Los Angeles: A post-mortem

I've lived in Los Angeles for 6 full months now. 6 months and 24 days, by the time I leave for Japan on the 24th. I'm working on transitioning in order to make this blog into my Japan Blog(tm), but Hella Angeleno's original purpose was to document my LA experience, my first big move to a new city. So what did I get out of the whole thing?

I think a lot about the part of Elizabeth Gilbert's "Eat, Pray, Love" where she says that each person and each city has one word that describes their way of life. (In Rome, where she is first introduced to this theory, the word is SEX, in New York, it's ACHIEVE.) If your word doesn't match the word in your city, you're in for a lot of frustration and disappointment. I don't know what my word is, or LA's word, but I do know that this city and I don't match up on a fundamental level.

People come here to make it big. In San Francisco, most of the people I knew were from the Bay Area, with a few from Southern California and fewer still from other parts of the US. (These last ones were mostly gay people, who seemed in general to be willing to travel farther for the kind of freedom San Francisco affords.) Here, everyone is from the Midwest, from Toronto, from New York, from Honduras. Everyone--EVERYONE--is in the entertainment industry, whether as a writer, a production assistant, a producer, an office drone, a coffee-fetching intern. When the guy next to you at a coffee shop is working on his laptop and you glance over at his screen, nine times out of ten, he'll be working on a screenplay. At my old Gap store, my coworkers were mostly students; here, they're actors.

There are a lot of things I hate about LA. I hate how far apart everything is and how you have to drive to get anywhere. I hate the billboards for crap movies that no one in their right mind would want to watch. I hate the idiots lining up for American Idol (though I love American Idol). I hate how no one can stay in their fucking lane when they drive.

But to be honest, the reason I was so unhappy in the beginning wasn't because of those things, or even because of the disconnect between my way of life and the LA mindset. There was a lot of dumb luck involved, too. It rained for about a week straight when I got here. Then I got sick for a week; then it rained for another week. I couldn't find real work no matter how many resumes I sent out, and my retail coworkers were unfriendly and hostile.

There are some things I like about LA, things that wouldn't necessarily make me want to live here all on their own, but that are pleasant enough, since I'm here anyway. I like the jacaranda trees and magnolia trees and bougainvillea and honeysuckle and yes, on a good day I even appreciate the palm trees. I like the cute 50's style homes in my neighborhood. I like Melrose and Santa Monica and Silverlake and Hollywood.

And then there are things that make me think I've been wrong about this city. The main branch library, with its cozy workstations and wealth of books. The Kogi truck (seriously). Most importantly, Little Tokyo and the Japanese American community. It's so different from the community I'm used to in San Francisco. There, I sat in a stuffy back room transcribing interviews with people who had been in the internment camps; here, I handed out parking validations at a Jero concert and poured drinks for VIPs who had donated $10,000 or more to the organization I was volunteering for. I still can't quite believe how sleek and well-funded everything is (for example, the Japanese American National Museum). But despite these differences, volunteering in Little Tokyo was the one thing that made me feel at home in LA, and the one time when I met people I could really relate to. When I think about it, it even makes me look forward to coming back.

I won't lie--I'm still a little sad that I'm going to be coming back here, and not to San Francisco, when I finish JET. But I think I'll be better prepared this time. I know where to go when I'm homesick, and where to avoid (I'm looking at you, The Grove). I'll have a built-in network in JETAASC, and a more detailed plan than "get a job that is not at Gap." I'll have savings instead of debt, and Japanese language skills (useful for volunteering, getting random admin jobs, and talking to old ladies, who totally make my day).

You and me, we might not get along, but we're not through yet, LA. I'll see you around, and you better be ready for me.