Official Grand Opening of USA Cars 2 Canada

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Grieving Trip: Day 8 – 07/29/07

This was the last day of the grieving trip.

Kaiser Hospital (Redwood City):

This was the outlook of Kaiser Hospital where Shirley was transferred to perform the brain surgery.

This was the entrance and the admission office. Mother-in-law and I came here first when we arrived at the hospital.

This was the Critical Care Unit (CCU) on the 3rd floor. Shirley stayed at Room 7 after the surgery was performed.

This was the hallway and common area outside the CCU on the 3rd floor. The last picture was the waiting room where I had lots and lots of conference meetings with doctors, social workers, hospital staff, family, friends, etc. every day.

This was the 5th floor. After Shirley performed the surgery, Carina was transferred from San Francisco Kaiser Hospital to Redwood City. Carina stayed at the room shown in the third photo on the 5th floor, where she was taken care by the nurse. Shirley’s parents and I stayed at the room shown in the fourth photo on the same floor.

Linen Outlet:


This was a shopping plaza close to the airport. Shirley and I went shopping at the Linen Outlet there. I didn’t remember whether she bought anything, but she spent quite some time inside. I also went to Lowe’s in the same plaza.

Moon Star Buffet:


This was an Asian buffet restaurant where Shirley and I went a number of times with our friends. We celebrated her birthday here many years ago. We had also brought her dad and her boss Saif here. The last time we went there was Sharon’s farewell on October 15, 2006. Shirley was the organizer. It was 3 weeks before Carina was born. The first photo shows the parking we parked when we attended Sharon’s farewell.

Fisherman’s Wharf (west end):


We liked the scenic Fisherman’s Wharf. There was a time when Shirley and I sat on the lawn and had a discussion about life and future.

McCormick and Kuleto’s Seafood Restaurant:


This restaurant was in Fisherman’s Wharf. Shirley and I had our Christmas dinner there on December 25, 2002. The last photo shows the table that we sat at.

Ghirardelli Chocolate:

This place was famous for their Chocolate and ice-cream sundae. We brought a lot of people here, including Ivy, father-in-law, David, Alesia, Yuchih, Steve, Frank, Sharon, Janice, Johnson, etc. We usually had the buy-one-get-one-free coupon prepared.

Marina district:


This was a very nice neighborhood. The houses were facing Golden Gate Bridge and Pacific Ocean. They had got very nice views with their oversize windows. These houses usually left their curtains opened so that people could see the furniture and decorations inside. Shirley and I loved them a lot. We dreamed about living in one of these houses some day.

Rolling Blading Area:


Shirley and I got into roller blading in 2005. This was the bike lane in Marina. The rectangular pedestrian walk surrounded a large lawn area, and was covered with smooth cement. We went there with Frank, Sharon, Yuchih, and Steve on occasionally Sundays. Sometimes we went to Golden Gate Park as well.

This was the starting point of the bike trial. We took breaks here after roller blading every 1 or 2 rounds.

This was near the halfway of the bike trial. We also took breaks here occasionally, sometimes waiting for each other.

As mentioned, the bike trial surrounded a large rectangular lawn area. There were people playing kites on the lawn. Some of the kites looked huge and professional. The kite players sometimes played with us by precisely controlling the huge kite very close to us. We were scared and excited. It was fun.

Marin City:

Bus Terminal
This was the bus stop in Marin City where I dropped Shirley off to work every Saturday morning at 7:40am. In weekdays, there was a bus that would go directly from our apartment to San Francisco. That bus route did not open on weekends.

Babiesrus
Shirley and I went to this Babiesrus in Marin City to shop for baby gifts when there were events like baby showers, baby’s birthday, Christmas, etc. We went there to see if we needed to buy something for Carina before her birth, but we ended up didn’t buy anything.

Sausalito:

The Lighthouse Coffee Shop
Shirley and I went there for brunch on a Sunday. It was relaxing. The food was not particularly impressive, but it was an interesting experience as Shirley and I only went to this type of place to have brunch occasionally.

