san diego - ucsd, salk and la jolla!

so i've finally realized instead of painstakingly uploading EVERY STINKING PICTURE slowly and manually via blogger, i can just upload them in a batch with picasa and then embed 'em here.

THAT'S WHAT I'MA DO.

honestly it'd probably just be easier for me to go ahead and just add comments directly to picasa, but ... eh. i like having it in blog form. esp cuz i can also occasionally blog about shit i cook, stuff that annoys me, and stuff that makes me happy :] mostly the latter! :]]]

anyhoooo.

at kai's urging, i've decided to start putting up san diego pics again. part of the reason i've been dragging my feet is because there are SO MANY. i really went overboard *LOL* after this! i'm gonna rein myself in a bit. yes, all the pics are fucking awesome. but no, i do not need a thousand pictures of san diego.

and after san diego! there's still chicago - 2nd trip. then monterey! and i've been meaning to run around the bay area too! agh! PROJEKT.

okay. digression aside. san diego!

in the last installment, i made it to irvine by dusk. i got to san diego about an hour after that and settled into my hotel. i was only there for a few days -- the first day i had to go to ucsd to meet people and give talks and whatnot, but everything was done by about 3pm so i spent the rest of the day running around the ucsd/la jolla area.

ucsd's really done well since i was in med school there. lots of new buildings and stuff. i was happy for my alma mater! first up is stein clinical research building, where i actually did quite a bit of research during school:

From San Diego

there's actually quite a bit of interesting modern-ish architecture in ucsd. obviously the #1 example is salk, but ... i've always thought the grey/green of stein really fit la jolla's climate. it tends to be cloudy there a lot, since it's right on the lip of the pacific, and also very green. grey and green!

this is a view of the whole building. that round circle-part is basically what you would see if you hung a left at that ... gap ... thing there:

From San Diego

if you walk a lil bit from the stein building, you'll be smack in the middle of the medical campus. this isn't actually where the hospital is. thornton hospital is a little hospital about 5 min from the med campus, but ucsd's main medical center is in hillcrest -- on the crest of a hill overlooking downtown -- about 30 min away by car. i took a pic of thornton and didn't go to hillcrest, but the pic of thornton was pretty crappy anyway and I HAVE TOO MANY PICS so ... i'm not sure why i'm bothering to talk about all this at all! *LOL*

annnyway. yes. after walking a bit, this is sorta the edge of the medical quad seen from the parking lot:

From San Diego

to the right is the old medical teaching building. straight ahead, under construction still, is the new medical teaching building! lucky bastards. and to the right, behind the MTB, is the medical quad...

From San Diego

...which btw didn't even exist when i went to school here. this used to be one giant parking lot, yo. look how nice it is now! GRASS!

walking out from the medical area, we're pretty much in the heart of ucsd here:

From San Diego

UCSD doesn't really have a quad, but this is about as central as you get in the school. the benches on the sides commemorate different graduating classes. ucsd was only set up in the 60s, so there aren't that many benches filled yet. i have no idea what they're gonna do when they run out of spaces though. stanford does sorta the same thing -- there are plaques on the floor of the main quad, all the way around. what are they gonna do when they run out? are they not expecting their school to last more than 100-200 years?

various administrative offices are kinda hidden in the trees to both sides, like in here:

From San Diego

the student center -- bookstore, lots of food and shops -- is off to the right near the main library.

From San Diego

and the main library, of course, is straight ahead:

From San Diego

...affectionately called "the UFO". possibly only by me and frendz. also, that dead tree in front of it? actually made of metal.

so here's one of the coolest things about geisel library. see how the path actually slopes down, and walls of mirrored glass kinda rise from either side? well, that's actually the first story of the library. the second and third are all offices and machinery stuff. most of the library itself is on levels 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and in the sprawling first story -- which is actually more like this half-basement, because when you're up on top of the library it just looks like a field -- and the basement. however, those shards of glass kinda popping up out of the ground are actually windows and skylights for the library. so when you go down into the basement, where there's a lot of study space, you see this along the walls:

From San Diego

how awesome is that? real trees and natural light, right in front of where you're studying :]

another really cool thing about geisel is that it has an emergency exit stairwell right down the middle. it's very utilitarian, but i can't help but think they designed this at least a LITTLE with cool-factor in mind. this is what it looks like from the eighth floor up:

From San Diego

lemme tell you, even now looking down i get twinges of panic-that-i'll-drop-my-phone *LOL*

eighth story also has some fantastic views. notice there's like a little platform outside the window. that's actually the ceiling of the (larger) seventh story. the biggest story is ... the fifth, i believe. then three above and three below, and the half-buried first story.

this is looking eastish toward UTC, university town center, which despite its name is really more a shopping/business area:

From San Diego

and this is looking north. down in the shadows below is the central path we came down earlier!

