Field Trip: Bianchis Flowers and Pumpkins

 

Where: Bianchi Flowers and Pumpkins (243 Butano Cutoff, Pescadero, CA 9406)
When : October
Who   : All ages
Cost   : $6/student to pick a small pumpkin

One of the perks of homeschooling in San Mateo county is our access to the coast just 30 minutes away. Though the coast draws crowds during events like Mavericks Surf Competition and Half Moon Bay Pumpkin and Art Festival, we can visit at other times and places to see where locals live and work. When a homeschooling friend on the coast mentioned Bianchi Flowers and Pumpkins as a 5th generation farm, we jumped at the chance to visit and hear from farmer Bridget about growing pumpkins. 

Bianchi's is a short drive from Pescadero downtown, so it is easily accessible. Parking is readily available besides the field. When you pull up, you'll see some tractors which make for great photo ops, as well as their pumpkin stand with loads of pumpkin and squash types. 

We had arranged to meet farmer Bridget at the stand. She started with the history of their farm - it was originally a cabbage farm started by her great grandparents, before transitioning to be a beans and flower farm. However, they had to diversify especially after NAFTA was signed in 1994 - flowers from South America flooded the market at pennies to the dollar, and it took them 1.5 years to clear their stock of strawflowers. They cut back their flower acreage, and added other crops like pumpkins and tomatoes. Diversification also helps with the unexpected - one year, their crop was wiped out by cucumber beetles. It reminded me of Laura Ingalls's story of locusts in "On the Banks of Plum Creek", and how one year's work could disappear in a couple of days.  It also explains why farmers have to be good savers. Still,  Bridget loves her work though it's hard and at times risky. 

One of Bianchi's distinctives is that you can pick pumpkins off the vine - after picking, people have come to her saying, "I never knew that pumpkin plants had fuzz/bristles!". She passed out paper bags and scissors, and the children eagerly grabbed wagons before heading out into the field to find the "perfect pumpkin".  A handy tip: Start from the back of the field and work your way back toward the entrance.

Along the way, we passed rows of sunflowers and corn flowers they had planted..

as well as rows upon rows of pumpkins in all sizes and colors. It was difficult to choose!

For those who have trouble choosing, there are deals where you can load up a wheelbarrow or wagon and pay a flat price. It can be as full as you make it - Bridget chuckled when she described a family wheeling their wagon back with children and adults making a human wall around it so no pumpkins would tumble off. 

We were also thrilled to see the tomato plants at the end of the field. They were bent over with the weight of ripe Early Girl tomatoes, and we quickly filled bags. For the record, they make excellent salad tomatoes and you can roast them for a gourmet tomato soup. 

Back at the stand, Bridget weighed our tomatoes, counted up our pumpkins and gave us generous prices on everything. She also answered questions about the types of pumpkins and squash at the stand, e.g. white pumpkins, Cinderella and sugar pies are great for baking.

Sugar pie

Carnival

Carver (Traditional)

Cinderella

Decorative gourds

Lunch Ladies (how unflattering!)

Minis/Bee bees

White

Spider

We enjoyed our visit and highly recommend Bianchis. Bridget is a treasure trove of information - students can learn so much from talking with her. Its quiet atmosphere also makes it suitable for families who want less stimulation. As a plus, it is also close to R&R Farms so families can stop by and pick late season berries.  How thankful we are for the Lord's provision!

Farming is a profession of hope - Brett Brian

Field Trip: Journey to Work (San Mateo County History Museum)

Credit: San Mateo County History Museum

Where: San Mateo County History Museum (2200 Broadway, Redwood City, CA 94063)
When : During the school year
Who   : 1st-3rd graders recommended
Cost   : $110 for a group, max 30 students per group

Last year, we had come across this field trip on the San Mateo County History Museum's list of school programs, and thought it would be a fun trip for the younger students in our group. Booking is straight forward - if you sign up for their educators' mailing list, you will be informed when they begin accepting bookings (April 15 this year) and you can pay online. 

