Berkeley is a city many people associate with weirdness. Good or bad, the weirdness is usually a result of people wanting to be different or themselves without the pressures of the society. These pressures are usually slopes that tend to roll down people into a pile of red tape, in case someone wants to do something that puts a bad name to the reputation of that society. While Berkeley tends to call itself a hippie or a trendy culture, it can in fact, when observed, can be seen as a city that takes many qualities of San Francisco and applies them to a quieter, less hyper and in many cases a safer area called Berkeley.

Shark van, shark van, who are you?
Shark van, shark van, what are you?
Shark van, shark van, who drives you?
Shark van, shark van, where are you?

Berkeley houses many different types of visual differences compared to many of the neighboring cities. Even San Francisco, which exceeds Berkeley in many levels, has random exhibits of emotions and ideas in people and the artifacts that are visible to both the people and the cameras. Whether one is on Facebook or on MySpace, people in Berkeley can walk around with almost any attire in many of the different areas around the UC Berkeley campus. This Shark Van in Berkeley is one of such artifacts in Berkeley which differs than many, if not most, of the vehicles in San Francisco. While it is unknown whether the Shark Van can conquer the heights of the hilly roads in San Francisco, it is very clear that the Shark Van exists to conquer the curiosity, or visual satisfaction, of many observers.

Who drives the Shark Van? What is is used for? I am not sure. I would love to find out. I have seen the Shark Van drive by me more than once when I used to live in Berkeley. Then, the thoughts of where to eat the next Thai food or which movie to watch that night immediately followed the happy face that came around after seeing the Shark Van. Now, I have to think about the Shark Van and wonder about the reasons behind and around it, and the reasons it creates for other things.

Shark van, shark van, can I ride with you?
Shark van, shark van, I am scared if you carry candy with you?
Shark van, shark van, who was it that made you?
Shark van driver, shark van driver, do you eat vegetables, or do you eat shark and tofu?

So here is the Shark Van. Found in Berkeley in this picture. The actual shark, or the driver, may live nearby.

Pork pork pork pork pork.

There once was a filthy little pig,
Little piggy started to love the filth,
In filth he lived & slept & played,
filth filth filth filth filth.

The little pig got visitors,
in form of human touristers,
little pig got touched a lot that day,
touch touch touch touch touch.

Little pig asked other animals,
about indecent animal touching,
other animals just laughed at pig,
ha ha ha ha ha.

Other animals told the little pig,
of other things happening to pigs,
touching, getting butchered, and rotting in fridge,
tor ture tor ture tor ture.

While many people loved many pigs,
and kept them as pets and professed love for them,
many people hacked and ate them,
food food food food food.

So little pig thought and thought some more,
he thought till he could think no more,
he found a way to keep humans away,
awaay awaaaaaay awaaaay.

The little pig started rolling in mud,
and rolling in crap & under the doctor’s hut,
even the rolled in factory toxic dumplands and melted nuts,
illness illness illness.

Next day more and more touchy humans came,
all they wanted was to touch for a photo frame,
and one little girl kissed the filthy pig,
eww eww eww eww ewww.

The rest, as they say, is history,
though for the little pig was a mystery,
how people started dying far away,
how how how how how.

Little girl had kissed mommy shoo shoo shoo,
mommy then kissed hubby boo yoohoo,
both parents kissed the smelly son good night,
sleep sleep sleep sleep sleep tight.

The son ran out the next idiotic day,
and kissed many girls that he met at the bay,
and soon it all spread like pigs,
perv perv perv perv perv.

Poor people died left and right,
and little pig’s morale was like an Irish “shite”,
little pig realized his filthiness,
oww eww oww eww owww.

Little pig became very silent,
and kept to himself for many weekends,
he avoided thinking of human beings,
om om om om nom.

While half of the world was panicking,
the other half of the world was frolicking,
Not everyone wanted to hate the pigs,
love thy pig thy pig.

So the little pig dressed up to go to America,
dressed up as a man dressed up as a pig,
little pig went to San Francisco,
hippie pig yippeee kaaaa yaaay.

There little pig was so damningly surprised,
to see no flu masks and no deadly skies,
it wasn’t like what the bastard tv newsman said,
die die tv newsman die.

Less than 1 in 5 thousand had a flu mask,
and even with the cheap Walmart mask they had fun and all,
everyone was living a pigsy life,
walk fun walk fun walk walk.

So the little pig saw happy humans and became happy at it all,
realizing he hadn’t severely traumatized them all,
people still had faith in the skies and the mud,
roll the sky in mud.

So the little pig got ready to go back,
back to his mud filled crappy outback stack,
he wanted to roll in the muddy mud,
roll roll roll roll roll.

As he thought of starting journey back home,
his porky heart leapt like thousand hyper gnomes,
he saw a truck dedicated to loving his existence,
“Pork Love Doesn’t Stop For Swine Flu”.

As the little pig started heading to the airport,
he smelled something and thought “Oh is that my neighbor the oldie goat?”,
he was shocked at seeing people eating fellow pig Mr. Oats,
the horror ohhh ohh horror!

That night little pig got back to his house,
he rolled in the mud confused like a trout,
he was happy to be back and happy to not know,
“Distract me so I forget!” yelled little pig to the neighbor boar.

For little pig thought he should be ashamed,
for causing the decay of human beings,
but humans kill for fun and food,
what to do what to do what to do.

Little pig made a little hopeful wish to the heavens at night,
“Please don’t allow anyone to die all right?”,
With that little pig became happy felt sleepy and went to bed.
pork pork sleep dear pork.

—Taken at 340 Post St, San Francisco, CA 94102 by the Williams-Sonoma store, on June 1st, 2009 at 5:02pm.

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