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Charlie Chaplin made a few movies in the historic Niles District of Fremont in 1915. Charlie Chaplin Days is a two-day event held in Niles every year celebrating Chaplin’s brief stay making films locally. The family and I started our day late last Saturday so we got to the event an hour before it ended. When we arrived at the Niles Essanay Silent Film Museum, we caught the tail-end of The Tramp. A Japanese film crew interviewed some of the audience members after the movie was over.

I was expecting the street to be teeming with Charlie Chaplin lookalikes but I only saw a handful. Here are a few that I saw. I failed to take a photo of the most genuine-looking one. I suppose if we had gone much earlier there would have been more around.

A day after a story about new energy-generating giant windmills in Northern Philippines appeared in the news, an article on the unexpected downside of wind power appeared in Wired News. It mentions that hundreds of the five thousand windmills 30 miles east of where I live in Fremont will be shut down next month. Although the wind farm is situated in Altamont Pass where winds are strong, it lies on an “important bird-migration path,” killing about 1000 raptor birds a year. The 70s-built turbines here use older, inefficient designs and were installed “without any type of environmental impact study.” It’s interesting that two groups concerned with environmental issues - one for alternative sources of energy, the other for preservation of wildlife habitats - have clashed over this matter.

I almost forgot about the photos I took last September of our local mission, Mission San José de Guadalupe, until I read Phisch’s entry on the mission in her area. Like Phisch, I was unwilling to pay the $5 entrance fee to check out the mission so the images here are of its exterior surroundings.

The plaque on the side of the church has this to say:

At the Ohlone Indian village of Oroysom, Padre Fermín Francisco de Lasuén founded this fourteenth of twenty-one Franciscan missions June 11, 1797. Taught by Padre Narcisco Durán, the Ohlone orchestra and choir became famous. By 1830 almost 2,000 Indians were living at the mission. The mission was secularized in 1836 and its lands divided into ranchos. The 1868 earthquake destroyed the adobe church and most other mission buildings. The church was rebuilt in 1985.

The neighbors next door had their pine tree cut down and the ones across the street had their house fumigated.

 
We were at Banyan Garden on Saturday night after a whole day of doing laundry. Banyan is one fine restaurant that serves Malaysian/Singaporean/Thai food.

 
We missed the controversial Fourth of July parade in Fremont which took place a mere three blocks from where we live. We were in church that morning, then as soon as we got home my wife had to take an online quiz for school.

After last year’s fireworks-deprived Fourth of July, my wife and I wanted to bring the family to some sort of fireworks show this year. We had season passes for Paramount’s Great America so we decided to go there. We found out too late, however, that Great America did an Iraq government handover stunt by scheduling the fireworks show one day early because of security concerns. But instead of fearing eruptions of violence from insurgents, they feared eruptions of violence from gang members. *sigh* So we settled for doing our own fireworks in the nearest city where it is legal to do so, in Union City.

The next day we headed off to Bonfante Gardens in Gilroy. It’s a theme park with amusement rides and unique trees set in beautifully landscaped gardens.
 
 
 
 

More pictures here.