From San Diego

after i left ucsd, i went to salk. i wanted to get there in the early evening. this is really one of my favorite places in the world. from the outside, you can't really tell how amazing it is inside; it's kinda hidden behind trees, and it kinda... looks more like a campground than anything else:

From San Diego

but then you turn a corner and go up a set of broad, shallow steps, and suddenly the gates open before you and you see THIS:

From San Diego

the first time i went there, i had no idea what i would see. it was seriously breathtaking. this is ... absolutely the way a place of miraculous lifesaving discoveries should look. minimalistic buildings aligned to either side, slanting away like opening doors, leaving immense room in the middle of space and white light from the west. everything's concrete, water, wood, or sky. it looks so absolutely open and free-minded to me :]

as you walk into that space, you see this thin strip of water running down the distance. the ground literally just seems to stop at the end -- nothing but sea and sky after that. there's a bronze inscription on the floor; sadly, i can't remember what it said.

From San Diego

as you get closer, you realize the strip of water in the middle doesn't come from nowhere. there's a little fountain at the head:

From San Diego

i'm not sure why water was splashed everywhere that day. probably tourists splashing around. usually the water flows very calmly down the furrow, just this gleaming, sky-reflecting strip.

if you follow it all the way to the end, you see that it broads out into a reflecting pool:

From San Diego

and yeah, that's the pacific past it, and down a cliff. a better look at the reflecting pool:

From San Diego

and that's really where you realize there's something past the drop. up until then, it really looks like salk institute just runs to the edge of the cliff and plunges off. but there's actually a set of stairs that leads you down, and then when you turn around you see a second cascade of fountains:

From San Diego

i love the echoing of that first fountain, where it was like... two waterfalls on either side. this time, the stairs flank the falls, and the falls are two-step. there's a poetry in that.

coming back up and looking at the sunward side of the buildings, you see that every one of them has a window to the sea:

From San Diego

i love the juxtaposition of natural wood and unfinished concrete. it adds just the touch of naturalism this place needs. without it, it'd be too austere, too cold, but with it it looks like it's a perfect piece between water and sky.

side note: that random dude sitting there was there, pretty much motionless, the ENTIRE TIME i was walking around. i would've been more annoyed except i understood so well. if i worked there, i'd probably spend hours every day just thinking out in that courtyard :]

coming out of salk, it was getting near sunset. UCSD's right on the lip of a cliff overlooking the beach (obviously), so it's pretty easy to get down there. actually right below UCSD is black's beach, famous for waves and nudists. i took the winding switchback road down to la jolla cove, though.

i took some pics along the way, but in the end they just all looked like sunset pics. so here are two representative ones:

From San Diego

that's a stretch of the road before it really starts to wind down the cliff. lots and lots of million-dollar houses along that path, most of them surprisingly small. it's really the view they're paying for, but honestly, if i had the money i'd pay the premium too.

eventually at the bottom of the hill you get into la jolla's seaside village. very touristy surf-town-ish:

From San Diego

i didn't stick around, though, because i was losing daylight fast. by the time i parked and walked onto the beach, the sun was low:

From San Diego

you can see la jolla's entertainment district off on the promontory to the left. pretty much every sunset ever here is breathtaking, but i always love how every single time there are still lots of people just standing around waiting for it. i rolled my slacks up, took my shoes off and stood in the surf for a while waiting for the sun to set.

looking southward, some kayakers were packing it in:

From San Diego

looking northward, some random dude was doing what i was doing :]

From San Diego

even the way the light fell through shallow waves onto washed-up seaweed was beautiful:

From San Diego

i stayed there until the last of the sunset was finished. this is the last picture i took that day; i wanted to just stand there and watch the sunset instead of snapping pics :]

From San Diego

next up: old town, balboa, and the southwesternmost beach in the continental US!