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Where Is Life in San Francisco?
Wherein we talk about the dying financial district and Simone de Beauvoir (and yes they are related).
In the memoir narrating her 1947 tour of the US¹, Simone de Beauvoir laments on a few occasions that it’s impossible to know where local people spend their time in any city you’ve never visited before. That is unless you know someone there.
In 1947, before Beauvoir flew from Paris to New York, she asked friends to introduce her to people they knew who might have acquaintances in the cities where she’d stay.
Local friends of her friends shared with her their favorite places, and she’d visit them. Her new local acquaintances would also make introductions, and recommend restaurants, and bars. And sometimes they’d take her to wherever they were going. So she’d experience life as a local.
And that’s how she ended up doing and seeing things no tourist would have thought about doing and seeing, most of all because they wouldn’t have known they just existed.
Staying on the surface
That was back in 1947.
Today, would Simone have pored over yelp reviews to find the best bar? Would she have been wondering about dinner while eating lunch, scrolling furiously on her…
