Blue, Green and Ready to Roll

It’s blue, green, and ready to roll: In March 2011, coastal residents in San Mateo County, Calif. got a new bookmobile powered by biodiesel and solar panels. It’s also wheelchair accessible. The bookmobile will serve unincorporated communities in the 25-mile stretch between Pescadero and Montara (with the exception of Half Moon Bay, the only incorporated town in the area), and go as far inland as LaHonda.

The new bookmobile debuted in Pescadero on March 5. I produced (camera, interviews, video editing) this video of the event for Half Moon Bay Patch.

Blue, Green, and Ready to Roll from kristine a. wong on Vimeo.

Seismic Safety in Question at Cabrillo Unified Schools

by Kristine A. Wong

At least one school building in Half Moon Bay has been listed as vulnerable in the event of an earthquake, while over a dozen additional Cabrillo Unified School District building projects are listed among those not certified as meeting state seismic safety standards, according to a media watchdog investigation.

A 19-month California Watch investigation, which was released Thursday, uncovered holes in the state’s enforcement of seismic safety regulations for public schools.

California began regulating school architecture for seismic safety in 1933 with the Field Act, but data taken from the Division of the State Architect’s Office shows 20,000 school projects statewide never got final safety certifications. In the crunch to get schools built within the last few decades, state architects have been lax on enforcement, California Watch reported.

A separate inventory completed nine years ago found 7,500 seismically risky school buildings in the state. Yet, California Watch reports that only two schools have been able to access a $200 million fund for upgrades.

While none of the district’s schools were found to be located in an Alquist-Priolo fault zone, liquefaction zone, landslide zone, or within a quarter-mile of a fault, the investigation identified a 10,000 square-foot building at Half Moon Bay High School as “likely to not perform well in an earthquake” and “in need of a structural evaluation.”

half moon bay high school buildingThrough a state inventory list dated March 30, 2011, Half Moon Bay Patch found the building has one story, is located in seismic Zone 4 (the highest-risk classification in the 4-zone system developed by the U.S. Geological Survey) and had its records placed on file with the state on Jan. 1, 1961. The building, which could not be specifically identified, has not been shown as ever being seismically reviewed or retrofitted, according to California Watch, nor has it been demolished or sold, according to the March 30 inventory list.

Thirteen other projects located throughout the district were included in California Watch’s uncertified list, including building projects at Cunha Intermediate School in Half Moon Bay, El Granada Elementary, Farallone View in Montara, Kings Mountain Elementary in Woodside, and other projects at Half Moon Bay High. Four of these projects were described as “various locations” throughout the district.

California Watch also found that one project at Hatch Elementary in Half Moon Bay was once listed as a “Letter 4” level of risk under the Field Act – the highest level in its ranking system — but downgraded to a Letter 3 on March 25, 2010 by the State Architect’s office. While it is not clear whether this is the case for the project at Hatch Elementary, California Watch’s investigation found that some projects upgraded from a Letter 4 status did not appear to have resolved the structural issues which deemed the building as high risk in the first place.

When presented with California Watch’s data for district schools, Facilities Manager Jim Tjogas said he was confident that the district’s facilities are safe.

“All of our buildings were built after the Field Act,” he said. “When they were built, they were built to standard,” he said.

The state’s records of monitoring and assessments of the seismic safety of its K-12 school buildings has consistently been a work in progress. Its Tracker database does not include any projects submitted to the state before Nov. 12, 1997. To rectify this, it is currently working to get a backlog of paper records scanned into this system, installed more than five years ago.

Other problems with the state’s database include incorrect addresses on file for specific schools, including Cunha Intermediate School in Half Moon Bay. The address associated with Cunha was that of the district office — 498 Kelly Ave. — instead of its physical address at 600 Church St. This problem prevented California Watch from being able to match every project in the uncertified list with the school each project was associated with.

With knowledge of the discrepancies in the state’s tracking database, Half Moon Bay Patch asked Tjogas for documentation from the state showing that the projects on the California Watch list were certified as safe.

Earlier this week, Tjogas said that he could not provide that. “I don’t have info on that or those records,” he said on Thursday. “I don’t know where they are offhand. We have them in some boxes and they’re scattered all over,” Tjogas said.

Half Moon Bay Patch inquired about district records with Jim Hackett, the acting regional manager of the State Architect’s Oakland office where the state houses the school district’s building records and correspondence. Hackett did not return a call to Half Moon Bay Patch by the time of publication. Half Moon Bay Patch has also filed a public records request with the state architect’s office for the district’s building records.

Following Half Moon Bay Patch’s inquiry with the district for the records, Tjogas said that he contacted Hackett’s office on April 6 in regards to obtaining and reviewing the district’s records.

“This is a statewide problem that’s affecting all schools, not just the Cabrillo Unified School District,” Tjogas said. “It would be really nice to have money to get the records on microfiche, but we haven’t been given those funds,” he said.

District Superintendent Rob Gaskill elected not to be interviewed for this story.

Half Moon Bay Patch is continuing to investigate this story and will provide updates as they become available.

This story was produced using data provided to Half Moon Bay Patch by California Watch, the state’s largest investigative reporting team and part of the Center for Investigative Reporting.

To view the interactive map, click here http://projects.californiawatch.org/earthquakes/school-safety/

Etches in the Sand: Sion Milosky Remembered

This article was published on Half Moon Bay Patch on March 18, 2011.

message from daughters to sion miloskyA day after Sion Milosky died surfing the powerful Mavericks surf break on Wednesday evening, he was remembered by his family and friends on the beach at Mavericks with a line of hearfelt messages etched in sand, each accompanied by flowers.

“WE LOVE YOU DADDY,” read one message written to Milosky which appeared to be from his two daughters. Delicate pink roses marked the top of another message which appeared to be from his wife, reading “To the Love of my Life forever.” The letter “o” in the word “love” was written as a heart, and the names of the couple written inside a heart at the bottom.

Some messages referred to Milosky’s passion for surfing big waves that he had turned into a lifestyle in his home state of Hawaii: “SION/THANK YOU FOR SHOWING US THE RECIPE OF LIFE!” and “INSPIRATION/YOU DA MAN.”

And a few others included in their messages to Milosky with the simple — yet complex in meaning — Hawaiian word “Aloha.”

