Hollywood is in Florida and
other California curiosities
By Romina D. Saha
INQ7.net

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DO YOU know the way to San Jose? Burt Bacharach didn't really tell you the way in his popular sixties song. If anything, the song probably even confused more people as Dionne Warwick crooned, "L.A. is a great big freeway," making one think that perhaps San Jose was near L.A. (they're more than 300 miles apart). San Jose is otherwise hardly mentioned in Hollywood, from which most American entertainment on Philippine TV originates. So if you don't know where San Jose, California is, you're not alone. Many others don't either.

When I tell Filipino friends or relatives back home that I live in San Jose, they ask, "So you live near San Francisco?" I say, "Well, we're south of San Francisco." "South?" they reply. "So you're near L.A.?"

To some, California is only divided into San Francisco and Los Angeles. Blame The Streets of San Francisco and L.A. Law for that. And the fact that most Filipinos arrive here through either the San Francisco International Airport or the Los Angeles International Airport-"SFO" and "LAX" to experienced travelers. Relatives and friends sending off their loved ones only know they are going to one or the other airport. Where they end up after baggage claim is a vague idea. Milpitas? Daly City? Vallejo? Oh yes, that is in San Francisco. Not.

Here are some interesting tidbits about California and some of its cities: California has a total land area of 156,000 square miles, larger than the Philippines' 116,000 square miles. However, it has a population of only 37 million as of 2005 (Dept. of Finance), less than half of the Philippines' 76.5 million.

California has 478 cities.

Filipinos make up 919,000 or 2.7 percent of the total California population (U.S. Census, 2000).

The city of San Francisco is the only city in the county of San Francisco. South San Francisco is a city in San Mateo County.

There is a California City in Kern County.

What most people think of as Hollywood-where the movie studios and celebrities are-is actually the city of West Hollywood in Los Angeles County. There is a Hollywood City in Florida.

There is a Hotel California in Palo Alto (Northern California) but there is also The Hotel California in Santa Monica (Southern California). But then there is a Hotel California in Michoacan, Mexico, another in Oaxaca, Mexico, another in Baja California Sur, Mexico, and still another in Manuel Antonio, Costa Rica. No clue as to which of them was built first or whether any of them was inspired by the 1976 Eagles' song or vice versa. Interestingly, the photo used for the "Hotel California" album cover was that of the Beverly Hills Hotel. There are nine Jollibee, fifteen Goldilocks, and seventeen Red Ribbon restaurants throughout California.

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I myself had no idea where San Jose was, or what it was, when I first came to California in 1990. It was almost a full year before I learned where it was, only about thirty minutes from where I lived.

Here are some facts about San Jose, according to the city's official website: San Jose was California's first civilian settlement. It is the site of the first state capital. (The current capital is Sacramento.) It is the third largest city in California, after Los Angeles and San Diego. (Yes, it is bigger than San Francisco.) It is the tenth largest city in the U.S., with a population of almost one million. It is located 50 miles south of San Francisco, in the county of Santa Clara (the so-called Silicon Valley). It is home to more than 6,600 technology companies, employing about a quarter million people. It has "the largest concentration of technology expertise in the world."

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One of the nice things about living in San Jose is that this is where Cinequest happens every year. Cinequest, now on its sixteenth year, is one of the top international film festivals in the U.S. I have the privilege of covering it for the fourth year in a row. Last year, Fallen Angels, a short film made by Michael Tuviera, a young promising Filipino filmmaker, was shown here. This year, unfortunately, there are no Filipino participants. Nonetheless, for 12 days this March (1-12), Cinequest 16 features a rich and diverse selection of intelligent, thought-provoking, intriguing, and challenging films from around the world, many of them by or about Asians.

Right on the heels of Cinequest, the prestigious San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival opens on March 16. Though based in San Francisco, this filmfest has a presence in San Jose, screening some films in several San Jose theaters. This festival will screen two feature films by Filipinos- Rigodon (Sari Lluch Dalena and Keith Sicat, directors and writers) and Colma: The Musical (Richard Wong, director; H.P. Mendoza, writer)-and the short films Balikbayan Confessions by Tina Bartolome; Void by Patrick Espino; Rolling Longaniza by Romeo Candido; My Break Ups Into a Million Pieces by Amir Motlagh; Tears in the Rain by David Estrada; and The Light by Mark Decena.

I hope to see entries by Filipino filmmakers at Cinequest next year. C'mon, creative ones! Visit http://www.cinequest.org and http://www.asianamericanfilmfestival.org for more information about these two events.

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If you have comments or questions about this column, write me at mywrite77@yahoo.com.