There were a lot more places that are memorable between me and Shirley in Sausalito. Unfortunately, I do not have enough time in this grieving trip to capture photos on those other places.

Grieving Trip: Day 7 – 07/28/07

I stayed at David and Alesia’s place and spent the daytime with them together. We went out for lunch in San Jose. David and I took a ride on his Audi TT convertible.

Grieving Trip: Day 6 – 07/27/07

Daly City:

Todai Sushi Buffet
This is the restaurant where Shirley and I celebrated her birthday last year. We couldn’t think of another place, and this restaurant offered free meal for the birthday person. The last photo showed the table we sat at that dinner.

Kukje Korean Supermarket
Shirley and I accidentally found this big Korean Supermarket when we drove around in Daly City some time ago.

Bolboa Street:

Bay Fung Tong Seafood Tea House
This restaurant was run by the same owner who owned Best Panda (Ho Mei Do) restaurant at Bolboa Street and 42th Ave. They used to have lots of variety of live seafood with good prices. But the place was not very elegant. However, it had been running downhill. The food was still cheap, but there was not much seafood to choose when Shirley and I went there the last few times.

Emperor Palace Restaurant
I believe it was around Christmas time in 2003. David Lee, Shirley and I were supposed to meet and have dinner at an Indian restaurant nearby. But it was closed. So we ended up having dinner at this small Chinese restaurant. The food was OK.

Kaiser Hospital (San Francisco):

This was the outside look of Kaiser Hospital where Shirley delivered the baby.

This was the small waiting room for patients’ family when Shirley was in the Triage room waiting to be admitted.
The right photo showed the pharmacy. We picked up some medication there the week before delivery, when Shirley had a stiff arm but the hospital really couldn’t determine the root cause.

This was the OBGYN room where Shirley delivered the baby. It was a large comfortable room. However, it was also the last room, last bed, last pillow that she saw and used before she lost her consciousness.

Kaiser Hospital Clinic (San Francisco):

This Kaiser Hospital clinic was right across the street from the hospital (both on Geary Street). After Shirley had her last pre-natal checkup at the hospital clinic, we went across the street to the hospital.

This was the entrance and ground floor hall of the hospital clinic.

This was the the OBGYN clinic section on the 6th floor, where Shirley had her pre-natal checkups in San Francisco.

This was the Pearl Room where Shirley and I attended the pre-natal baby classes. It was conducted in Cantonese.

Hospital Neighborhood on Geary Street:

Korean Zazang Noodle
I went out to this restaurant for lunch while Shirley and I were waiting in the hospital to get ready to deliver the baby on November 2, 2006. I remember because I had waited extremely long time for the food to arrive, the restaurant offered me pot dumplings on the house.

Office depot
I took a quick look inside the store after I finished lunch at the Korean restaurant.

Mailbox
I posted a mail at this mailbox which is right opposite to Office Depot after lunch.

Geary Street:

Brother’s Restaurant
This was a popular Korean BBQ restaurant. They had 2 stores on Geary Street. Shirley and I went there once to order dishes. The food was not specially impressive, but it was crowded with people. They gave us a dish on the house because they felt that we had waited too long. We also went with mother-in-law to the other sister store on Geary Street and had BBQ food there. Because I like BBQ food, I felt it was better this time.

My Tofu House
This restaurant was specialized in spicy tofu soup. Shirley and I went here several times. I usually ordered more spicy than Shirley. The soup was very good.

Star India Cuisine
This was an Indian buffet restaurant. Shirley and I went there once after a pre-natal class. There were enough variety of Indian food in the buffet. We were both satisfied.

Shoe Repair
I remember Shirley and I brought her shoes to repair here.

Mama-san Japanese Cuisine
Shirley and I went there 2 or 3 times. I did not remember why we went there more than once. The food was more like Chinese food than Japanese food. And it only tasted so-so. Maybe we couldn’t think of any other places to go so we just randomly picked it again.

Kowloon Tong Dessert Cafe
We went to this dessert place several times ourselves. The dessert was great, and Shirley also liked to read the magazines there. We went there once with Kelvin Chu. The other time we also went with Edward and Isabella.