As in our last field trip, the museum scheduled our field trip to begin at 9:30am, before its official opening time of 10:00am. Once inside, we sat down and went over some guidelines for understanding what a museum was, and the artifacts unique to this one. Throughout the museum, there are signs specifying which may be touched, and which may not. This is one area we are thankful to be a homeschooling group - with all the parents present, we tend to have a good chaperone to student ratio.  

"Journey to Work" is a permanent exhibit at the museum. When you enter through the doorway across from the gift shop, you step back into time to the 1850s. Immediately, you see a beautiful display of saddles, as a reminder of the integral role the horse played in the West.

Turning the corner, you see a gleaming stagecoach, considered the bus of the 1850s. 

The docent introduced terms like the whip (driver), and riding shotgun (guard). An interesting difference from today is that there was no common currency then, so how did passengers pay for their rides? (Hint: what had just been discovered in California?)

Yes, passengers paid in gold. It took 2 oz of gold for a wagon ride from San Francisco to San Jose, about $32 then. Considering that most people earned $1/day, a stagecoach ride was an extravagance. 

Another question that stumped the students: How long did it take for a stage coach to ride from SF to SJ? Given that it takes about 1.5 hours now with traffic, guesses ranged from hours to days.  Answer: It took 3 horses pulling for 6-9 hours. They would have needed to change horses at stage stops. Wikipedia has a list of Peninsula Mile Houses, including 7 Mile House in Brisbane and Halfway House in San Mateo.

Students could do a few activities here - they could use a scale to measure some "gold" (pyrite). They could also write messages and stick them to a "Message Tree" - since there were no postal service, and towns were small with the stagecoach stop being a hub, it was common to hang notes off trees and hope the recipient would pick them up the next time they were in town.

Messages from our group

How we paid for our stagecoach ride

To our students' delight, the docent then divided the group into smaller groups of 10, then invited them for a stagecoach ride. Once aboard, the docent demonstrated how the ride might have felt on the uneven roads by rocking the coach, to a flurry of squeals.  The stagecoach was expensive, and carried only a few passengers so it made sense that it would be succeeded by the train. 

The construction of the railroad from San Francisco to San Jose reduced the travel time to 2.5 hours. However, it was still expensive so it remained the mode of transport for the wealthy who worked in San Francisco and came back to homes on the Peninsula. 

While we sat in front of the train cutout, our docent told a thrilling story when Mr. William Ralston, once decided to race the train in riding from San Francisco to his home in Belmont. To his advantage: the best horses money could buy, and a path that avoided a hill that would slow down the train. Against  him: the superior horsepower of the train. Which would win? The story had us on the edge of our seats, and you would have to ask the docent or read the archives to learn who won. 

The docent also told us about carriages, the car of the 1850s. There was a spider phaeton on display, the race car of the 1850s.  Per Wikipedia, the "Spider" name came its agility in maneuvering just like in nature, and "Phaeton" from its speed after mythical Phaethon, son of Helios, who nearly set the Earth on fire while attempting to drive the chariot of the Sun.



All this was very well, but trains and phaetons remained the domain of the upper class. The middle class would not use mass transport until streetcars/trolleys, which was our next stop in exploration.

The streetcar ran from San Francisco to San Mateo. It cost less than a train and was pulled by electric cables. There are no streetcars left in San Mateo county, but you can still see them in San Francisco.

The driver of a streetcar had to regulate the power flow - he could make the streetcar go faster by increasing the power, but too much power would shut it down. 

Students enjoyed "driving" the streetcar, one at a time, before getting off to ring the bell. 

After that, we came to familiar ground - the automobile. Students were asked to find differences between a large Chevrolet car of the era vs the cars we drove nowadays. At first, it didn't seem very different but once the docent started pointing out the details, they came tumbling out - large wheels, tail light designs which were different for each year, optional seatbelts. One difference which caught our fancy was that the car could actually have a record player - because cars were so long and heavy, the ride was smooth enough that a record player could play without skipping.

Photo credit: San Mateo County History Museum

We then moved into the next room, Charles Parson's Ships of the World. Mr. Parsons, a hobbyist from San Carlos, had meticulously crafted 24 models of famous ships. Most of the details lay in the descriptions of the ship, so the young students didn't appreciate the ships as much but the docent made it interesting by asking them to pick their favorite ship and to tell her its name, source of power (sail, oars, engine) and why they liked it. Older students would appreciate this room - they will likely find ships that tie in to whatever period of history they are studying.

