and was misssed at a meeting held the day before.  She's recuperating from a hip injury at the Jewish Home in SF.

We had a beautiful day for CCSF outreach at Sunday Streets in the Bayview, and I think Jeff Jelsmo, the site coordinator of Sunday Streets, was right that moving farther south near Bancroft on Third Street meant more foot traffic.

I loved the ride down Third Street, an area of the city I don't see very often.  We passsed Delancey, 4th and King, Mission Rock, Mariposa, , Evans, Oakdale--all names I'd heard for years, but the ride make them concrete.  I met a nice family who were going in the wrong direction and told them I had done that on occasions in spite of living in SF!

Danny Halford, the organizer of CCSF Outreach at Sunday Streets,  and Alex Guiriba, Associate Dean of Outreach, were there before 10:30, and the student ambassadors Zacharia Palacios and Ayesha Shabbir were there all day.

Thea Selby, President of the Board of Trustees, and Tom Temprano arrived in the afternoon--Tom Temprano after the ribbon-cutting ceremony at the newly renovated LGBT Center at 1800 Market.

Donna Hayes, a counselor, had not committed but came and helped out a lot.  Ophelia Clark, Chair of the Business Department,  also came by to help tho' not scheduled to do so.

Carole Meagher of Business also did a lot to help.

A Russian couple came by.    Her English was very basic, but she communicated a lot.  They lived in the apartments on Armstrong and 3rd Street, which she pointed out to me, saying it was very dangerous or had been.  I wasn't sure of the tense.  I think she told me a Russian taxi driver had been killed.  She also said, "Chinese, Chinese, Chinese.  It's Chinatown."  I think she and her husband were in senior housing.

She told me, "You have beautiful skin" and pulled the skin on her cheek to show me what skin meant.  I said, "Oh, is my skin all right?"  and she said, "Not all right.  Very, very good."

I was happy to hear that.  But even more I was interested in where people live and how they feel about it, however anecdotal.

 I asked a passerby if she was interested in summer school, and she said, "No, but I'm glad the proposition was passed so that classes will be free.  That should help you get more people."

I was startled and pleased  that she was aware and so articulate on the subject!   Other volunteers noted that not all passers-by were so well informed.

More photos:  

https://www.dropbox.com/sc/7995a2wuhabkcjs/AACyohGma5KJophjZMSL0yMza

Dennis Johnson Is Spirit in Action!

Dennis Johnson, a friend and colleague of many years at CCSF, hasn't retired from giving sensational benefit piano recitals for Spirit in Action. 

spiritinaction.org


 (Janet Fowler drove  Lauri Fried Lee, Shehla Khan, Bill Shoaf and me to Point Richmond to hear him play, and we saw Robin Mackey, another CCSF friend and colleague about to retire.)

Besides being an extraordinary pianist, he has a great sense of humor, and he knows that we are OLD friends, so he even excused us in advance for any visits to the restroom we might have to make between numbers.


He said that he had been alone at the piano for so long that he took notes on how to behave in public: Don't hum. Don't moan. Don't drool.... 

He played pieces by Scarlatti, Haydn, Chopin, Lamb, Brahms, and Franck, and he didn't drool at all!. 

He told us that Scarlatti had written 550 piano pieces but not to worry because he was going to play only three of them.  

 After he played three "Rags," he quipped "This may be the first time anyone's gone from playing  rags to Brahams at a recital, but when  you're retired, you can do whatever you want to do."

 He thanked his wife Marsha for being the page turner, and someone (Janet Fowler)  added "and more!" 

Their charming (and handsome) son Carl is here with Marsha and Dennis.

Then I had Dennis fake-play so I could take a picture without being disruptive!

He gives tidbits of information, too, and it's all new to me and helps me be a better listener since my usual choice of music is show tunes.  (I wonder how Joseph Lamb and other ragtime composers would regard the musical Ragtime if they were still around.)

I have to say, too, that when he played Chopin's Etude in E major, I wondered whether I'd heard that on an old Elaine May-Mike Nichols album."  

Someday I hope we get to hear Dennis play Ben Harney's "You've Been a Good Old Wagon, but You Done Broke."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEBs_mpTH6w