/karen/

27/09/05: In which we go shopping in LA

Thursday, 22 December, 2005

It's a sleep in day because everyone was tired (I think my dad and Helena had flown in from London while we were on the plane from Toronto) but I got up early anyway to do the laundry because we had very few clean summer clothes. Auntie Ruth told me that everyone sticks their clothes in the dryer even though LA is so dry, the sun could do all the work for the dryers in the city. They didn't have a clothes line so I tried an airing rack. Little did I know, I was holding up everyone else who wanted to do their laundry so we had to wait quite a while until it was all done.

In the interim, I photographed the house. This is the backyard:

Unfortunately I'd left my swimmers in Sydney. This is the lounge with the giant plasma TV:

And these are the orchids that sit on top of the Steinway:

(The Steinway is under a skylight and, during the sunniest periods of the day, Auntie Ruth covers it with a quilt so it won't get damaged.)

At 11 am, my father, my stepmother, my brother, Ben and I all piled into the car and went to The Grove for lunch. Kenneth drove.

The Grove is an outdoor shopping mall in LA. [Ed: I saw a Simpsons reference to it on Wednesday night.] It even has its own tram to take you from one end of it to the other.

We went to The Cheesecake Factory for lunch. The décor was all red and there were these amazing frescoes on the ceiling. We got a nice little booth near the balcony.

I had some pasta with pesto dish and Ben had the biggest Asian salad I've ever seen.

Of course, you can't go to The Cheesecake Factory without having cheesecake but pretty much everyone was so stuffed, we weren't sure if we could manage cheesecake. We compromised by just ordering one slice (out of the thirty or so options on the menu!) and Helena and I nibbled while Ben ate the rest; it was white chocolate with raspberry swirl.

I was so full by this stage I was feeling a bit ill. My dad suggested that we wander around for a while so we split up. Ben and I went to a 3-level Barnes and Noble where there were all these people sitting and reading in all these comfy chairs near the windows and a Starbucks near the cash register on the top floor. Ben finally found a CD copy of Neutral Milk Hotel's In the Aeroplane Over the Sea and I decided to splurge on Neil Gaiman's Anansi Boys in hardcover.

At the counter, Ben asked the girl who was serving us if she knew of any secondhand CD stores and she told him about a place called Amoeba, which was supposed to be on the corner of Fitzroy and Sunset. Since Ben wasn't too taken with The Grove, he decided he wanted to walk there. I objected because we didn't know how far it was but we went anyway. On the way, I posted my hair to Locks of Love in Florida (it cost 83 cents) and we walked past LA's NBC studio. We walked for blocks and blocks and there was no sign of the place. I noticed that there were a lot of shops around us which catered to Jewish people. Finally Ben admitted defeat and we turned around and went back. LA is so large and sprawling, you really do need a car to get around; my cousin says the public transport system is so bad, no one uses it.

We headed back to The Grove, poked around in a couple of shops (including the Apple Store where we saw just how small the iPod nano actually is. Then we met the others back at the parking station at 3:30 pm.

In the car again, and we crawled our way through LA traffic to Rodeo Drive—not really to shop (because do you think the average Jill could afford anything on Rodeo Drive???) but to look. There are some websites that say that you can spot movie stars on Rodeo Drive but I reckon they don't come out during the day; they come when the shops are closed to the general public and then do their spending sprees private when they can have all the shop assistants wait on just them.

Again, we split up and had a bit of a walk around. I found this absolutely awesome paper store in a sidestreet called Paper Source and thought of how much Kathleen would have loved it. We didn't dare go inside any of the shops—they looked terribly expensive and boring: Cartier, Louis Vitton, Chanel, Versace, Tiffany & Co, etc. We just passed them all by, walking and taking photos. This is the bit of Rodeo Drive which was built to look like a street in a small town in Italy:

I think the Versace house was in there.

As you can imagine, Ben was really bored. And thirsty. He got himself a drink from a coffee cart (the only thing we bought on Rodeo Drive!)

We took photos in front of a fountain and a couple of tourists were so taken with the shot, they asked us to take a photo for them too. Across the road there was the Regent Beverly Wilshire where Pretty Woman was shot.

We went inside and had a look around, then headed back to the car because there wasn't much more to do or see. Near the car, however, I found an art dealer which is probably where I should have gone first. Timidly I went inside and found that they had originals of Toulouse-Lautrec, Pissarro, Matisse and Piccasso on the walls (including this one which I gazed at for ages). One of the gallery attendants asked me if I wanted any help and I said, “No. Is it okay if I look around?” He said, “Of course. That's how it begins.” As if I'll ever own post-Impressionist originals! I'm a poor student; the only way I can ever possess these paintings are on posters and $2 postcards.

Back in the car once more and we drove through Beverly Hills and along Sunset Boulevard (and past Amoeba). We parked and walked along the star walk back towards the Chinese Theatre (where they used to hold the Oscars). On the way, Ben spotted a Krispy Kreme “doughnut” cart. Of course he had to buy one. And of course I had to photograph him.

At the Chinese Theatre I got accosted by a Captain Jack Sparrow-lookalike who wanted to take photos with me (must be a tourist thing). He spoke to me in Mandarin and I politely declined in English.

We spent a while in front of the theatre, looking at all the signatures, hands and feet in concrete. Here's Cary Grant's:

Then we went on to the Kodak Theatre which is where they hold the Oscars now.

It had its own plaza with these giant elephant statues perched up high above it. There was a wall decorated with Egyptian symbols and a little mall (with a Build-A-Bear Workshop [Ed: more about them in the next installment]). There were also these large blocks of text on the ground which told stories of how people have made it in Hollywood.

The sun was going down and we drove back to Malibu. Dinner was with Uncle Joe and Auntie Ruth, along with my cousin Cyrus. His fiancée, Akiko, wasn't there because she still had classes. Uncle Joe did a very yummy BBQ and then grilled Cyrus about the wedding details. Watching them was rather amusing because it reminded me of me with my parents sometimes. I sympathised with Cyrus; I remember what it was like the night before our wedding. Ben and I were so ready to elope. But Cyrus doesn't have that option because he and Akiko officially got married in August; they just put off the big party to September bcause Akiko's father couldn't make it out to the States in July.

Of course, in accordance with Chinese superstition, Cyrus and Akiko got married on the eighth day of the eighth month (which also happens to be my father's birthday). I think it's so weird that the Chinese have these things about numbers. My mother, for example, won't stay in any hotel room that has a “4” in it because “4” sounds like death. Thank God Jesus has freed us from such things.

Afterwards, Cyrus showed us some of his official wedding snaps on Kenneth's computer. I checked my mail and tried to buy tickets to Disneyland online (Ben decided that he wanted to go to Disneyland). Kenneth tried to find me cheaper tickets but he had no luck. I did, however, succeed in booking us tickets to Universal Studios.

I read some more Robin Hobb and then we went to bed.

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