Creations Dessert House
This was a franchise with stores in Hong Kong and other places. We went there a few times. This place was more expensive than Kowloon Tong. I remember going there with Frank and Sharon once and we shared some dessert there.

Parc Hong Kong Restaurant
This was one of our popular restaurants. Shirley and I went there for dim sum several times, with the North Bay crowd, with Rene and Connie, with Raymond Chan, with Edward and Isabella, etc. We also had dinner there ourselves, and also went with David, Alesia, and Raymond, etc.

Royal Ground Coffee
This restaurant belonged to Rick Ung’s sister. We went there after a dim sum lunch at Parc Hong Kong restaurant. It was right opposite to the restaurant. There was a big crowd with me and Shirley, Frank and Sharon, Beili and Eddie (ex-fiance), Anna and Kai, Angela, Xiaoming, and Rick.

UCSF Hospital:

This was the outside look of UCSF hospital. Shirley had almost performed a double bypass heart surgery here in May 2006. They diagnosed that she had a pulmonary artery dissection, which turned out didn’t exist.

This was the back side of UCSF hospital.

This was the phone booth I used to tell our families after Shirley had entered the operation room to start the surgery.

This was the bedroom floor where Shirley stayed. They had her in the Pediatric Cardiac Intensive Care Unit because they claimed that pulmonary artery dissection is most common among kids. This famous facility had the expertises to treat the operation.

Grieving Trip: Day 5 – 07/26/07

July 26 was Shirley’s birthday.

Postrio Restaurant:

Postrio was the restaurant where I originally planned to propose marriage to Shirley in March 2000. It was a top 10 fine dining restaurant in San Francisco. It had 3 floors, with the middle floor overlooking the largest lowest floor. I had brought the diamond ring with me.

Shirley and I sat at the lowest floor next to the big window. Photo XI, XII, and V in the fifth row shows the table we sat in that dinner.

At the end I didn’t propose there as the restaurant was noisy. I did think about doing that a couple times during the dinner but didn’t have the courage with the crowded people.

Golden Gate Bridge:


After the dinner, we drove back home to North Bay. I told myself that I had to do it, so I pulled over at the Golden Gate Bridge Vista Point on the north (Marin) side. The environment was romantic with the bridge, night, lights, and breeze. It was the perfect place to propose. I had a memorable time with her there.

Japan Town:
The Japanese food in Japan Town is OK. Shirley and I went there quite often as we both liked Japanese food.

These are some landmark buildings in Japan Town.

Restaurant Miyako
This was the last restaurant that Shirley and I went together in Japan Town in October 2006. At that time she was 8-month pregnant. She couldn’t eat any of her favorite sushi or sashimi because of her pregnancy. They had good deals with their set dinner menu.

Kushi Tsuru
This was the second last restaurant that Shirley and I went together in Japan Town in September 2006. We went there after a pre-natal class at night. Although she couldn’t eat raw fish, she still enjoyed the cooked Japanese food.

Takara
This was another restaurant we went together in 2006.

Tanpopo
It was a popular Japanese noodle soup restaurant. We went there a few times, once with Shirley’s mom. I had also been there with Garry. I do not remember whether he or Raymond introduced this restaurant to me. In addition, I had brought Shirley’s dad, Janice, and Johnson (Janice’s husband) there when they visited San Francisco in April 2007.

Juban
It is a pretty good Japanese BBQ restaurant. Shirley and I had been there a few times. I remember that we had our Christmas dinner here in 2005. We had also brought some of our visitors here as well, e.g. Saif and Khuzemah, Dick and his friend.

Izumiya
Shirley and I went to Izumiya a few times. It had great variety of food and good set dinner menu. We brought our friends here as well, e.g. Sam Kuo and Sandy, Ivy.

Sophie’s Crepes
Shirley and I tried their crepes when we brought Ivy there. The crepes were tasty.

Umeko
This was a Japanese buffet restaurant. Besides sushi and sashimi, they had seafood such as crabs and raw oysters. Shirley and I thought the food was so-so. I also remember going there with Kenn, Xiaoming, and Rick in a New Year’s Eve. Rick ended up having a diarrhea after eating. We still went to Embarcadero to do the countdown.

