Frisco Disco

It was just after 1:30am when we disembarked from the latest of our Greyhound coaches. It had been a relatively short trip by our standards, only about 5 hours, and without any major incidents. But now we had a challenge. It was early in the morning and we couldn’t even attempt to get in to our hostel til about midday, so what to do? Well, choose a spot in the small bus station and try and get some more sleep. Easier said than done. The spot we chose was a good one – near  dividing wall in the form of an L-shape. However, the grandma with 4 small children chose the exact same spot to set up camp and as we tried our best to get comfortable these small rug-rats jabbered on and played games on the travel rug that they had laid out right next to us. The station was small, but we were the only people in there! If I was the guardian of 4 small children I wouldn’t bed-down right next to the only two people in the terminal. But maybe that means that we don’t look like sex-offenders, which is good. We would have been able to sleep better also if the TV wasn’t on so loud (we always complain that it’s too quiet to hear anything, and the one time we wish it was it’s dead loud!) and the old Chinese man who guarded the place had let us be instead of checking if we were OK or if we needed anything. And it didn’t help that James went to use his small bag as a pillow and accidentally opened the bottle of water that was in there that ended up going everywhere. It didn’t look good when he mopped it up and the toilet roll came away absolutely filthy from the floor/our bed for the night.

We both stirred at around 6:00am in the morning and after we had freshened up (as best you can after not having slept in a bed for 3 nights, not showering for over 2 days and having hiked in Yosemite and around Salt Lake City) we blearily trudged over to the nearest Starbucks to order “the usual” and wait it out til check-in. We both had a little scout of the immediate area and realised that we might be able to get into the hostel at 11:00 rather than 3:00pm that we had originally thought. One last game of Beggar-My-Neighbour (one of our favourite card games which has absolutely no skill element in it whatsoever) and we were heading in the direction of the San Francisco International Hostel in the mid-morning heat. I say “mid-morning heat” but actually it was quite mild compared to what we have been used to. The cooling breeze was a delight and meant that we weren’t overly-sweaty by the time we finally found the place. Desperately in need of a shower, we were disappointed to be told that we could check-in and leave our bags but our room would not be ready until 3:00pm that afternoon so no early shower for us! With our backs relieved of carrying the heavy bags we thought that now would be the perfect time for me to buy a book. Having not packed one in the first place I assumed we would come across lots of second-hand book stores but none had been found so far. We walked into a bookshop that sold new books and asked him if there was anywhere nearby that sold used ones, and he said it would be on Church Street which was 15 minutes away....by bus. We thanked him for his time and set off for Church Street – we had little else pressing to do and we wanted to get there on foot just to prove a point, that we are Gray boys and nothing will stop us getting where we wanna be! Once we had completed the trek (and walked past a LOT of bums/homeless people/mentalists) we both purchased a book and popped across the road for more sandwich-making supplies from Safeway. James chatted fervently with the check-out girl about how he had worked for Safeway in England, but it was no longer around these days.

Inside the Party Hostel

By the time we had finished getting back from the book store we were allowed to get in to the room and finally get the unbelievably-much-needed shower that we were both craving. Our room was to be shared with two other unknown entities (both male) who we would no doubt be meeting shortly. As we entered the room we saw the two bunk-beds, with belongings on both bottom beds, meaning both me and James would be sleeping at the highest point in the hostel (top bunk + top floor). As we have postulated before, we feel that height = money and that the higher up you are in the building/street layout then the better your financial and/or social standing. The first bunk-mate we met was Rahul, a young lad from India who would be staying there til Tuesday as would we be. He advised us of the house rules and what to do and what not to do so that we could settle in as best as possible. The other bunk-mate was out somewhere so we set about rinsing off all the sweat, dirt, pine needles and grease that had accumulated on us over the past few days. Next job.....laundry. Again, well overdue, and I was down to my last pair of pants. Fortunately there were laundry facilities in the hostel, but only one washer and one drier between 450 people. The rule “if you snooze, you lose” came into effect as we removed the previous users laundry and shoved it on the sideboard for them to collect later (we would do the same with the stuff in the drier too). A quick round of peanut butter and crisp sandwiches and we were ready for whatever the night could throw at us...

It turns out that we had heard the hostel offers free beers at 9:30pm to all guests. We couldn’t decide if this was a myth or hearsay but we thought we would grab a quick beer away from the hostel first and see what happened later on. One $4.75 US pint of Budweiser (I wasn’t happy) later and we were back in the room counting down to the big kick-off. An air-raid siren attacks my ears and I wonder if there is a bomb threat somewhere on the street. It turns out it is actually a hefty oriental man with a loud-hailer at the bottom of the atrium hollering that the free beer will be flowing soon so get downstairs and get off Facebook. Rahul advises that there is no rush as he usually goes through a lot of guff before any actual beer is served and we should take our time. But he does not know the Gray boys that well and we are keen to taste the free beer that has been offered up to us. As we sit on the couch by the entrance (we think!) to the “club” downstairs there are a few others mingling around us. Some are just sitting down to dinner (I say “dinner” but there seemed to be a large amount of Cup Noodles and popcorn doing the rounds) and some have reasonably posh frocks and shirts on. Then there is the Boy Band. Three (possibly four) young lads with almost identical outfits – espadrilles, checked shorts, black t-shirt and black baseball cap. The “possibly fourth” member I speak of seems to hang around with the other three, but maybe only since staying in the hostel, and he is without the trademark black baseball cap, for reasons we will never know.

The Beer Pong table.....minus The Boy Band

Rahul was right about the amount of guff the organiser went through, as we were there waiting for 20 minutes while he (tried to) beat-box, sang, asked us to “like” the hostel on Facebook, told us over and over how big the hostel was (third biggest in the US) and mentioned the sponsors names a thousand times. And then, and only then, after all that, we were let into the “club” downstairs. As we descended the steps into the dimly-lit corridor with loud music pumping and coloured lights flashing we both couldn’t help but think back to our university days and how weird this now felt. We passed the poker table, the table for Beer Pong and got to the bar for our first cup of frothy “two-buck chuck” beer. We had also stuck our heads into the Chess Room to see what it was like. The Chess Room was designed for people who wanted to......play “chess” after a few beers, and didn’t want to wake up or disturb their room-mates as there were at least 4 people to a room. We found it strange too that there clearly weren’t many chess pieces left so how a couple would have played a game was beyond us. We drank the free beer, got a refill, and steadied ourselves in the corner whilst overseeing both the Beer Pong (throw a ping-pong ball into our opponents cup to make them drink it in one go) and the poker ($5 buy-in that seemed too rich for our wallets). Rahul joined us later before heading out to meet a friend and we managed to get the very last couple of beers from the free keg before it ran out. I had struck up a conversation with a couple of young girls from Germany who had also just stayed in Yosemite and the four of us (them, me and James) were getting on great before a drunk Scottish lad in a snazzy shirt announced that they were all off to a club around the corner, and it was $10 to get in and between $5 and $10 for a drink. Obviously me and James were not up for this (or, it seemed, invited as the lad hadn’t even acknowledged our presence) but the girls decided to give it a go and so we were left with the last few people still trying to play Beer Pong with a few last dregs of beer. It was time for bed, and that was just fine by us!