Chinese (Foochow) junk model

To wrap up, we went downstairs to the classroom where students made their own ship models. Here, they went to town - designing ships with multiple sources of power, and decorating them.

The students left, happily chatting about their boats and full of stories to tell back home. This was another excellent field trip by the San Mateo County History Museum, and we highly recommend it. 

Field Trip: Cultural Feast - SJ Japantown

"Shikata Ga Nai/It has to be endured" 

Our last Cultural Feast field trip for 2023 focused on Japanese culture. As with Chinese culture, we had to limit our scope because there is so much to explore about Japanese culture or its storied history. Poignantly though, there are only three Japantowns left in the US, all in California - San Francisco, San Jose and Los Angeles. 

We hesitated between San Francisco and San Jose. San Francisco's Japantown is larger and has malls filled with quintessential Japanese items, while San Jose's Japantown has retained more traditional stores.  What tipped the scale was the Japanese American Museum in San Jose - they were happy to arrange a tour for our group. Initially we hesitated since our group was nearing 40 people and they could only guarantee docent availability a couple of months ahead, but it turned out to be fine.

Stop #1: Japanese American Museum San Jose

Our tour was scheduled for 10am, which is before the museum's regular opening hour of 12pm. This was ideal since our group could focus on the exhibits without worrying about disturbing others. A nice side effect is that we could park in the museum's parking lot; otherwise we would have had to pay for street parking after 10am. That said, there is free street parking a few blocks away. 

Japanese American Museum SJ (535 N. Fifth Street)

We were especially looking forward to the Barracks Room exhibit - a recreation of a family's lodging at the Tule Lake camp. From a photo essay, "“The barracks were hastily constructed and the wood was untreated.. As the wood aged, the floorboards spread which created a gap. The frequent dust storms would cause sand and dirt to come streaming through the gaps and it would get into all of your belongings...Void of any insulation, the barracks quickly cooled. Without coal for the stove and without blankets or bedding, all seven of us  spent the night huddled together on the floor for warmth."

Credit: Japanese American Museum San Jose

The museum also describes the contributions of Japanese towards the agricultural economy. A KQED  article describes, "..before World War II, the area around San Jose was dotted with hundreds of Japanese farms growing vegetables for local and regional markets.. Japanese sent to camps in 1942 had to liquidate everything they couldn't carry with them.. (they) left $22 million of crops in the ground across California."

Stop #2: Japantown Landmarks

Still, they endured, and they returned. Japantown San Jose has various landmarks with inscriptions encapsulating Japanese resilience. Unfortunately it was raining the day we visited, but we had planned a scavenger hunt for them, including the Nikkei Lantern. If your students are familiar with WWII history, ask them to look closely: " Etched in the bend of the lantern is”February 19, 1942,” the date Executive Order 9066 was signed.  This bend symbolizes the profound stress and dislocations imposed upon Japanese Americans during internment."

Nikkei Lantern: photo credit Japantown San Jose

Stop #3: Heinlenville Park

Docents at the museum had suggested Heinlenville Park (200 E Santa Clara St) for our group to relax and have lunch. Not only is it a quiet place to relax for lunch after the tour, it has informational plaques and art that tie back to Heinlenville's history as a former Chinatown, and its entwined history with Japantown. 

#4. Shuei-Do Manju

While the students relaxed, some parents went over to Shuei-Do Ma\nju (217 Jackson Street) to pick up some manju that we had pre-ordered. Manju are stuffed rice flour cakes, and Shuei-Do Manju has excellent credentials because they served the Emperor of Japan on his last visit. They post the flavors of the week on their Facebook page, and to guarantee availability, it's recommended to call ahead to reserve. For an explanation on manju vs mochi, see this SakuraCo page.  The following menu picture may help you decide, but it's still a hard choice because everything we tried was delicious. 😋

Shuei-Do Manju menu

#5. Nijiya San Jose

Another option for lunch was bento boxes at Nijiya San Jose (240 Jackson St). We are so blessed in the Bay Area because we have several ethnic markets to choose from. 