Milosky’s wife went out to the break located less than a mile past Pillar Point Harbor on a jet ski yesterday and saw where her husband spent his last moments before drowning after a fatal wipeout that witnesses said took place at approximately 6:30 p.m.

Milosky was found tethered to his surfboard floating face down about twenty minutes later, according to the San Mateo County Sheriff’s Office, which handled the emergency dispatch call for aid at 6:50 p.m.

Three emergency firefighters/paramedics arrived to find Milosky receiving medical care from other surfers, the Sheriff’s Office reported. After the crew performed advanced CPR on Milosky, he was transported to the emergency room at Seton Medical Center Coastside in Moss Beach, where he was pronounced dead at 7:46 p.m. by the physician on duty, according to the Sheriff’s Office.

mavericks surfersMilosky’s misfortune on Wednesday night didn’t stop surfers from hitting the waves at Mavericks. About six to eight surfers were out surfing the break at midafternoon yesterday and were being watched over by one on a jet ski, according to a few observers who had climbed up on the bluffs at the edge of the beach during low tide to watch.

Although the surfers were barely visible to the naked eye from the bluffs, Kathe Goria-Hendrickson was able to amplify her view with binoculars.

“I’ve seen a couple of nice rides on the waves — and I’ve also seen a lot of surfboards up in the air,” she said.

Goria-Hendrickson, a resident of Clipper Mills, had wedged herself into a tight vertical space on the edge of a bluff with a pair of binoculars with her golden retriever dog Oso sitting patiently next to her. She had been there for about an hour, she said.

“It’s scary because they’re so huge,” she said, referring to the size of the waves, which dwarfed the surfers in comparison.

sion milosky memorialized on signBack out at the entrance to Mavericks, Milosky had also been memorialized on the wooden sign noting the beach’s location at Pillar Point Harbor, with “RIP SION” and “ALWAYS IN OUR HEARTS” carved into the top and left hand side of the sign. Flowers had been placed at the sign’s bottom ledge.

At Mavericks, Milosky will not be alone: his remembrances are a few steps away from a rock-and-shell memorial erected for Mark Foo, the first-known Mavericks casualty and another Hawaiian. Foo died surfing Mavericks in December 1994.

A memorial fund has been set up for Milosky’s wife and two daughters by Vans, the company which gave him $25,000 last December for winning the Project North Shore Underground contest co-sponsored with Surfing Magazine. Donations can be made at any Bank of Hawaii branch or through PayPal.

Volcom has also set up a memorial fund for Milosky’s family. Donations can be sent via PayPal here.

Milosky reportedly funded his trip to Half Moon Bay using some of the money he won from the North Shore contest, which was designated to be used as a surfing travel fund.

Photos by Kristine A. Wong

51 Tons and 100 Wheels

51 Tons and 100 Wheels: Phyllis J Crabbing Boat Transported Up Highway 1 from kristine a. wong on Vimeo.

At approximately 1 a.m. on January 4, the Phyllis J crabbing boat overturned at Francis Beach, a segment of Half Moon Bay State Beach on the California coast. The owner of the boat, Larry Fortado, and two crewmembers escaped safely. The trio was in the midst of a crabbing trip. (All of the 10,000 crabs estimated to be on board escaped as well).

A joint response team comprised of the Coast Guard, Fish and Game, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and private environmental response and vessel salvage/recovery specialists worked to upright the boat in the surf zone and avert the potential hazard of an oil spill by successfully draining 20,000 gallons of diesel fuel and 500 gallons of residual contaminants from the boat.

Because the owner decided to salvage the Phyllis J, it was dismantled for transport into two pieces. The wheelhouse (passenger cabin area) was cut off separately from the 51-ton hull.

The hull was pulled up Highway 1 by a truck and rested on specialized trailer with 96 wheels. Permits from the city, county, and state were required before the operation could begin.

Its transport on January 28 marked the end of a 24-day stay at Half Moon Bay State Beach.

I produced this video (camera, video editing, writing) for Half Moon Bay Patch, which provided comprehensive coverage the story of the Phyllis J from when it beached to its removal and delivery to Fortado’s yard in Princeton almost a month later.

How to Make a Pear Tart

How to Make a Pear Tart from kristine a. wong on Vimeo.

Pastry Chef Juan Marquez shows how to make a pear flambe tart at Caffé Mezza Luna in Princeton, Calif.

Marquez was trained by an Italian pastry chef. Each day, he works with a small crew to make a wide range of desserts including gelato, cannoli, meringues, macarons, mousse cakes and tarts.

I produced this video (camera, video editing, writing) for Half Moon Bay Patch.

An Afternoon Snack at the Farm

Half Moon Bay, Calif., is one of the pumpkin capitols of the world. Every fall, the small town receives thousands of tourists who come to pick pumpkins from local farms. The pumpkins are ready for the picking by late September/early October. A few hundred thousand also attend its annual pumpkin festival.

Despite the public’s enthusiasm for pumpkins, though, the local supply is often greater than the demand. This year was no exception. If you drive along San Mateo Road/Highway 92 in late fall/early winter, you’ll see pumpkins lying on the fields through the last few days of December.

What happens to all the leftover pumpkins, then? Watch this video for one answer.

I produced this video for Half Moon Bay Patch.com.

An Afternoon Snack at the Farm from kristine a. wong on Vimeo.

goats at tunitas creek family farm

Goats and sheep grazing at Tunitas Creek Family Farm.

Blue Whale and Fetus Wash Ashore California Beach

During the first weekend in October 2010, an 85-foot blue whale washed up on the shore of Bean Hollow State Beach in Pescadero, California. Blue whales are known to be the largest species living on earth.

On October 7, scientists announced that the cause of the whale’s death was due to the blunt force from a collision with a passing ship. The whale was pregnant at the time, and her fetus washed up close by.

I produced this video (camera, video editing, writing) for Half Moon Bay Patch.com.

Blue Whale and Fetus at Bean Hollow State Beach, Pescadero, California from kristine a. wong on Vimeo.

blue whale at Bean Hollow State Beach

A still from the video.

The fetus of the blue whale at Bean Hollow State Beach

A still from the video of the whale's fetus on shore.

