FEATURED BLOG POST: Ten Things I Love About Cupertino

I started blogging at Patch with a piece that explained from Central Pennsylvania.  Now, six months later, I am reflecting on the things I love about living here.  In no particular order, here they are:

1. I love the heady fragrance that fills the air as I venture past a wall of jasmine or a hedge of lavender, under an orange or lemon tree, or through a grove of eucalyptus trees.
2. I love the forgiving nature of traffic patterns that lets you decide you’ve made a mistake and can make a U-turn at the next opening.  I love the way that people here have of waiting politely for their turn at a four-way stop.  Try that in Brooklyn!
3. I love the Cupertino Library where people are waiting to get in twenty minutes before it opens and where books and media items I return are instantly recorded as returned.  I love that people at the checkout or at the web site where I go to renew something that is one or two days past due pretend that it is on time.
4. I love being a pedestrian again, walking where I need to go, to the Whole Foods Market, to Target to renew a prescription, to the Marina Markets across the street, to the Cupertino/Vallco Farmers’ Market, or to the Cupertino Senior Center for a meeting.  We now have two rolling shopping carts and a large red wagon.
5. I love the sunshine, so much so I bought eight hats to augment the four I already have. “Way overkill," says my husband.
6. I love this foodies' paradise.  There are so many places to buy fresh, authentic, even organic foods.  Some things I’ve started eating on a regular basis now:  avocados, fresh water chestnuts, fresh Shitake mushrooms, mangos, papayas, lychees, Dungeness crabs, giant clams, etc. and etc.  The supermarkets here are places of gastronomic joy:  Whole Foods, Marina Markets, Trader Joe’s, Ranch 99, Han Kook (for Korean food). etc. and etc.  So far I’ve stayed with California, Chinese, and Southeast Asian cuisines but hope to cook more Indian and Mediterranean dishes soon.  (For those who have never eaten fresh water chestnuts, they are to canned water chestnuts as a freshly boiled Yukon gold is to canned potatoes.)
7. I love being in Silicon Valley, the heart of technology innovation.  It’s great to read about Steve Jobs attending a local city council meeting and seeing Seagate Technology and Trend Micro signs as I take my daily walk.  Most of all, I love being around techie people with whom you can discuss the latest new release of Final Cut, the new startups, or why my iMac has become so slow.
8. I love the diversity of the people living here.  I love hearing many languages when I visit the Cupertino Senior Center, take my grandson to the playgrounds, or stroll on the streets - Mandarin, Cantonese, Vietnamese, Spanish, Hindi, Urdu, Parsi, Russian, French, Hebrew, and many I do not recognize, but just enjoy hearing.
9. I love being with my stubborn, opiniated, hilarious two-year-old grandson.  I love his intensity when he learns all there is to know about his new toy, his pride in showing me his new underpants (he’s being toilet trained), and the joy on his face when he spots me and my husband when we pick him up from day care.
10. I love living ten minutes away from my daughter (and son-in-law). My daughter left home when she was eighteen to go to Stanford and we had not lived in the same part of the country until now.  While she was studying, training, and then building up her practice, we saw each other only during major holidays and family events like graduation, weddings, funerals, and births. Now, we see each other three or four times a week and connect through more mundane things.  I cook dinner for her, we go out to lunch, she tells me about “her Mommy and son” lesson with the Spanish tutor, I tell her about a new show I am producing, she tells me she is expecting again, and I am speechless.