InBerkeley

Overheard today on the Twitterstream:

connortmcdonald: Walking by Berkeley High this morning – Guys prepped out in sweater vests – Girls in cuffed jean shorts. John Hughes is smiling.

kibird: Flushed and disoriented from 1st trip to the new Berkeley Bowl. Maybe this organic elderflower soda and a pluot will calm me down.

nitin: Just passed a girl sitting in a tree by Euclid and Hearst in Berkeley talking on a cell phone. Voice from on high a little disconcerting.

peterberen: Just saw an exhibit of protest posters from the 60’s and early ’70s at the Berkeley Historical Society called “Up Against the Wall.”

General

According to today’s New York Times, American Idiot has set box office records for the Berkeley Rep. So it hardly matters for the sell-out run what the critics think.

The reviews, however, are mostly positive. Robert Hurwitt in the Chronicle thought American Idiot was “wildly entertaining”, even if it didn’t have much of a story. Leslie Katz in the Examiner also complained about a “thin” story, but compared it to rock opera “spectacles” like Tommy and Jesus Christ Superstar. In the San Jose Mercury News, theater critic Karen D’Souza was ecstatic — the play “explodes in your heart like a hand grenade” — but music critic Jim Harrington was underwhelmed — “big, loud, bland and intended for mass consumption”.

“No national critics have been permitted to see the production yet,” according to the Times. I didn’t know critics needed permission.

Arts, Theater

The Berkeley Juggling and Unicycling Festival opens today at 5pm at Berkeley High’s gym. It gathers many of the best jugglers and unicyclists on the west coast, and also welcomes those of us who have never tossed a bean bag in the air. There are demonstrations, beginners’ and master classes, and a family-friendly variety show.

The festival runs until midnight tonight, then resumes at 9am on Saturday (and runs through to midnight again), followed by a modest 9 to 5 schedule on Sunday. While most of the events are at Berkeley High, the festival’s variety show on Saturday night will be at King Middle School.  For those who can’t get enough juggling, the schedule promises that juggling continues after the midnight closings on Friday and Saturday.

Photo by Matthieu from Flickr

Events

Berkeley is set to welcome its first mosque with renovations under way at the long neglected building at 2716 Derby Street.

The Berkeley Masjid Foundation (BMF) is committed to establishing a permanent place of worship for the muslim community in Berkeley. There is evidently a need for such a place of worship. As BMF writes on its website:

Berkeley is home to one of the premier educational institutions in the world. Any given year, there are at least 300 Muslim students attending UC Berkeley. These are the best and brightest minds from around the world and represent the future of our ummah both here and abroad.

Despite this notable Muslim presence, there is no established masjid to serve the community. We need your help to change this.

For information about the mosque, including how to support the organization or attend fundraising events, visit the Masjid Foundation’s website.

[Photo: Melissa Rapp.]

Property, Religion, The Elmwood Property, Religion, The Elmwood

In conjunction with its revised and expanded edition of the popular 41 Walking Tours of Berkeley, the Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association will be leading a series of five walking tours in select Berkeley neighborhoods over the next five weeks. All tours take place on a Saturday from 10 a.m. to noon starting tomorrow with a tour of the Dwight Way Station area.

Nineteenth-century business boosters tried unsuccessfully to shift the center of Berkeley’s Downtown several blocks south to Dwight Way Station. They failed, and instead the area became today’s district of fascinating Victorian homes, small-scale commercial buildings, and nearly forgotten historic sites at the intersection of Downtown, the Southside, the Le Conte neighborhood, and the areas west of Shattuck Avenue.

Steven Finacom will lead the Dwight Way Station walking tour. Other tours on subsequent Saturdays include West Berkeley, North-Central Berkeley, Claremont Creekside and Berkeley Villa Tract.

All tours are limited to 25 people. Tickets cost $10 per tour for association members, $15 for the general public, with discounts available for the whole series. For more information visit the Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association web site.

General

The Magnes Museum, one of the lesser known treasures of Berkeley, has put a wonderful collection of vintage Rosh Hashanah cards online. You can send them to friends to wish them a happy new year for 5770. Rosh Hashanah — the Jewish new year — starts at sundown tonight.

Religion