Blue whale and fetus wash ashore on Bean Hollow State Beach, Pescadero, California

Dickens Fair Enchants and Transcends Time

This story was published on Dec. 10, 2010 on Half Moon Bay Patch as the first of a two-part series at a look behind the scenes of the Dickens Christmas Fair. It won a third-place prize in the San Francisco Peninsula Press Club’s 2011 Greater Bay Area Awards competition for the “Entertainment” category in the Broadband/Web division.

actors depicting miss havisham and charles dickensThe world of Victorian England depicted by Charles Dickens in his many novels was not always bright. Recall some of his most memorable characters: Miss Havisham, pining away in a decaying wedding dress for a man who left her at the altar long ago in Great Expectations; Tiny Tim, a young boy near death whose family cannot pay for his medical treatment in A Christmas Carol; and in the book that bears his name, the orphan Oliver Twist, a child laborer who escapes from his job only to join a juvenile pickpocketing gang run by Fagin and the Artful Dodger.

But Dickens penned a fair share of the brighter side of life in his work, most notably when Ebenezer Scrooge realizes the “true” meaning of Christmas is to live his life in the way that imparts the true holiday spirit of giving — which he throws himself into with great aplomb alongside Tiny Tim and the rest of the Cratchit family.

It’s this warm-hearted spirit that is at the center of the world of Victorian England depicted by the Great Dickens Christmas Fair (known more commonly as “The Dickens Fair”) which opened the day after Thanksgiving and is open for two more weekends at Daly City’s Cow Palace.

Part of the Bay Area holiday event calendar since 1970, the Dickens Fair is another creation of the Patterson family from Novato, who started the Bay Area Renaissance Fair in the late 1960s after sponsoring the inaugural event in Los Angeles earlier in the decade.

Visitors who come to the Dickens Fair walk from dull gray skies into a bright, vibrant, three-acre wonderland filled with the rich sights, scents, and sounds one might expect in London during the holiday season. There’s music, dancing, food and drink, browsing (or shopping) galore through the many period stores, games, a puppet show, and interactive street theater with Dickens’ characters and London residents going about daily life.

What should one do first? Well, it depends on the kind of experience you want to have at the fair. One can get down, Victorian-style, at Fezziwig’s Dance Party, a large hall located to the immediate left of the entrance where dozens of couples dressed in the styles of the day dance elegantly to music, navigating around each other with grace.

If you have the gumption, try sending a telegram from the old post office to someone in the festival.

Put your mind to work at the Adventurer’s Club, where lectures, readings, and demonstrations are given throughout the day on topics of interest during the Victorian period.

Get your hair braided in the style of the day with bright ribbons, browse through the antiquarian bookshop, or follow the townspeople as they charge down the streets in protest.

Talk to the people who make up Victorian London as you pass them in the street — whether it be the kid juggling next to the Christmas tree, the society couple walking arm in arm who has paused to listen to some harp music, or the streetsweeper — someone who probably has lots of interesting stories up his sleeve.

And when you’re tired, sit back for some food, be it savory pies, fish and chips, lamb, or a simple sandwich. Have a beer or a drink at the absinthe bar, and enjoy one of the many performances at one of the six stages on site.

Taking in the number of options of things to do and see at the fair is overwhelming, so it’s best to get there early to get the full experience. Every aspect of the fair cries out for attention.

mother and daughter in victorian costumeIt’s the elaborate costumes, though, that are the most eye-catching, with women dressed in their most fancy, gussied-up hats accented with feathers and billowing, corseted floor-length dresses made of sumptuous fabric. Most men are nattily dressed in a tall top hat and a dark three-piece suit, while those playing roles of working class residents wear newspaper boy-style caps, worn jackets and faded button down shirts.

Not all of these modern-day men and women turned weekend Victorian London residents are officially affiliated with the fair; many are visitors. In total, though, there are hundreds of actors playing some role or another as part of the fair. They’re just waiting for you to hear their English accents or talk with them in greater depth at one of the many parlors and social clubs located throughout the fair.

It’s at one of these parlors where Miss Havisham is spending her time on a recent weekend. In her all-white ensemble of crumbled wedding dress, hair and hat, she’s hard to miss.

Miss Havisham (Pacifica resident Surrey Blackburn) explains the work that goes on behind the scenes to make the experience as enchanting as possible for the visitor — in other words, to make him or her believe that the Dickens Fair actually is Victorian England for the time that they are there, based on what they see and hear the actors doing, as well as with their interactions with the actors themselves.

Most actors, like Blackburn, are volunteers. Many have been involved for several years — Blackburn herself has been playing the role of Miss Havisham for nine years. However, unlike most of her peers, Blackburn’s English accent is the real McCoy, which nabbed her the job of teaching Cockney accents to Dickens Fair volunteer actors at Oceana High School in Pacifica for many years.

Blackburn said that those who want to volunteer as actors must take four classes to learn the accents, learn the songs of the period, learn how to dance and sing, know how to put together an authentic period costume, and have an overall understanding of Dickens’ life.

Sounds like a tall order for an American living in the 21st century. But judging from the crowds of actors dressed in their Victorian best who were speaking in English accents that sounded just fine to the untrained American ear — the challenge for them to reinvent themselves was not insurmountable.

Blackburn is part of the division of actors who play out scenes around the fair from Dickens’ many books. While it might appear to the casual visitor that all these scenes unfold quite spontaneously as they encounter each other on the fairgrounds — they are all scheduled and overseen by a different person who is the director of a major Dickens book.

“There’s a director for A Christmas Carol and a director for Oliver Twist,” Blackburn says. “Then there’s one director for all his other books, and under that, there are people who direct each of the books in that category.”

Blackburn is the director of Great Expectations, and she takes her role very seriously. All the major characters are on a tight schedule each day, she says, pulling out a laminated 8.5″ x 11″ schedule from her purse. A quick glance at the schedule is dizzying, as it shows several mini-performances of scenes from the book scheduled for each hour, along with where the scene will be acted out on the grounds and which other characters are part of that scene.

“It’s a 12-hour day,” she said. Blackburn arrives at the fair at 8 or 8:30 a.m. to prepare for the 11 a.m. opening, where she receives notes from her director each day. After the fair ends at 7 p.m., the actors are given feedback and the performances of the day are discussed as a group.

Despite the long hours, Blackburn seems to relish playing the role of Miss Havisham, and has even engineered a few quirky twists to her interactions with visitors.

