The past few weeks have been a series
of goodbyes – they don't get any easier, even when you know you're
headed for something really cool and worthwhile, and that both sides
of the sendoff really want you to take this giant leap of faith. This
morning was that bittersweet tearing in two – now that I'm in
motion though, I'm ready for the adventure to begin again. The
connections between Halifax and Toronto went surprisingly like
clockwork, especially when you consider that the U.S. customs officer
asked me where I was coming from and I panicked and couldn't
remember, so I blurted, “Uhh, Newfoundland . . . wait, no, I was
just in Halifax!”
It turns out I made it through just the
same, and went from being lethargic (one last cup of Tim Horton's may
have helped) to real excited, in a real big hurry. A thick layer of
cloud (and rain on the ground) followed me from Deer Lake to Toronto,
but once we got over Lake Michigan, the clouds opened up and I could
see the world beneath me. A bit of snow, few plains . . . and then
all of a sudden, these snowy peaks of mountains started jutting up
all over the place. Other than whizzing over the Pyrennes about a
year ago, I've never seen a real-live mountain before (unless you
count the snow-capped peaks of Pine Hill in Pasadena), so there was
plenty to gawk at 30,000 feet below. We had the mountains in Colorado
and as we came into Utah, and then it was like we blew off course and
ended up flying over Mars, with all the dusty plains and ridges, and
somewhere in the midst of that desert Las Vegas appeared. We're not
in Kansas anymore, Dorothy (note: at no point today was I anywhere
near Kansas).
And
finally, a sprawling urban mass (some 4,000,000 people, the second
biggest city in the country) opened up at the base of the Santa
Monica Mountains, and we were in Los Angeles. It was just past 3:00
in the afternoon (a warm day in January, in the mid-teens), but I had
already punched in a full day travelling (could not – would
not – think about that, and
ruin this one short day by getting sleepy). Before I actually started
packing and realized how stupid it would be, I gave serious
consideration to buying a cardigan and wearing it as I stepped off
the plane.
Y'know,
so I could say I hopped off the plane at LAX with a dream and my
cardigan.
Surprisingly,
even traversing this major airport was a simple matter of following
the leader. Miracles of miracles, my big ol' blue backpack was
waiting for me on the conveyor loop, and the FlyAway shuttle bus came
not long afterwards to carry me off to Union Station, a major rail
station as well as a central landmark in downtown Los Angeles.
As the
bus filled up, a dude sat next to me. I do the logical thing: I say
hello, how are you. I kid you not, within 5 minutes (we were still
stuck in traffic, not even thinking about freeway speeds yet), I was
explaining to him my life plan and why there was a cod moratorium in
Newfoundland twenty years ago.
“That's
a spot I've never been, Newfoundland,” he said (he just got back
from a motorcycle trek of Columbia and, yes, he pronounced my island
home wrong). “You've got something to look forward to – in New
Zealand, you're going to be the unique, exotic one.”
I
hadn't considered that before. I was so caught up in the totally
different world I'm about to enter that it literally never crossed my
mind that, to them, I'm going to have the accent, and I'm the one
coming from a little island on the other side of the globe. Funny
thing, this perspective thing.
Anyway,
my friend had been living in Los Angeles on and off for the past 20
years, so he was able to act as a tour guide, pointing out the
University of Southern California, the Staples Centre, the Hollywood
Sign on the not-so distant hills, the various districts within LA,
and even mapped out my best (and cheapest) way back to the airport
tomorrow evening. As we passed the building where his gym is, I asked
if he worked nearby.
“I'm
semi-retired,” he said. “I'm involved in film these days.”
Oh?
“Yeah,
I was in Europe last year for 4 or 5 months, associate producing a
film. What About Love
– Sharon Stone is in it.”
So I
shook Bill Sloan's hand and proceeded to look him up on the Internet
as soon as I had a connection – and it turns out he wasn't
bluffing. He told me he just bought the rights to a book that he
wants to turn into an upcoming film, based on the life of abstract
expressionist painter Joan Mitchell. That's Hollywood for you.
From
Union Station, I found the Metro Red Line that stops at the
Hollywood/Highland station. The underground system here is nowhere
near as intricate and complete as the one in, say, London, but it
worked out perfect for me, opening right at Hollywood Boulevard with
the Hollywood Youth Hostel right across the street.
I
couldn't check in right away, so I dropped off my bags and started to
wander, eyes darting back and forth between checking out the names
along the Hollywood Walk of Fame and looking up at the bright lights
and razzle dazzle of the city. As I came to Grauman's Chinese Theatre
(still within that same area), the road was blocked off.
“Oh,”
I heard some undoubtedly jaded Hollywooder say, “another
premiere. It's worse in the
summer, there's one every week!”
Of
course there was a movie premiere outside my door. Why wouldn't there
be? So, I did the natural thing – I got right up in the
crowd barricaded on the other end of the street, even if I have no
intention of ever seeing Arnold Schwarzenegger in The Last Stand.
The former Governor was present, as was Luis Guzman (I saw him in an
on-flight episode of Community this
afternoon) and Gene Simmons. I mean, it's not the A-listers or
anything, but it still counts, right?
After I checked into my room and threw my things together in semi-haphazard organization, I went out again. It was a nice night, a slight chill but not enough to kill off the palm trees that are just all over the place. I wandered up around the Hollywood Hills, up around Mulholland Drive, and came to a big bare hill by the Hollywood Bowl. Now, I had no map with me, but my vague sighting of the Hollywood Sign earlier this afternoon told me that, if I wandered up this darkened path, the lights of Los Angeles would meet me in panorama. If I brought a girl with me, this would be the scene in the movie where I'd kiss her. I started to climb up the path, but something occurred to me: I could actually get into trouble here. Not stealing a glass from the bar kind of trouble either – there could be a dude waiting in the bushes, ready to attack some stupid kid who goes out into the dark woods by himself. Or this could actually be trespassing, and people might not look too kindly on the aforementioned stupid kid. As I went over this things in my mind, a helicopter flew overhead, and my first thought was, “My God, someone saw me on the road, called the cops, and now they've got the searchlight on me and footage of me is interrupting every major network across the country tonight. Now I'll never get to pick kiwis!”
So, I
bolted back down the hill. Fortunately, it turns out the Hollywood
Sign was nowhere near me. More fortunately, if that was LAPD looking for me, they never got me.
Near
exhausted, I went back along the main drag, up into a residential
area that looked secluded and lavishly Spanish, like there might be a
movie star behind any given gate. By the end of it, I just about
collapsed over a burger from Burger King (it's true what they say
about portions here – more than a few fries and about a litre of
soda went in the garbage, and I don't even feel bad). It's another
long, long day
tomorrow, and even a whirlwind tour of a massive city has to calm
down at some point.
Before
I left home, I meant to really study the night sky, just to see if I
would notice the differences when I got to the Southern Hemisphere.
It turns out last night it was too cloudy, but somehow, despite the
flashing lights on every building and the skyscrapers reaching into
the night sky, the stars are in fine form tonight.
That's
Hollywood for you.
Cheers,
rb
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