SFist Tonight
Week Around the Ists
SFist Tonight
The Week Ahead: Bay Area Concerts 11/23 - 11/29
(By Eyleen Tavy)
Following a link on the always-excellent Eater SF's Board Wrap (they lurk so we don't have to), we came across this sterling remark: "A friend of mine who lives in the Financial District asked me not to call it FiDi."
What? We didn't know this was bad. We feel like the well-meaning folks who try to engage us when we go back home to Delaware, all "So how's it in San Fran?" Readers, what about it? Is "FiDI" the nabe equivalent of "Frisco", and we're too uncool to know, until now? Or is this forum poster's "friend" a bit, shall we say, of a prig?
Image credit: Orin Optiglot
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Despite my history of vocally despising the old "First two letters of both words" formula as wannabe and unbecoming of our trendsetting city, I think it's cute when this formula gives you an ironic double meaning (e.g. "SoSo" in Philly). I always thought "FiDi" was a mockery of Dianne Fienstein's name/popular pseudonym, so I have thought that it is cute. If this is not a mockery of Dianne Feinstein's name, then it is dumb and we should follow this prig's advice.
Is it a mockery of Dianne Feinstein's name?
There's no such place as FiDi. No such place as NoPa either.
TAYM, i fear you will one day soon turn into a pillar of salt.
Please don't call South of Howard Street Soho unless you are in New York as it is Soma here.
I work in the FiDi. I also live in the FiDi. I firmly believe that nobody would have come up with FiDi as a neighborhood nickname if we hadn't had a mayor and a Senator (and almost a governor) nicknamed DiFi.
But if I lived a couple blocks over I could tell people I lived in ChinFinIon. Which, eventually, would result in my ass getting kicked by people who can't abide by made up neighborhood names.
one thing we did right
was the day we started to fight
keep your eye
on the prize
hold on
hole ON.
Next thing you know, someone will tell me I can't refer to the Tenderloin as "That Shithole" anymore. Relax, it's just a nickname, people...
All I can say is InSu represent boooyyyeeeee!
I guess I'm just a busy guy, but exactly where the hell is NOPA? North Of Pacific Avenue? Not Obviously Potrero, Asshole? Never Out Past Anza?
"North of Panhandle"
WeTwPe anyone?
Come on, Brock! I call bullshit.
Inner Richmond=Southwestern Addition=Western Hayes=Higher Haight=Upper Hayes Valley=Hayes Vally Notch???
Let's just all agree that one neighborhood in SF should be called exactly what it is - no bullshit.
The "Big Rich Titties and Cock Who Can Afford Them with Garaged S Class" area. Then we can tell everyone on Rincon Hill some bullshit line about getting the best soy lattes in "the city" in Daly City. Work with us here.
People are staring at their crotches wondering where their pubes disappeared while San Francisco burns to the ground.
Gavin and I will be hanging out waiting for the rest of you to gentrify our 'hood.
hehe...
According to some recent Craigslist leasing postings, its called the Trendyloin now... get it right!
The North of Panhandle Neighborhood Association self-refers to itself on the website as NOPA.
http://www.nopna.org/
So yes, I do think NOPA exists as a neighborhood--albeit with undefined borders. And if not, then it is a tasty, expensive, yuppy restaurant.
Excerpt: NOPA in the Big Apple?
Thanks to freelance writer and NOPA neighbor Nicole Spiridakis, our neighborhood was recently written up in the travel section of the NY Times! Despite being edited significantly, the article explains to the world how NOPA has "emerged as a cultural bridge between hippie Haight Street and the rest of the City. Always good to get PR in the NY Times. Our merchants should be delighted. Read more.
No evidence by means of neighborhood associations, however, that the Financial District is called FiDi.
Block by block affinity groups; each block can choose among four (or five!) different intersections. I'm a SaBu myself, although some PiMo's are starting to hang out around here with their tacky money-colored bandannas.
There are already far too many acronym names out there, and frankly I think the Financial District is just not cool enough to deserve a trendy acronym. NO FiDi please!
The main problem with FiDi is that it doesn't roll off the tongue.
financh is good enough for me...
Fidi rolls off the tongue if you say it fiddy
I always call it 'the FD' or 'DF' when talking to my spanish speaking friends.
FiDi, like NoPa is an invention of the vile real estate agent cult. You think real estate agents are benign behind those glamour shots they place next to their poorly written ads? Hah! The words NoPa and FiDi are merely a desperate attempt to dress up old neighborhoods with shiny new names so they can ass rape suckers looking to buy a "lifestyle" out of even more American dollars. Are you a sucker? Is that what you are? It is if you live in NoPa or FiDi.
Once upon a time, NoPa was part of the Western Addition. However, those pesky coloreds live there and that scared away all the white yuppies who could afford to buy houses. Enter the real estate agents, and voila! NoPa! No longer just an address, now an attitude just like the Nob Hill Gazette! Quick! Call DeDe! Same thing for FiDi. People are moving downtown and the words Financial District carries connotations of homelessness, pigeons, and Frank Chu. Who wants to live in that? Let's rename the district FiDi and raise prices 25% across the board! Urgh! Anyone who uses the words NoPa or FiDi in earnest needs to be rounded up.
But Brock, don't you see?
Like Prince Adam, You Have The Power. As the editor of a powerful local blog, you can make it FiDi.
You are the media.
The media is you.
Choose wisely O Red One.
I live at McAllister/Baker, which is near the northeast corner of "NoPa" but right across the street from where "NOPNA" (nabe association) holds its meetings (Cafe Neon). I call it "the WAd", short for Western Addition, because that's where I am. The WAd stretches from Van Ness out to Masonic, and from somewhere north of Haight to somewhere north of Geary. It's a big 'hood. Japantown and the Fillmore lie within it. NOPNA defines NoPa as being between Divis and Masonic, but Divis is 2 blocks east of the Panhandle and Masonic is only halfway across the Panhandle. What about Lower Cole Valley, or Hayes Valley West?
Maybe get over it, get out there in the city, and enjoy a beer with your fellow citizens. OK I admit, it's fun to haggle about neighborhood rubrics. But for fuck's sake at least have a defensible opinion. Oh wait, this is SF. Jeez, I sound almost like some other commenters here. Oops! Maybe we're ALL not so fucking smart and need to stop the wringing of hands, gnashing of teeth and just do what SF is known, if not reviled for: having fun.
Cheers everyone.
Cheers! Although that brings up another point. Is Japantown not really a place because it is in the Addition? That seems to be the thought when you say NoPa doesn't exist because it is just a renaming of a part of the Addition.