For example, she said that she gives over 200 small toy mice (the kind that are sold in pet stores for cats) over the course of the fair, which are symbolic of the mice that eat Miss Havisham’s abandoned wedding cake.

She also says that people have told her that they come back to the Dickens Fair year after year just to see Miss Havisham and talk with her.

“As a volunteer, I do it for the love of it,” Blackburn says.

Photos by Kristine A. Wong

Forecasting Big Waves for Mavericks Surf

This story was published on Dec. 3, 2010 on Half Moon Bay Patch. It won a second-place prize in the San Francisco Peninsula Press Club’s 2011 Greater Bay Area Journalism Awards competition for the “Sports Story” category in the Broadband/Web division.

To a nonsurfer, it may seem like a formidable task and a lot of pressure—forecasting big waves for The Jay At Mavericks Big Wave Invitational, one of the top surfing competitions in the world. But to Mark Sponsler, official surf forecaster for the contest, it’s a fairly simple task that can be boiled down to a basic science.

Instead of being held on a set date, the competition has a three-month contest window from Dec. 1 to Feb. 28, meaning that the event can take place at any time during this period. The window ensures that the surf conditions on the day of the event are befitting of The Jay At Mavericks’ prestigious nature. Invited competitors are essentially on call to arrive in Half Moon Bay. In previous years, competitors had only 24 hours to arrive after the call was made for the competition to begin.

Sponsler, an unassuming man who is quick to smile and laugh—and is also a surfer himself—runs stormsurf.com, a global surf forecasting site. He is not a formally trained meteorologist, but is self-taught. Though he is the one to notify contest organizers when he thinks it’s the right time to hold the contest, Sponsler says that the process is more collaborative than his title betrays.

“By looking at the surf report, the surfers already know pretty much when the competition will be held,” he said this past Monday, standing on the beach at Mavericks as he looked out to the ocean where surfers were engaging in the traditional prayer circle as part of the day’s opening ceremonies.

When the data looks right, Sponsler talks with the organizers, and more in-depth analysis of the conditions take place.

“When we think it’s time, they [the competitors] talk about if they think the conditions are right, and if they agree, then the call is made,” Sponsler says.

Though Sponsler is on call for what could potentially be almost three months, he doesn’t appear to be burdened at all by the assignment—nor does he let his added responsibilities hinder his regular activities during the period—responsibilities that include a day job.

“I can do it all by digital device,” he said. “I check the data about three or four times daily—I can even be skiing at the top of a mountain and look at it,” he said. The first time he looks at the surf conditions data each day, he says, is at 6:30 a.m.

Sponsler got started in surf forecasting by building the analytical models that he uses to predict surf conditions. As a software project manager by trade, he drew upon his programming experience to capitalize on data collected from buoys essential in forecasting surf conditions that are stationed around the world by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and other countries.

Equipped with digital Iridium Satellite sensors, the buoys’ sensors measure wave height, wave period, wind speed, and barometer pressure, according to Sponsler. The buoys relay this data by satellite to NOAA’s headquarters, which then makes its way to Sponsler’s computer, thanks to a Freedom of Information Act request Sponsler filed to get access to the data.

“Because the buoys are off the coast, you can really see the swell coming,” Sponsler says.

Sponsler’s computer is able to render the data live, he says, and the data gets fed into algorithms and surf forecast models he developed. The models update three or four times a day, which is when Sponsler checks the data during the contest window period. In addition to Mavericks’ swells, Sponsler’s website shows data from around the world, and provides a tutorial section so that anyone interested in learning how to read the data can do so.

What kind of surf conditions is Sponsler looking for? Buoys reading a “pure swell of 10 feet with wave crests of 18 seconds apart,” he says. “The wind has to be just right when the swell arrives also, along with having low tide and sunlight.”

Though the word around Monday’s opening ceremonies was that no big wave action would be happening at Mavericks in the first part of this month, Sponsler seemed as positive as ever for the opening of the contest window to begin.

Ironically, Sponsler’s surf-forecasting career got started at the time when he had to move away from Mavericks—all the way to the East Bay, where he lives now in Castro Valley. “I couldn’t just check the conditions out here anymore,” he said.

Though Sponsler can’t be out surfing as much as he did before, the big wave competition at Mavericks is all the better for it.

Photo by Kristine A. Wong

Crab Fishermen Get Green Light to Start Season

Story and photos by Kristine A Wong

This story was the first to break the news that after a prolonged wait, Central Coast fishermen were allowed start the Fall 2010 Dungeness crab season, after body composition tests met market requirements. It was published (with accompanying photos) as breaking news on Half Moon Bay Patch on Nov. 15, 2010.

A message written outside the Harbormaster’s office at Pillar Point Harbor today said it all. “Commercial Crab Season Opens November X??,” it read, with traces of the number “15” erased and a large X crossed out over the erased number.

But shortly before 5 pm, Duncan McLean, president of the Half Moon Bay Fisherman’s Association, said that the fishermen docked in Pillar Point Harbor would leave tomorrow at 6 am to start the season.

Though the start of the Dungeness Crab commercial fishing season legally and officially opened earlier today at midnight, local commercial fishermen at Pillar Point had been spending the day standing out on the pier instead of doing what they had originally planned to be doing at this time: crabbing.

The reason for the standoff was because local fishermen wanted to test the local crabs’ percentage of meat as part of its overall body composition to ensure that their catch would bring in stable market orders before the fleet could head out and drop their crab pots into the ocean.

“The rumors were that the crabs were not very good at all, so we wanted to get the price solidified to ensure good quality to the public and make sure the price is stable,” said Duncan McLean, president of the Half Moon Bay Fishermen’s Association.

“Usually a 22 percent portion of meat as part of the crab’s overall weight is what is needed to be marketable,” said John Draper, Assistant Harbormaster at Pillar Point Harbor.

Draper said that this morning, the crabs were sent out to be tested at North Coast Fisheries in Santa Rosa from Bodega Bay, San Francisco, and the waters outside Pillar Point Harbor.

Duncan McLean, president of the Half Moon Bay Fisherman’s Association, said earlier at 4:45 pm today that he was still waiting for the test results to come in from the crabs from Bodega Bay and San Francisco, and that a 6 am start tomorrow for the fishermen was a “definite maybe.”