Ichiban Ken and Nijiya Market were two Japanese grocery stores that Shirley and I liked to shop at.

This street area was closed during the Japanese festival. There were merchants selling all different kinds of food at the street. Although it was a rainy day, the street was crowded and there were line ups. Shirley and I bought noodle soup, Japanese snack, and drinks.

Shirley’s graveyard:


I spent the whole afternoon at Shirley’s graveyard from 1:30pm – 6pm. Since Shirley hadn’t had any of her favorite raw fish when she got pregnant, I had bought her some sushimi.

Koi Palace:

This was one of the best dim sum and seafood restaurant in San Francisco bay area. We had been there many times, including:
– dinner with Raymond and Henry before we were married (to celebrate NLC’s IPO)
– dim sum with David and Alesia (before they moved to bay area)
– dim sum with Phuong, Ai, Diane, Yuchih, Sam Kuo
– dim sum with Diane, Mark, and her parents
– dim sum with Anna, Beili, Van, Lan, Will, Kai, Yuchih, etc.
– dim sum with Caroline, Diane, Per (to celebrate my birthday in 2002). Shirley was on a business trip.
– dim sum with mom (she had diarrhea afterwards)
– dim sum with mother-in-law
– dim sum with Alice
– dim sum by ourselves
– dim sum with Uncle & Auntie 4, Monica, Alice, Connie, Rene, Laraine after they attended Shirley’s funeral
– dinner with David, Connie, Rene, and Laraine on July 29, 2007 in this trip

Milpitas Square:

Hot Pot City
This was a Taiwanese style hot pot restaurant. I believe Alex brought us to this restaurant. When we first went there, we were impressed as we hadn’t been to this style of restaurant before. After going there a few times, we weren’t interested anymore as the quality of food and service went downhill.

Ranch 99 Supermarket
We were impressed when we first saw this Chinese supermarket in south bay many years ago. The scale was comparable to the big Chinese supermarkets in Toronto.

Mayflower Seafood Restaurant
We went there once. We were not impressed by the dim sum there.

Cafe Won Kee
Shirley and I went there a few times for dinner. There was once when we went together with a group, but I can’t remember exactly who the group of people were.

Penang Garden
Shirley and I liked this Malaysian restaurant. We had been there a few times, and once with her dad.

Thai Town Restaurant
Shirley and I had been there a couple times. The crabs that they served were delicious.

Darda Seafood
This was a Muslim restaurant. The food was delicious and spicy. It was like Chinese style, except that they don’t serve pork. Shirley and I went there with Edward and Isabella.

Grieving Trip: Day 4 – 07/25/07

Oakland:
Oakland Chinatown Mall

Oakland Chinatown Library
It was an Asian library in the Mall. We visited this mall a few times.

Peony Restaurant
Shirley and I went to this dim sum restaurant a few times. I remember we went there once with Connie and Rene, and once with Desmond. We had also joined the CUHK OAA Chinese New Year dinner gathering there in 2005.

Oakland Chinatown Mall, Photo I-III
The pictures show the outlook of the mall.

Oakland Chinatown

Oakland Chinatown Grocery Store
When Shirley and I lived in Santa Rosa before, sometimes we chose to go to Oakland instead of San Francisco on the weekends. If so, we bought groceries from these stores.

Oakland Chinatown Restaurant
This is another (oldest?) branch of D&E restaurant. Very good deal on afternoon tea (3pm – 6pm) food and drink.

Emeryville:

Ikea Furniture
Shirley and I liked visiting Ikea even though we ended up did not buy much from there every time.

Emeryville Highway Entrance
This was a semi-hidden highway entrance that we always drove through when we went home after visiting Ikea.

El Cerrito:

Saigon Seafood Restaurant
Shirley and I went to this dim sum restaurant a few times. We also enjoyed having dinner there. We liked their food because they were delicious and had great variety. Unfortunately, the restaurant was burnt down by fire and it never recovered.

