Jake Lee was getting old. He had retired and was living in South Korea, where his wife was from. But as he got older, he dreamt of returning to his hometown of Berkeley, California. He reflected on what “What makes Berkeley, “Berkeley?” “

He thought that Berkeley is a “how Berkeley, can you be vibe” town, Home to CAL with 40,000 students who flood into the city nine months of the year, University professors, staff, and students, Yet Berkeley is so much more the ultimate college town.

It is delicious food is everywhere around the corner sort of town, An artisanal craft beer, and spirits, coffee, herbal tea, Kombucha, and wine drinking city, where Coca-Cola is seldom served, gourmet ghetto, inventor of the new American cuisine revolution, home of Chez Panisse, the French Laundry, and so many other restaurants, a place where you can find every cuisine of the world at a most affordable price.

Craft beer paradise, the hometown of Peet's Coffee, still the best damn coffee even though they have gone corporate, the coffee revolution of the late 50s and 60s started here in the Coffee mecca of the United States, where Café Med proudly proclaimed to one and all,

‘We Don’t Serve Establishment Coffee"

Berkeley is a very diverse city, although less so day by day as it is just so damn expensive to live there. Berkeley is a very ethnic town, used to have the largest Finnish community in the U.S,, lots of Russians and Eastern Europeans back in the day, a city with people, from all the known world, where 250 different languages are spoken at home, an African-American town, used to be a very black town, 40 percent back in the 70s now perhaps twenty percent, a middle class suburb of Oakland back in the day, but with a black lower class, working class, who are still hanging on somehow, but still a lot of my African Americans brothers and sisters hanging on despite the high rents and housing costs, many property rich but cash poor, joined by so many African immigrants and Caribbean African immigrants as well, an Asian American city, home of a vibrant Chinese-American community, Korean-American, Hispanic City, Ohlone Tribal city, Native Americans from all different tribes still around city, Japanese-American, Indian-American city, an Iranian diaspora, and now Afghani diaspora as well, French people, European people, Jewish people, but no Jewish space lasers yet, Indian-American little Bombay community where you can get the latest Bollywood movies, food and Indian political gossip,

.

Berkeley is an artistic city, a creative city, a Great art Museum at CAL, home of the Pacific Film Archives a real treasure for movie lovers, with more movie theaters per capita than anywhere else, it is a book lovers city filled with great bookstores, the best public library in the country,  the University library system is among the best in the country as well.  Berkeley still has some one-of-a-kind bookstores, although sadly, Cody's and Shakespeare's books are long gone.  And sadly many movie theaters are closing. They will be missed.

An Oakland A, and SF Giants' town, forty-niners (although some hate them for moving to San Jose, the Northern California clone of LA. And Golden States Warriors but everyone now hates the Las Vegas Raiders, as much every person born in Berkeley must hate LA, sort of part of Berkeley and the Northern California DNA to be hating on LA, the LA Dodgers, and now the Las Vegas Raiders.

Rents are insane, and housing prices; the only people who can afford to buy are people with boatloads of money, and somehow there are lots of those types hanging out, and lots of people who don’t have money who somehow manage to get by, who can afford to live here?

But still, Jake felt drawn to the city and told his wife, it was time to return and they made their plans. But reality intervened.  The "Big One” came destroying most of the Bay Area, along with volcanic eruptions, causing massive fires which continued burning up the state. Sadly, Jake Lee was never able to return home as Berkeley and California became uninhabitable ghost towns.