Later, at 4:50 pm, after calling to confirm test results, McLean said that based on a  average of 26.84 percent in body composition tests from Bodega Bay, San Francisco, and outside Pillar Point Harbor, the fishermen were “good to go.”

Shortly after 3:30 pm this afternoon, McLean cited the test results from just the Pillar Point Harbor area when he was waiting for test results from all locations to come in. “The crabs [from outside the Pillar Point area] were good, a little over 27.4 percent,” McLean had said.

Bill Webb, who fishes off his boat Cricket (along with his dog that is named after his boat) which is based in a berth in Pillar Point Harbor, said earlier today that the fishermen were waiting to hear the official word from McLean that the fishermen had a market order based on the results of the crabs’ body composition tests.

Webb had heard the rumor that the fishermen weren’t going to be able to go out until tomorrow at 6 am. Mentions of the “6 am start” were overheard in several passing conversations around the harbor in the late afternoon.

“I’ve already got six pages of orders,” Webb said, sitting in his boat while he encouraged his dog Cricket to shake his hand with her paw. Webb sells some crab off his boat, and sells some to wholesalers.

“It’s tough,” Webb said about the state of this year’s fishing season. “Some of these guys have no salmon season…that used to be more than half my season,” he said. “So you put in more [crab] pots which cost more money…the pots come to about $200 each,” he said.

“It puts more pressure on the crab season than it can handle,” he said.

Time for Red Eggs and Ginger

This piece was published on Half Moon Bay Patch on Nov. 15, 2010. It won a third-place prize in the San Francisco Peninsula Press Club’s 2011 Greater Bay Area Journalism Awards competition for the “Blog/Commentary” category in the Broadband/Web division.

red egg and ginger on a plateImagine my mother’s surprise when I told her yesterday afternoon that I was going to be having a red egg and ginger celebration today.

You see, in the Chinese culture, new parents throw a red egg and ginger party on their child’s one-month birthday. This tradition originates back to the times when many babies wouldn’t make it to the 30-day mark. Once the child reached that milestone, they were believed to be likely to survive, so it was at that time that the baby was introduced to the extended family and community.

As far as my mother knew, no new grandchild had shown up last month, so she looked a little perplexed. But when I reminded her that it was one month ago on October 15 when Half Moon Bay Patch launched, she smiled.

“That’s a cute idea,” she said.

True, it only took 3 months to introduce Half Moon Bay Patch to the world, compared to the 9 months it takes to give birth to an infant. Not being a mother, I know that I can’t even begin to comprehend all the tiny, incremental processes that take place inside the womb over this period. Nor do I know what it’s like to give birth to a live human being and the devote the amount of time, energy, consideration and patience it takes to keep coming back to nudge the child along what you believe to be the right path day after day, no matter how little sleep you’ve had due to their crying the night before, or how late you stayed up to help them with their 7th grade science fair project.

But I think you know where I’m going here, because what I’m going to say is what you already know: that I can relate in some way to the ongoing effort to keep a young and growing entity alive and well.

What does one have to do to keep an entity alive and well?

* You have to feed it. (New stories and content every day. Sometimes this involves staying up late into the night, depending on what happened the day before.)

* Before you feed it, though, you have to go out in the world and find it some food. Sometimes you hunt, sometimes you forage, sometimes you pick fruit off a tree, and sometimes you’re searching for wild mushrooms that might take awhile for you to find. (Choosing stories to cover. Assigning stories. Reporting. Write or film the story. Take pictures. Edit. Publish. Repeat.)

* You have to get it out on the playground. (Launched site, thank goodness there’s no repeat loop here.)

* And once it’s out on the playground, you have to supervise to make sure it doesn’t get into any kind of trouble. (Daily monitoring, updating, playing fair.)

It would be nice to be able to type a satisfactory “Check” after all of the above items, but to do so would be to miss the point entirely.

Why? Because as a daily publication, we can only move along one day at a time. We are celebrating the one-month birthday of Half Moon Bay Patch today, and I am putting a plate of virtual, symbolic red eggs and ginger in front of each of you right now to thank you for coming to our party and for reading this — but our work still continues after today.

The contributors and I have talked with many of you over the last 30 days. We’ve enjoyed reporting a range of stories from arts, business, city and Coastside news, sports, government, education, farming and the environment. I want to thank all of you who shared your perspective with us in order to make those stories find their final destination here. I would also like to thank our readers, as well as our contributors and columnists, as it’s all of our actions together that keeps this a living and breathing entity every day.

But I recognize that there are still so many people and so many parts of Half Moon Bay and the Coastside that we still need to reach. We’re still young and growing, but we’ve been out on the playground and are getting more out there every day. We hope that you’ll come meet us there, whether it be through your participation through comments, submissions and story ideas online — or in person when we’re out reporting.

Why red eggs and ginger, you ask? Eggs symbolize fertility. Red symbolizes good luck. And ginger gives a mother who has just given birth the strength to keep going and continue to raise her child (though anyone who knows me well would agree that it would be more appropriate to make this a red egg and coffee party).

So thanks, and we hope that you’ll sit and hang out with us at the table for awhile.

Photo by Kristine A. Wong

Generations Past & Present, Together

This story was published on Oct. 29, 2010 on Half Moon Bay Patch. It won a first-place prize in the San Francisco Peninsula Press Club’s 2011 Greater Bay Area Journalism Awards competition for the “Feature Story of a Light Nature” in the Broadband/Web category.

altarforporfiriolopez

Porfirio Lopez was a Mexican cowboy.

“He loved cows, horses, and family,” said Lily Monroy, recalling her father-in-law as she stood next to the altar dedicated to Lopez on display at tonight’s Día de los Muertos celebration at the Half Moon Bay Library. At the center of the altar was a photo of Lopez sitting tall on a horse, cowboy hat intact.

From the town of Cocula in Jalisco state, Lopez owned a farm, and was a father to 16 children (only 8 survived). He passed away 5 years ago, but his son and daughter-in-law still miss him very much. “He was very hardworking,” Monroy recalled. “He was a wonderful father and grandfather for us and our kids.”

Lopez’s photo was accompanied by a stout brown and cream-colored spotted cow, symbolic of his love for the animals he took care of. Monroy, originally from the state of Oaxaca, had placed a small mound of shiny brown pecans next to a similar pile of peanuts at the base of the altar. Bright orange cempasúchil (marigolds) flanked both ends, and skeleton figures watched over it all.