Pacific East Mall

Pacific East Mall, Photo I-III
The pictures show the outlook of the mall.

Coriya Hot Pot City
They had restaurants in El Cerrito, Richmond district and Milpitas. Shirley and I had been to all of them. The food served by this Taiwanese hot pot restaurant was not impressive. They did not serve any seafood anymore. They used to serve better food.

168 Restaurant
Shirley and I had been to this Taiwanese restaurant a few times. The food was OK. The restaurant was spacious and comfortable, and usually we did not need to wait for the table. We had been there with Frank and Sharon once.

Macau Cafe
We liked this Hong Kong style restaurant, and had been there quite a few times. They had different variety of food, and the curry was tasty. We went there with David and Alesia once.

Asian Pearl Restaurant
It was a relatively new dim sum restaurant opened in 2006. It has grand decorations and good chef. Shirley and I had dim sum with Prof. Wong and Catherine. We also had dinner with Yuchih, Steve, and his girlfriends.

Range 99 Supermarket
Shirley and I went grocery shopping in this supermarket a lot. It was clean and tidy. It was also very big and had all variety of food that we needed.

Kingstone Book Store
We went inside the store once and spent a whole 15-20 minutes looking at the books and CDs.

Sheng Kee Bakery
It was a franchise Taiwanese bakery store. There is also another one in Sunset district that we visited. Shirley liked to buy bakery there.

Richmond Bridge

Every time we went to East Bay, we would drive past the Richmond Bridge. When we went home, it was usually dark at night.

Grieving Trip: Day 3 – 07/24/07

San Francisco Chinatown:

SF Chinatown Landmark
A traditional landmark where we had taken photos together when we first visited SF Chinatown in 2000 (or 1997?).

SF Chinatown Library
Shirley and I went there to apply for library cards. We borrowed some books in order to come up with some idea on the baby’s Chinese name, and we also borrowed some English and Chinese story books. She read the story books to the baby inside the tummy at night.

SF Chinatown Bookstore
We went there to buy a baby poster. Shirley believed that if she looked at the baby poster every day, our baby will be as cute as the baby in the poster. It turns out to be true.

SF Chinatown Supermarket
We liked to shop in this supermarket as this is close to her Citibank. It has a good variety of goods, and the price is right.

Some grocery stores that we visited frequently on Stockton Street.

Some bakery stores that we visited frequently in SF Chinatown.

SF Chinatown Bakery Store, Photo I
They had $1 for 4 buns and also a lot of variety. Shirley liked to buy different types of cake pieces there.

SF Chinatown Bakery Store, Photo II
One of the staff there was Citibank customer. She knew Shirley and she would give her extra egg tarts when we bought there. That’s why I always wanted to buy from there, but Shirley was shy and felt embarrassed.

SF Chinatown Bakery Store, Photo III
It was right opposite Citibank and was tourist famous for their egg tarts. There was always a long line waiting.

Shirley had worked in this Citibank for her last 2 years.

Some restaurants that we visited frequently in SF Chinatown.

SF Chinatown Restaurant, Photo I
This one was close to Citibank. Shirley did not like to eat there, but she would buy takeout from the restaurant.

SF Chinatown Restaurant, Photo II
This restaurant was opened in 2006 (or 2005). They had branches in Oakland and Richmond district. They had $1 red bean drink and $2 noodle soup at afternoon tea time. Shirley was so-so about this restaurant but I liked to go there a lot.

SF Chinatown Restaurant, Photo III
This restaurant opened until very late and had a lot of variety of dishes. We had dinner with Frank, Sharon, Yuchih, and Steve here.

Grieving Trip: Day 2 – 07/23/07

Santa Rosa:

Pho Vietnam
This was our most favorite weekend lunch restaurant in Santa Rosa. Their noodle soup, especially Bun Bo Hue, was very delicious. Shirley and I had been there many times. Before we married, Yuchih and I went there a lot too.

McDonald
This was one of our frequent weekend lunch places when we could not think of anywhere else to go in Santa Rosa.

