Culture

After a cold, wet winter made its presence known throughout the Bay Area, spring quickly blossomed back in the city of Oakland with its sweet, crisp smell filling the air as the birds chirp. It is the time of the year Oaklanders gear up for the arrival of America’s pastime: baseball, a game played on a beautifully-manicured diamond made of beam clay and green grass. One of those diamonds has stood upright on 45th Street in North Oakland since 2007….

Three metal ladders shoot out of the ground at Cypress Memorial Park in West Oakland. They stand as a monument to the Loma Prieta Earthquake that shook the entire Bay Area on October 17, 1989. Ladders like these were used that fateful day to rescue people trapped on the collapsed Cypress freeway. For such an unforgettable display of nature’s fury, the park is small and intimate. It’s nestled at the corner of 14th Street and Mandela Parkway, and easy to…

Inside the Chapel of the Chimes in North Oakland, it is quiet. The hum of daily life just outside—cars passing by, construction work, a breeze—disappears. It is the type of place where visitors whisper even though there are no rules against talking. Many of the visitors come to mourn or pay respects to a loved one, whose remains reside among thousands and thousands of others here. On this Monday morning, there are only a few visitors wandering—that’s all one can…

At the precipice of spring, before the proper time of year, only a few roses bloom at the Morcom Amphitheater of Roses, though pruned rose bushes—bare, spiky, grey, brown, some a sunny red-green—line the area profusely, thorns prominently on display. It’s a clear, crisp, cloudless day: The sun shines upon an ovular green reflecting pool and small children play among rose bushes above a gurgling stone fountain. Large trees surround the garden, providing shade and camouflaging the occasional looming apartment…