Some are just happy to still be together.

But most of the former Inter national Hotel tenants about 50 elderly men and women- echoed the words of Felix Ayson, a 79-yearold Filipino American, who said:

"There is no place like home. The International Hotel was my home. We are now here in the middle of the financial district. We are surrounded by the high-rises that we were opposing, so we feel we are under siege," he said, pointing at the towering steel and concrete office buildings that dwarf their new temporary home.

"For some of us, it's a little better than the I-Hotel, physically." Ayson said. "Some of the rooms are bigger. But it's not our home any more. We are guests in somebody else's home."

Ayson and others complained that the Stanford is far from grocery stores and from the small, inexpensive Chinese and Filipino restaurants where some of the tenants ate many of their meals.

This is a major hardship for the elderly residents, Ayson said.

"For now we remain happy because we are still together, rather than going to the places that the City offered," he said. "They tried to divide us in nine sections- they tried one more time to break us up. to divide us. They have failed again."

Tenants voiced bitterness at the manner in which the eviction was carried out and have asked for restitution from the City for property damaged, lost or stolen during the eviction.

"They spent $250,000 to train people to evict the poor people in the hotel and they don't even care where they put them elderly people just dumped in the street at 3 o'clock in the morning," said Wahat Tompeo, a tenant leader. "My wrist watch was taken. My television was taken. My two good fishing poles, worth about $200, were taken. I don't know why the sheriff's people had to fake all that," Tompeo said.

Since their eviction in the predawn hours of Aug. 4, the tenants have loaded their scant belongings aboard a green bus operate by the International Hotel Tenants Asso ciation and movedthree times twice to temporary donated hous ing in the Mission District and then to the Stanford Hotel last week.

As more rooms become available at the Stanford, other former 1Hotel tepants have moved in-40 so far. Another 10, all elderly. Chinese, have moved into apart ments with friends and relatives m the Chinatown area.

Those at the Stanford will pay from $35 to $135 monthly for their rooms if they stay there past this month. Tenant leaders have urged city officials to pay for their first month's rent as a "relocation" aid, and City Hall sources have said this is likely to occur. At the 1-Hotel, rents ranged from $40 to $80 monthly.

After surviving the shock of eviction, tenants and their support. ers are trying again to save the 150room International Hotel from demolition. The Four Seas Investment Corp., which owns the hotel, wants it torn down to make way for a commercial project.

The tenants have sought to at least delay demolition while they

try to rally support for a plan to acquire the hotel and keep it as city-owned, low-rent housing for the crowded Chinatown area.

At the Stanford, meanwhile, a "food committee" has been authorized by the hotel's management to cook meals for all of the I-Hotel refugees because there is no cook. ing allowed in the rooms.

The Stanford lobby, once quiet and desolate, is bustling with regular Stanford residents and their new neighbors.

"This place is alive now," said a long-time Stanford resident.

But most of the I-Hotel tenants would rather be elsewhere:

Yeong Chang Yip, 72, who for months has worn a "Yippie" button given him by a supporter, said: Tell the people that what they have done is wrong. I want to leave this place. I want to go home."

Police, Protesters

Clash at Eviction
In San Francisco

SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 4 (UPI) Hundreds of police, some on horseback, broke through a human bar ricade of 1,000 chanting demonstrators before dawn today to evict 45 elderly tenants from a rundown hotel.

One demonstrator was charged with resisting arrest and interferring with an officer. Five persons were treated at a hospital for minor injuries. and another dozen were treated by volunteer medics.

Officers smashed doors and windows to get inside the rooms. The tenants, mostly elderly Orientals, were escorted or carried out by of ficers. One was 95 years old.

The court-ordered eviction, made by 360 police and sheriff's deputies, was the climax of nine years of bat tling through the courts by the owners of the International Hotel at the edge of Chinatown to evict the resi dents and tear down the hotel. The tenants' effort to stay was turned down by the California Supreme Court.

Hundreds of officers in riot gear stormed the hotel several times during the 24-hour operation, with 11 mounted patrolmen swinging clubs as they tried to break through.

They were repulsed four times by the demonstrators locked arm-inarm and four deep who then stood aside to avoid further injuries. More demonstrators clogged the lobby and bailways and officers had to carry each one outside.

The owner of the building. Four' Seas Investment Co. of Bangkok, plans to raze the hotel and develop the lot with three adjacent sites.

Sheriff Richard Hongisto, who spent five days in jail last spring for refusing to serve the eviction notice, personally directed the officers along with San Francisco Police Chief Charles Gain. Hongisto wielded a hammer at one point to break open a door.

"It's certainly the most distasteful thing I've had to do since I've been in office," he said. "Some of the elderly poor I saw here were absolutely pathetle"

Hongisto srid housing has been ar ranged for all tenants who want it.