ARCO
Our frequent gas station as it was right off our highway exit.

Our House in Santa Rosa, I
It still looked the same from the front view.

Our House in Santa Rosa, II
The side bushes had grown so tall that it essentially blocked outsiders from viewing the house and backyard.

Our House in Santa Rosa, III
It was Shirley’s proposal to put flat stones at the front door. It made the house entrance look more elegant.

Rohnert Park:

Home Depot
We went to Home Depot in Rohnert Park almost every day in the first month after we bought our house in Santa Rosa.

Next Level Communications
The main building, soccer field, and volleyball court remained there even though the site is now closed.

Petaluma:

Calix Network
I hadn’t got time to drop by the company, so I just took a picture when I was driving on Highway 101.

San Rafael:

San Rafael Kaiser Hospital
This was the hospital where Shirley had her pre-natal checkup before the pulmonary artery dissection incident happened. We went to this ER where they performed a CAT scan and claimed that Shirley had a pulmonary artery dissection.

4th Street in downtown San Rafael

House of Lee Chinese Restaurant
This is the closest dim sum restaurant in North Bay (especially when Shirley and I lived in Santa Rosa) without crossing the Golden Gate Bridge. We agreed that the quality of dim sum and fried noodles were quite acceptable. We had dim sum with Yuchih and Kenn when we lived in Santa Rosa. We also had dim sum with Frank after we moved to Mill Valley. I remembered I got a parking ticket because the meter expired.

My Thai Restaurant
Shirley and I had been to this Thai restaurant a couple times.

Rafael Jewelers
We once spent a long time in this shop looking at the brand name watches.

San Rafael downtown Church
This was a landmark in downtown San Rafael.

Philly Cheese Steak Fish and Chips
Shirley loved the philly cheese steak and potato chips here. If we were not crossing the Golden Gate Bridge for our weekend lunch, she would like to go to this restaurant.

Beauty Expo
Shirley liked to buy hair beauty products from this shop which had a lot of variety.

Borders Book Store
We occasionally went to this book store together to spend our time.

Toysrus
We bought toys here when we attended others’ baby showers and kids’ birthday parties.

Mill Valley:

Mill Valley Plaza at East Blithdale Avenue

Peking Wok Chinese Restaurant
We went to this Chinese restaurant once when we were looking for apartments in Mill Valley. This is the one and only one Chinese restaurant we ever went in Mill Valley.

Bank of America
We went to this BoA to open a bank account on the first weekend we moved to Mill Valley.

Rite Aid
There were sometimes some good rebate stuff in this drugstore.

Mill Valley Apartment Neighborhood

Safeway
We bought milk, ice-cream, and occasionally groceries in this supermarket. It was right across the street from the apartment. When Shirley became pregnant, I picked her up here when she took the bus home from work.

Tamalpais High School
This high school is right next to the apartment. I joked about letting Carina study in this school. Shirley said that it will be many years and we won’t know whether we will still live in Mill Valley.

Gomez Way
The road Gomez Way was very steep. When Shirley became pregnant, she could not walk up the steep road. I picked her up at Safeway when she returned from work.

Mill Valley Apartment
Shirley and I moved to this apartment on December 10, 2004.

Grieving Trip: Day 1 – 07/22/07

19th Avenue:

19th Avenue in San Francisco, Photo I
This is the road that Shirley and I drove past a lot whenever we went to Daly City, SFO Airport, Peninsula, and South Bay.

19th Avenue in San Francisco, Photo II
This was the area where we stalled the Porsche in the middle of the road when we first bought the Boxster.

South Sea Seafood Village:

This was the restaurant where Shirley had her last dim sum lunch before we went to Kaiser.

Clement Street:

Ocean Restaurant
A dim sum restaurant where Shirley and I went for lunch, afternoon tea, take out, and dinner occasionally.

Richmond New May Wah Supermarket
We went grocery shopping at this supermarket a lot because it is the closest one when we came from the Golden Gate Bridge.

Shirley’s graveyard:

Shirley had a new neighbor. They were a Caucasian couple who were just buried there last week. I met their daughter and grandson.