The peanuts and pecans were a contribution from the Oaxacan tradition, Monroy said. People from Jalisco, she said, do not traditionally include food at altars.

altardisplayLopez’s altar was just one of ten on display at the library. Along with a photo, skeletons, and marigolds, each altar was filled with mementos and objects of personal significance to the deceased. In preparation for tonight’s event, Armando Ramirez, Community Services Librarian, invited several members of the community to create altars in honor of their loved ones who have passed on.

The altar dedicated to H. Clair McMahon had special meaning for Ramirez, who put it together in collaboration with McMahon’s daughter Laurie. McMahon, a teacher at El Granada Elementary School, explained how it was only by chance that Ramirez discovered that her father was the man who helped him get through difficult times at Westview School in Pacifica, when he first arrived in the US from Mexico.

“I’d known Armando for 12 years,” she said, “and a year ago I pulled out my library card along with an old photo of my dad,” she said. “When Armando saw the photo, he started to cry,” she said.

Ramirez told McMahon that it was her father, the principal at Westview School, who took him under his wing and helped him adjust to attending school when fellow students teased him for having an accent. Coincidentally, Ramirez also unknowingly got to know McMahon’s mother when the two collaborated on a Bilingual Storytime project at the Millbrae Library years ago.

Under a smiling portrait of her dad, McMahon had placed a box of Sees candy, a Glenn Miller CD, and a black and white photo of Westview School where he was principal, along with a mug of his college alma mater. Ramirez added the traditional skeleton figures and orange marigolds, along with a tall and slender candle.

The younger generation was represented in full as well. The evening began with a bilingual reading of the children’s book Día de los Muertos by Bob Barrer. Rosa Martinez, Senior Library Assistant at the Half Moon Bay Library, read each page in English with Martina Tello, Community Program Specialist for the San Mateo County Library, reading the same page in Spanish immediately afterwards.

Next, Cunha Intermediate School’s drama class took the stage with their rendition of the bilingual book Ghost Wings (titled El Circito Magico in Spanish) by Barbara M. Joose, a story set in a Mexican forest where butterflies like to fly. The class read the story and acted it out for the standing-room only crowd filled with proud parents and family members.

After the play finished, it was time for pan de muerto (baked sweet bread of the dead, shaped to represent the deceased) and champurrado, a steaming drink of corn, chocolate, cinnamon and sugar made by Monroy and her sister Elda.

Over the food and drink, the children played and the adults reminisced. The deceased were there, too, looking out from their photos to the mix of mothers, fathers, sons, and daughters.

It was a night where generations past and present came together.

Photos by Kristine A. Wong

Pumpkin In My Ears, Pumpkin In My Hair, Pumpkin Everywhere

This story was published on Half Moon Bay Patch on Oct. 16, 2010. It won a second-place prize in the San Francisco Peninsula’s 2011 Greater Bay Area Journalism Awards competition for the “Headline” category of the Broadband/Web division.

To many, no matter their age, it’s the most exciting part of Half Moon Bay’s Pumpkin Festival: the pie-eating contest. Where else could one have a legitimate excuse to dive (headfirst) into an entire pumpkin pie, eat it as fast as you can, all with your hands tied behind your back? To make the contest even better, you’re supposed to get as messy as possible in the process.

During this weekend’s festival, there are four opportunities to do just that. Two of them happened earlier this afternoon, starting at 2 pm at the Bank of America parking lot off Main Street, otherwise known as the festival’s “Family Fun Zone.”

The first contest was for those age 11 and younger.

When emcee Michael Lederman of the Coastal Repertory Theater gave the emphatic go-ahead to the first group of contestants, a frenzied round of eating and cheering ensued.

pieeatingcontestRon Root, one of three contest judges and this year’s Annual Pumpkin Weigh-Off winner, said that the pie-eaters generally followed one of two strategies: eating delicate bites one at a time, or letting it all hang out: “The smaller kids are very neat — they don’t make a mess and they actually eat it. Then there are some that just rub their face in it and make as much of a mess as they can.”

When time was called, judges selected the top three contestants they thought were the messiest and who had eaten the most of their pie. Joining Root as a judge was Cameron Palmer, owner of Cameron’s Restaurant and Inn, and Michael Langfelder, a clerk at Safeway, whose company provided the pies.

In the end, the contestant in the age 11-and-under competition who followed the strategy of making as much of a mess as he could was first-time competitor Michael Whitlatch, 10, of Half Moon Bay. Whitlatch won the top prize, and it was easy to see why: burying his entire face into the pie during the duration of the competition had left smeared globs of pumpkin pie on his face and sweatshirt. The front strands of his hair were coated with a generous helping, and the top portion of one of his ears was spread with pumpkin as well.

boy with face covered in pumpkin pie“It was an amazing experience,” he said, shortly after he accepted his golden ribbon and descended the stage. “I just dumped my face in it and rubbed my head in it.” His father stepped in promptly with a roll of paper towels to clean his face, hair, and ears.

Jacquelyn Dellins, 9, also of Half Moon Bay, came in second. “I made blowing noises into my pie,” she said of her strategy to win the messiest award, “so that it would get all over me.”

Sean Kennedy, 8, of Half Moon Bay, came in third.

“These kids make excellent human piranhas when it comes to eating pie,” Langfelder said, smiling.

Sound fun? There’s two more chances tomorrow at the same time and same place: 2 pm (age 11 and under) and 2:15 pm (age 12 and up), Bank of America parking lot on Main Street. Get there early if you want to enter the contest.

Photos by Kristine A. Wong

How sweet the sound

Six gospel choirs sung, shimmied and swayed before a cheering crowd at Oakland’s Oracle Arena at the 2008 “How Sweet the Sound” Gospel Choir Competition. Their quest: the chance to be named the best in America, and a trip to the national finals in Atlanta. (Photos by Kristine A. Wong. Audio by Bagassi Koura.)

To view in fullscreen mode, click on the square in the far right hand corner.

Korean Americans find roots in traditional drumming

photos and story by KRISTINE WONG

The first time Amie Kim heard traditional Korean drumming, the beats went straight to her heart. At 20 years old, the Korean adoptee — raised in the Minneapolis suburbs since the age of two — had never been exposed to Korean culture before.

