Wednesday, May 15, 2013

San Francisco: Haight-Ashbury


One of the reasons I had always been attracted to San Francisco is that (together with Paris, London, and dare I say, Mexico city), the city was at the heart of the counterculture movement of the late 1960's. During "the summer of love" in1967, as many as 100,000 people converged on the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood of San Francisco, initiating a major cultural and political shift. The so-called 'flower-children' have always fascinated me. Maybe, probably, I am idealizing but it's almost as if the youth of those days really believed in a different World. Not only that, but they were going to make it happen. Nowadays, we protest, but at the same time, we feel very, very lost. We are very good at pin-pointing what is wrong in the system, but when it comes to finding a clear path, to defining how we are going to change things, a fog seems to appear, and there is no consensus. That, and a certain cynical attitude, like the naiveté was lost, like we no longer believe things can really change, like we somehow helplessly accept this wicked world will stay as it is, no matter what we do.


Back to the Haight. This neighborhood takes its name from the junction of the two main streets Haight and Ashbury. "It is bounded by Stanyan Street and Golden Gate Park on the west, Oak Street and the Golden Gate Park Panhandle on the north, Baker Street and Buena Vista Park to the east and Frederick Street and Ashbury Heights and Cole Valley neighborhoods to the south."

The area was built in the 1890s as a middle class suburb, but by the 1960s the Haight become a host to a bohemian community that was a hotbed of anarchy. By 1967 it brought around 75,000 young people in search of love, music and drugs and it became the focus of a worldwide youth culture. Today, it continues to cater alternative lifestyles.


<< The "hippies" were suspicious of the government, rejected consumerist values, and generally opposed the Vietnam War. >>

As stated by The San Francisco Oracle*: "A new concept of celebrations beneath the human underground must emerge, become conscious, and be shared, so a revolution can be formed with a renaissance of compassion, awareness, and love, and the revelation of unity for all mankind."

<<Their culture was based primarily on music and the rejection of established society, a large and colorful thread running through the social fabric at the time featured enlightenment through discovery and personal development, trying to achieve a path for evolution onto a "higher plane" of consciousness.>>

And did you know that the band "The Doors" took their name from a poem by William Blake, "The marriage of heaven and hell", as cited by Aldous Huxley's book "The doors of perception"?

<<If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, infinite. >>

I leave you with some images of the neighborhood. I loved to be at the same spot where all of this happened, even if almost 43 years later (wow).

Anarchist collective bookstore.

12 comments:

  1. Ik snap wel waarom je je aangetrokken voelt tot die stroom :) En het idee dat wij wel willen veranderen, maar denken dat het niet haalbaar is, herken ik. Gelukkig ben ik altijd van verrandering begint bij jezelf. En dus zal ik altijd proberen mijn ideeën over integriteit en oprechtheid uit te dragen en te behouden. Wat ik ook aan het doen ben. De buurt ziet er overigens prachtig uit ;-)

    xx

    liquoriceandpumps.blogspot.com

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Ja je hebt gelijk. Ik denk dat een betere wereld ook bij jezelf begint. De buurt was super mooi!

      Delete
  2. I absolutely love this. San Francisco is on my travel bucket list (top of the list) and we hope to visit next year for our honeymoon (only 2 years after the wedding!)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Oh yes you should absolutely go ! Delayed honeymoon is the perfect excuse!

      Delete
  3. Those houses in your first picture. I want to live in those houses. Or maybe eat them, but probably live there.

    You're probably right about the different mindsets of youth culture in the sixties vs now. Part of what has current culture so "lost", I think, is that we've all read about the sixties, and about what's happened since. Some substantial changes were affected in civil rights but society hasn't been rebuilt happier and better and more functional. And so many of those same protestors went on to live lives that seem so out of line with those values. So we're cynical, we don't want to commit to our idealism.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Those houses were super pretty. They had all kinds of cute, wooden, colorful houses in different styles. In the Mission as well.

      I think, like Louise said above, that we can only do so much, or, like Gandhi said: "Be the change you want to see in the world". We can help, vote with the products we buy (or if possible at all grow our own), volunteer, etc. I am highly doubtful of structural change, or else you have to be involved in politics and for that you have to be a certain way, have a certain character. I even distrust many NGOs, as soon as something gets to a level where it's an organization it gets bureaucratic and people start fighting over the silliest things.
      So I think if we change, maybe others will follow (you start seeing it now, the organic / bio movement is strong, and people do want alternative lifestyles, maybe more eco-friendly). I also believe that to change ideas / culture, you have to work with children (that's why I loved my time at the Education department of the zoo, so so much, you saw the kids having epiphanies and Eureka moments, it was like seeing the change right in front of your eyes).

      Delete
  4. Me encantan las casas, me recuerda a la serie "Full House" que veía cuando era pequeña.
    Yo también creo éso, que (al menos en México) somos buenos criticando pero nos da flojera o no sé qué cambiarlo, o será que ya perdimos la esperanza o que estamos muy cómodos mientras no nos afecte tanto a nosotros, no sé.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. O Full House, en México le decían "3x3" es esa serie verdad?
      Sí, exacto, mientras no nos afecte, no nos movemos. La cosa es darse cuenta que si nos afecta, porque estamos todos conectados.
      Hay esbozos, hay gente que si quiere cambiar las cosas, pero como se trata de cambios culturales masivos hay que ir poco a poco, y lo que es más difícil empezar desde uno mismo.

      Delete
  5. My mom and dad, intrepid hippies that they were, were in The Haight, (as they called it then), in '67! I'm envious that they got to live through that idealism, because I agree with you; nowadays, we know lots of things need to change, but we're lost. I grew up with stories of how different it once was, and was raised on the tail end of that revolution...Ah, those were the days!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Oh wow, your mom and dad are the coolest.
      My dad was a bit too young to have been there (he was born in '55), but he admired the movement and it stayed with him. So I grew up listening to the music of the era, admiring his books (that was partly the reason why he ended up in Mexico). He wanted to go to Brasil originally, but, he wasn't allowed because of his "collection". He studied political science, so all of this, the anarchy movements, etc. really made an impression on him ('til this day).

      Definitely those were the days.

      I do see a spark of hope / idealism in the youth of today, but everything seems so much more complicated. Back then they wanted to break the structures, and renew them from scratch, nowadays, after seeing communism fail (or after seeing that in ways, when it comes to having power, people become the same), there is no idealistic, utopian alternative anymore. We have to invent a new system, but we do need a system. It's complicated.

      Delete
  6. I love the Haight!! We always take a trip to Haight Ashbury when we go up to SF. It really feels like you're stepping back in time. And you feel inspired by the idealism that existed there.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Exactly, you leave there inspired. And it really was like a short trip back in time :) It's nice to visit places that are connected to other people's stories (including your personal one from your family visits :) )

      Delete

I love your comments, let's talk .

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...