Credit: Japanese Snack Reviews

We had earlier reached out to Nijiya's manager for suggestions on bento boxes for our field trip, and they had replied, "If you happen to stop by at our store after the Japanese American Museum, I would recommend some rice balls (onigiri), some snack, and some ramune drink to go with for lunch at the park. We also have pre-packaged lunch boxes (bento), side dishes (sozai) and sushi if your students are familiar with Japanese foods. "

Nijiya bento box (photo credit: Yelp)

Bonus: Nichi Bei Bussan

We hadn't scheduled this formally because younger students would have been tired after the tour, but we recommend stopping in at Nichi Bei Bussan (140 Jackson St). Owner Arlene has wonderful stories to share: she was born in the Topaz internment camp, her brother had been born in the Tanforan holding center and her father had taken the only private footage available of internment conditions. She is happy to describe Japanese culture or the immigration experience - we hope she will write them down sometime.

Nichi Bei Bussan, photo credit NBstore.com

Speaking of memoirs, we highly recommend the following books:

Nissei Daughter, by Monica Sone

Recommended for middle/high school

Journey to Topaz, by Yoshiko Uchida (also the sequel, Journey Home)

Recommended for elementary school

Our current culture tends to embrace pleasure - we know about Cherry Blossom festivals, and perhaps some others like Obon and Nikkei Matsuri. But we shy away from pain, which is why books like the above are important. Besides being firsthand narratives of Japanese culture and history, they bear testimony of a culture that endured pain. We recommend the above in particular because they show grace and forgiveness. True, Japanese history has had dark stains (Lord willing, we will cover another perspective of WWII experience with future Cultural Feasts including Philippines  and Vietnam). However, we hope the books and experiences above will help us remember that we are all sinners in need of God, and with Christ we can forgive and be free. 

Field Trip: Cultural Feast - SF Chinatown

As part of our Cultural Feast book club, we knew we wanted to cover Chinese culture - the only question was scope since we could easily spend the whole year on it given how rich Chinese history and culture are. We decided to focus on San Francisco - it is especially vital as the first landing point for Asian immigrants (see our Angel Island field trip), as well as being the oldest Chinese community and largest Chinatown outside Asia.  We were blessed to have members who grew up in Chinatown who could guide us. With their guidance, we put together the following field trip.

Stop #1: Portsmouth Square

Chinatown can be intimidating to drive around - thankfully there is a central garage, Portsmouth Square Garage, which costs $4/h. Additionally, it was free for the first 2 hours when we visited during Luna New Year!  Families taking public transport would get off at Rose Pak MUNI station. Portsmouth Square would be our base to walk around Chinatown, but first we started with a scavenger hunt to explore Portsmouth Square's history - we searched for traces of events including: 

 Where the American Flag was first raised in San Francisco.

 

The first public school in California

The Eastern Terminus (endpoint) for the first cable car

Other historical notes about Portsmouth Square: The discovery of gold was first announced here in 1848, and Robert Louis Stevenson lived nearby in 1879-1880.

Stop #2: Chinese Railroad Workers' History Center

Dr. Gordon Chang has written an excellent book detailing the harrowing experiences of the Chinese railroad workers in laying the western section of the Transcontinental Railroad. However, their contributions have not been acknowledged until recently. From the book description, "..those of them who survived this perilous effort would suffer a different kind of death—a historical one, as they were pushed first to the margins of American life and then to the fringes of public memory." 

(Due to intensity of some of the memoirs, this is better for high schoolers. For younger readers, we recommend "Coolies" by Yin and Soentpiet- it is beautifully illustrated and warmly told).

As part of recovering a fuller perspective, we were looking forward to exploring the Chinese Railroad Workers' History Center which is just down the street from Portsmouth Square at 653 Kearny St,. Unfortunately they were closed when we visited but you can look forward to artifacts from the railroad and descriptions of their lives. As a bonus, it's free though donations are gratefully appreciated.