As she watched and listened to the Korean drum troupe perform that night 14 years ago, her throat swelled. She remembers that the sound vibrations created a feeling in her heart that she could only describe as a mixture of sorrow, anger, loss, and longing. Somehow, she thought, I’ve heard this music before.

“It made me cry,” she says. “It sent chills through me.” The sounds, she says, fed her spirit. “The drumming helped me to feel whole, especially since my life had been rootless and tumultuous.”

“I knew at that moment,” she says, “that I wanted to learn how to drum.”

A year ago, Kim, 34, took her first Korean drumming class in the Bay Area and was hooked. “Drumming has connected me with Korean language and culture, because music is a language of its own,” the Oakland resident says, during a break from a Pungmul class in Oakland Chinatown’s Asian Cultural Center (OACC), her drum at her side.

Ten minutes later, Kim is back in action, tying the cloth straps of her jangoo – or hourglass drum – behind her back allowing her to strike the drum on both sides. Jangoo drums, with surfaces made out of cows’ skin stretched taut on the top and bottom, are connected by an hourglass-shaped piece of poplar wood carved hollow in the middle. The top and bottom surfaces are tied together by white ropes at several points along its circumference. Drummers can tighten or loosen the ropes depending on how resonant a sound he or she wants to achieve.

“Ready?,” says the teacher, veteran drummer and OACC artist-in-residence Dohee Lee, 33, as the students regroup. Demonstrating several variations of the one-two count rhythm (whimori) and bending one knee at the count, her head also following the beat – Lee brings a small bounce and kick to her feet as she drums. “Your body is a metronome,” she tells the students, gesturing its back-and-forth rhythm with her hands.

“Do four of these,” she says, referring to the rhythmic pattern she demonstrated a moment ago.  At Lee’s signal, the four students – all in their twenties and thirties – make it look easy, hitting their drums not only simultaneously and in perfect rhythm, but moving as they drum into a choreographed piece that has them coming together in pairs, moving outward, and crossing paths like a marching band.

While count one is struck on the top of the drum, count two is struck at the bottom –producing two low and hollow-sounding distinct pitches. The alternating pitch of the beats creates a driving, chant-like cycle of rhythms that starts slowly, then increases in tempo and volume.

As the insistent and demanding sounds reverberate through the room, the students become immersed in the sound of their own drums and the turning and rising of their own feet as they maneuver between each other. Their movements are fluid and graceful, yet filled with purpose and determination.

As the crescendo reaches its climax, Lee and the students mark the moment by spinning simultaneously, then punctuating the final notes of the cycle with a quick repetition of definitive and powerful beats.

Lee surveys the students, all of them breathing hard from the exertion. “When you approach each other in pairs, I want more tension,” she says. Her voice is firm, yet kind. “A little bit more aggression,” she says. “You know – arrrgh!” She waves her drumsticks in the air.

Lee’s push for tension comes from the fact that Koreans use Pungmul as a form of protest music. Centuries ago, villagers would drum songs while yelling out spirited words of encouragement so that the farmers would keep up their energy when planting, tending, and harvesting crops. “Pungmul has always been working class music,” Lee says.

The form was revived in the 1970s by the student and labor movements in Korea, and has continued to build the morale and energy of these movements to this day. “Today Pungmul is performed in Korea and the U.S. at cultural events or at political protests,“ she says, as at the Prop. 8 protest held earlier this month in San Francisco.

Lee, 33, immigrated six years ago from Korea, where she studied traditional dance. An aficionado of heavy metal music, she had played the drums at home and dreamed of being in a rock band – but never looked back after experiencing a Korean drumming performance in college. “I caught the rhythm really fast,” she says. “I thought ‘This is it –this is better than dance or heavy metal,’” she says.

Lee says that her students represent the reasons why Koreans of many generations in the U.S. are attracted to traditional drumming. “Korean Americans want to learn to drum because they want to know more about their culture and identity,” she said. “Korean immigrants take classes because they want to be in a Korean cultural environment – they are in their 40s, 50s, and 60s,” she says, referring to students within three of the other classes she teaches.

Yeri Shon, 26, sees herself in the middle of both groups. Arriving in the U.S. at age 8, Shon was immersed in Korean culture and language at home, but also became fluent in English and American customs as she grew up. After four years of drumming, she credits the activity with allowing her to become more expressive, as well as increasing her confidence. “My dad says that it’s improved my singing ability and rhythm as well,” she jokes.

Shon muses about the spiritual sides of drumming. “When I play drums I feel something coming up inside me,” she says. “It’s kind of like a chi, spirit, or energy trying to come out.”

Lee created the students’ choreographed moves for a show they will perform in the 2009 Lunar New Year celebration at the OACC. This year’s Lunar New Year show, compared to those in the past, will be different, as the Korean Youth Cultural Center (KYCC) drumming group will be noticeably absent.

KYCC, a Korean youth activist organization, sponsored drumming classes for almost twenty years, but shut down its drumming classes in the past year, due to lack of enrollment. The organization rents a gathering space on Telegraph Avenue in Oakland’s Temescal neighborhood. Since its founding in 1987 by a group of Korean international students at UC Berkeley, the organization quickly became the center of cultural and political activity by holding events in support of the South Korean pro-democracy movement, and offering classes in native arts such as folk songs (minyo), mask dance (tal chum), painting, woodblock prints, and calligraphy. But due to a lack of funds and community members to fill its classes, it will be vacating its space next month.

Though the organization may be closing its doors on Telegraph Avenue, says Elisa Ghang, KYCC’s immediate past development director, KYCC is still fighting to survive. “It’s in a transition period – the members are just trying to figure out what the next step is.”

“I think people dropped out of the KYCC drumming group because another group was formed at UC Berkeley,” says Kent Hong, 24, one of the students attending the class. “Since most of the KYCC students came from Berkeley, the organization tried recruiting others in the area, but there is no residential Korean population in Oakland to draw from, just business owners who live outside the city.”

Hong, a senior music major at UC Berkeley, is studying Korean percussion, and hopes to earn graduate degrees in both the U.S. and Korea. While drumming at KYCC may be in limbo for now, Hong says, he emphasizes that there are at least other 30 Korean drumming groups in the U.S., with at least half of them comprised of groups on college campuses.

