 At the age of eleven , Riley and her parents move to San Francisco for her father 's new business . Riley has poor first experiences : the new house is cramped and old , the moving van with all their belongings was misdirected , her father is under stress from his business , and a poor encounter at a pizza restaurant leaves her disheartened . When Sadness begins touching Riley 's happy memories , turning them sad , Joy tries to guard them by isolating her . On Riley 's first day at her new school , Sadness accidentally causes Riley to cry in front of her class , creating a sad core memory . Joy , panicking , tries to dispose of it , but accidentally knocks the other core memories loose during a struggle with Sadness , deactivating the personality islands . Joy , Sadness , and the core memories are sucked out of Headquarters , and taken to the maze @-@ like storage area of long @-@ term memory . 