Stop #3:  Walking Grant St to Jackson St

Not quite a stop, but as we walked up Grant St., we could see several Single Room Occupancy (SRO) hotels, though hotel is euphemistic given its dimensions. Per SF.gov, "A typical room in an SRO hotel is a single 100-square foot room with shared bathrooms and kitchen facilities". We asked families to preview these KQED and BoldItalic articles to determine how much to share, but we think it is important to understand/empathize with those living in difficult conditions just a stone's throw away. 

  

We also saw landmarks like the Old Chinese Telephone Exchange, which makes for great photos. In fact, most of Chinatown has "classic" Chinese architecture by design. Per this page from the Bancroft Library in Berkeley: "after the 1906 earthquake and fire reduced Chinatown to smoldering ashes, there was a movement by the Reconstruction Committee to move the Chinese..In an effort to save their community from being uprooted, Chinese leaders convinced municipal leaders and the neighborhood's white landlords that the "New" Chinatown should be rebuilt in a distinctive Oriental style that would attract more tourism and business. The results were the familiar curved eaves, colorful street lanterns, recessed balconies, and gilded facades that we associate with Chinatown".

Stop #4: Golden Gate Cookie Factory

This was more a tourist stop than a cultural/historical stop given that fortune cookies aren't traditionally Chinese, however it is a landmark of Chinatown and the cookies are popular with all ages. 

Step #5: Wong Lee Bakery

That said, we tried not to gulp down all the cookies because our next stop was a hidden gem - Wong Lee Bakery at 732 Jackson St. It is a sister bakery to Good Mong Kok which is well known for its dim sum and is always crowded. There was a line at Wong Lee too, but it moved quickly and we were delighted by the variety of common dim sum as well as staples like noodles, all for reasonable prices. 

(Following photos courtesy of Yelp - we weren't able to get photos before our families inhaled the food!) 

Don't forget the 蛋挞 !

Stop #6: Woh Hei Yuen Park

Our children are troopers who can walk miles for field trips, but we know it's important to get the wiggles out so we had built in some park time. Woh Hei Yuen park, at the corner of Powell and John, was a welcome oasis after the crowded streets. The children started running around, tossing a football which had mysteriously popped up out from nowhere. 

Adults chatted about our next steps - some of us decided to walk a few blocks over for a quick visit to the San Francisco Cable Car Museum on 1201 Mason St.One of our young students was so charmed by the cable cars, he insisted on waving goodbye to every cable car that came by.

Another recommendation for homeschool families is the San Francisco Chinatown Library on 1135 Powell. Families can apply for a library card as long as they are California residents and the SFPL system often has electronic resources that aren't available in the SMCL system. 

Stop #7: Cumberland Presbyterian Church

Our last stop was a meeting with the youth coordinator of Cumberland Presbyterian Church at 865 Jackson St. It is a multilingual church with deep roots, dating back to 1894. We were touched by the Lord's faithfulness in starting it from small beginnings (a store front rental) to its current size (two campuses - downtown San Francisco and Daly City). Throughout the years, it has served its community, e.g. a Chinese school for families who wanted to retain their Chinese roots. It has also risen to the multi-cultural challenge - it runs English, Mandarin and Cantonese services. 

San Francisco tends to evoke strong associations, many negative, e.g. doom loop, homelessness, and lawlessness. Certainly we were careful during our walk, and for the most part it was like any other city with its residents going around their day shopping and chatting. The positive and negative impressions don't cancel each other out - they are part of its fabric - but the last picture of the church overlooking the city was a fitting finale for our field trip. It reminds us that the Lord is sovereign above all, and of His faithfulness in sustaining His people throughout their challenges. Having been saved by faith, what remains for His people is to "do the good works that He has prepared in advance for us to do" (Ephesians 2:10) and to wait faithfully for Him. 

Notes for future exploration

• If you are touring Chinatown on your own, consider the free walking tours offered by the San Francisco Public Library.
• We would like to highlight Chinatown Alleyway Tours, a non-profit group. Tours are run by students, many of whom grew up in Chinatown, and who can give insider experiences of its culture and history. Costs go toward improving the alleyway district, and are (as of Feb 2024) $20/adult, $10/student.
• Hang Ah Tea Room lays claim to be the oldest dim sum restaurant in America.