Today, Kim is the coordinator for Sister Sound (called Jamaesori in Korean), a drumming group comprised of Korean American women activists. Though she has her frustrations with trying to memorize complicated rhythms and routines mostly taught in Korean, she seems at peace with the learning process -– and herself. “After fifteen years of exploring what it means to be a Korean adoptee and an Asian American, I can finally understand what it feels like to be a real Korean, because all music transcends language. When I’m really into a piece that I feel confident with, I don’t have to qualify my Korean-ness with a hyphen or an acronym. I can just be Korean.”

Lee is more direct. “It’s your heartbeat,” she says, referring to the drumming. “You can’t live without your heartbeat.”

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This story was originally published on November 22, 2008 at Oakland North.

Artists with disabilities defy traditions, expectations

story and photos by KRISTINE WONG

Every day, a group of artists congregate in their studio on 23rd Street in Richmond. Several of the artists have exhibited in San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York, China, and Japan. Like other artists, they draw, paint, sew, paste, and sculpt, enveloped in deep concentration.

But what sets these artists apart is that they create in a constant, fluid motion. There’s no hesitation when selecting colors, or putting their brush to paper, needle to fabric, or hands to clay. Their freedom generates an industrious atmosphere, as well as one that appears to honor creativity in its most spontaneous form.

These artists are working at the National Institute for Arts and Disabilities (NIAD), a studio and gallery collaborating with developmentally disabled adults since 1982. More recently, NIAD opened its doors to adults with any kind of disability. More than 60 artists from Contra Costa and Alameda Counties currently work at the studio, supported by a group of 20 teachers, all artists themselves.

It’s the artists’ lack of ego, NIAD staff says, that make them so inspiring. “They have no inhibition,” says Gallery Director Brian Stechschulte. “They’re not restrained by those psychological concerns…that’s what makes their work so interesting. It’s raw, it’s immediate, and it’s unrestrained.”

NIAD was the last of four art centers in the Bay Area founded by Elias and Florence Katz, a couple who wanted to provide a place where people with disabilities could lead self-fulfilling lives. The center in San Jose has since closed, but the other two centers — Creative Growth in Oakland and Creativity Explored in San Francisco – are thriving.

NIAD’s gallery has a regular rotation of exhibits showcasing their artists’ work. Past shows have centered on ceramics, beads, and shadow puppets, and collaborations with Richmond High School and Oakland-based California College of the Arts. “The artists here find solutions that you will never think about,” says Andres Cisneros, Studio Manager. “Traditional artists are taught rules – you just have to forget about that here.”

Several of NIAD’s clientele have been practicing art for more than 20 years. One of them, Sylvia Fragoso, 47, is known for her whimsical, colorful pastel work with religious themes. Fragoso, who lives with her parents in San Pablo, doesn’t say much about her art, but the constant smile on her face is a sign of how she feels. One of her large pastel paintings — a bright, symmetrical scene composed of a gallery of angels, checkered squares resembling stained glass, and babies lying underneath – recently sold to a couple from North Carolina. “I like angels,” Fragoso says, who has exhibited her work in Washington, D.C., Belgium, and China.

Fragoso, like all other NIAD artists who sell their work in the organization’s gallery, gift shop and online store – receive 50% of the selling price. The remains stay within the organization to support teaching and operating expenses. This arrangement, says Pat Coleman, Executive Director, enables the artists to have their own money to spend as they wish. The money artists make from their sales does not jeopardize their monthly Social Security benefits for disabled adults, Coleman says, as NIAD pays artists in monthly increments. In addition to the money they make through sales of their work, over a third of NIAD artists get paid for studio jobs ranging from rinsing out brushes to making tea for the teachers and artists.

The studio is divided into three activity areas: painting, fiber arts, and printmaking. Students also make jewelry, ceramics, and sculpture. Teachers work with the artists one-on-one and introduce them to a number of different techniques. Stechschulte says the teachers do not get in the way of the artists’ creativity, nor do they shape or manipulate their work.

“It’s a fragile line,” says Jan Mignaud, who has taught at NIAD for 3 years. Mignaud was working with the studio’s oldest artist, 88-year-old Beverly Trieber, known affectionately as “Bubba.” The collages, paintings, and prints he produced in the past 20 years at NIAD were featured in a retrospective exhibit last year alongside those of fellow artist Rosie Pardo.

Trieber, wearing a baseball hat festooned with pins and a forest green apron underneath his gold and red 49ers jacket, was designing patches made out of a jumble of recycled silk flowers and scraps of patterned fabric. An array of vintage magazines lay in front of him, where he selected images that would be included on the patches by sticking the pictures to cellophane tape, then sewing them on to the patch. Using a zigzag stitch, he had already sewn several of the patches onto a dark brown apron.

Before coming to NIAD, Trieber was institutionalized for much of his life, which was the norm for people with disabilities born before the late 1970s. Coleman points to Trieber as an example of the effect NIAD has had on the lives of those old enough to have undergone institutionalization. “It’s giving people a chance to lead productive lives,” she says. “They’re developing professional and artistic skills.” In the era of institutionalization, she says, society did not see a role for people who had disabilities, resulting, Coleman says, in the creation of a poor sense of self.

NIAD also sponsors other activities: field trips for artistic inspiration, and independent living classes held during the lunch hour. Many get to the studio by the bus provided by the Regional Center for the East Bay. The Regional Center is the organization that funds a good portion of the daily costs for each developmentally disabled client. The classes are voluntary, as many live with their families and at group homes. But others choose to come on their own through public transit.

Working regular studio hours – some 5 days a week, others just a few days per week — seems to provide a sense of community and friendship.

Harry Ingram and Sarah Malpass were quick to praise each other’s paintings, and eager to pose for a photo together. On a break from working on a cowboy scene in colored pencil and ink — a piece that she said reminded her of a Dean Martin movie — Rosie Pardo munched on half a sandwich. When she saw that another artist didn’t have any food on her table for lunch, she quickly offered to give the other half away.

Stechschulte says what he most enjoys about his job organizing NIAD exhibitions is undermining popular misconceptions about art created by people with disabilities. “People are surprised – they have low expectations,” he says.

Coleman says that NIAD’s model should be replicated in day care centers, nursing homes, and other group homes. “This is the problem with our culture…they don’t have budgets for art. Their way of doing art projects is to keep them busy. But to actually be really creative…wow.”

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This story was originally published on December 23,2009 at Richmond Confidential.