[New York to San Francisco First Day 2]

Interviews and conversations on a sidewalk in New York City about the city, recorded to be played as part of a festival in San Francisco.

00:28Copy video clip URL The tape opens mid-conversation with bystanders on the sidewalk, but the conversation is inaudible. The camera follows people walking down the street, including a nun, a businessman who looks skeptically at the camera, and a number of people who seem annoyed by the crowd blocking the sidewalk. A guitar player plays while sitting cross-legged on the sidewalk. 

09:50Copy video clip URL A white man wearing a “Native American” costume walks by but the interviewers call him back. They ask him if he wants to deliver a message to San Francisco. His message is one of peace and love, and he talks about his ex-wife and an ex-lover who are both in San Francisco. Of his wife, he says that “she was the best woman I’ve ever known, and probably one of the most human and humane people I’ve ever known. My ex-lover? Well, he was a shit.”

11:10Copy video clip URL A young white man with long hair talks with the camera. His interview is largely inaudible. 

11:57Copy video clip URL A young man approaches the camera and asks if they’re selling their recording equipment. He just returned from San Francisco, which is “so beautiful.” He’s going to school and wants to pay off all his debts so he can move out to San Francisco.

12:57Copy video clip URL A bystander has a message for “Bob and Pam and Gregory”: “I’m sorry you fell out of the window and hope you get better soon. Look me up on the East Side.”

13:13Copy video clip URL A young black man named Harry Parham expresses concern about the closing of a Job Corps center. He prefers New York to San Francisco but likes the scenery out there. Racism is more aggressive out there, he thinks. 

15:20Copy video clip URL A young boy who only speaks Spanish gives a message for San Francisco. He’s learning English in school he says. 

16:36Copy video clip URL A middle-aged woman with curly hair says hello to several friends in San Francisco, who she hopes make it to the Pacific Festival at Berkeley where the tape will be shown. She loves San Francisco because it’s “so pure and clean…” 

18:00Copy video clip URL The woman’s husband, a tall man with a long beard, says, “My thought about the parallel between California and mankind is that we know what we’re doing, we know the answers, we know through all mankind, we know we’re having too many people, we know the population explosion is just out of control the same way that people in California know they’re living right on the fault line. But it doesn’t matter. Believe is what matters. Knowledge is unimportant. We don’t believe it, so what difference does it make. So let’s all be happy.” His wife talks about the perceived decline of the city, which she credits to drugs. 

20:41Copy video clip URL A musician performs a song “I’m proud to be a New York City hippie. I’m proud to be a freak who never cares.”