Dead give-aways

Even if Mt Sutro behind UCSF Medical Center is so covered with eucalypts you could swear you were in Canberra, you know you're in San Francisco when:

- you walk down the hill toward the ocean and the weatherboard houses are multi-storeyed and the churches are all in Spanish style;
- the taxis are differently coloured;
- buses have bicycle racks in front of them;
- people preface remarks with, "You know what?..."
- normal conversation is in a higher performance mode, and the people behind counters engage you in actual repartee;
- the House of Representatives proceedings on C-span are not merely a volley of slinging off at each other (surprisingly);
- a protestor outside UCSF Medical Center is calling for the return of 'Glass-Stiegall';
- ads on TV begin with, "if you're an individual owner of an Indian Land Trust...";
- your eyes start to wander automatically to the Spanish translations on billboards because it's "muy importante";
- you make a note to become familiar with the music of Enrico Chapela, Gabriela Lena Frank, and Mason Bates;
- the secondhand bookshops stock titles like 'Souls Grown Deep: African American Vernacular Art of the South', or 'Philadelphia in the Civil War, 1861-1863';
- the panhandler in a seedy part of town offers a piece of wise advice: "Keep her on the inside, sir."
- pharmaceutical ads on TV go for twice the normal length because of all the caveats - "'If you suffer from high blood pressure, or are pregnant, trying to become pregnant, or nursing don't use this product. Ingestion may also cause nausea and twitching. If heart palpitations continue for too long, contact your doctor. Prolonged use may result in eye flutter, vomiting or death...";
- people have bungee cords around their books to keep them from shaking off the bookshelf in an earthquake;
- the uni student at the BART talking to her 'mom' on her cell phone starts off with, "Well, the house got shot up last night."

Mind you, you know things are the same the world over, when she clearly greets her mom's suggestion to move back into a dorm ("Oh, motherrrrrr....") with sardonic dismissal.