Los Angeles is a mad house.
I’m writing this from my third story dorm room at USC. Outside my window is Figueroa St. A police car speeds through it, reds and blues spinning in the night. A helicopter shoots past overhead. Across the street at the USC parking garage, a car alarm goes off. Inner city L.A. is dangerous business, and my kevlar’s in the post.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. I will now relate the long drive all the way from Seattle down to Los Angeles, my new home for the next few years.
The first stop on the long road trip down from Seattle to L.A. was Gualala. We stayed there for a few days to get some R&R to prepare for my journey into higher education. Gualala, so named because its founder was asked what to name the town while he had a sore throat and was gargling salt water, is a small town to the utmost degree of the term. Admittedly a good deal of relaxing and resting happened, but mostly because there’s nobody there but tourists moving through and old folks drinking coffee in diners and walking their dogs.
The drive down was immensely enjoyable for me mostly because I was at the helm of the VW Lovemobile. The roads were nice and windy, with a high speed limit and no place for cops to hide. Taking Sam Haynor’s advice into consideration, I insisted we drive down Highway 101, rather than the multi-laned robotically efficient soulless concrete sprawled across the west coast like a long scar on the leg of the United States transportation thoroughfare known as I-5.
Believe me, I’ve driven I-5 enough back and forth from school to last me well into all my potential automobile driving reincarnations until the end of the universe or the Second Coming or the apocalypse or when “You Got Served 2: This Time It’s Personal” comes out or what have you.
Sam’s advice turns out to be extremely entertaining, and extremely nauseating for the rest of the car. My mom, who doesn’t have the iron stomach I do (ha) when it comes to motion sickness, had to sit in the front, and she managed to fall asleep before the real curvy stuff came, avoiding damaging my nice leather interior with acidic vomit. My brother and dad spent the time sleeping. But at least I had a good time, iPod blaring taking curves with a back end that’s barely gripping the road, and other vaguely sexual car antics..
Because I have read both “Drive to Survive” and “Speed Secrets” (1 and 2, 1 is much better, but 2 is great if you’re somebody already a kickin’ rad driver with mad skillz such as myself), I believe myself to be a hot shit driver. No, not believe, because “believe” is way too tame. More like “Religiously Ascribe to the Notion that my Shit as a Driver is So Hot, You Could Use it To Forge Steel.” I took those turns like men of ill-repute take sweets from a child – with extreme prejudice and unquenchable greed.
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Paul has some issues with "holding it in."
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We stopped along 101 for lunch at the “Mystery Forest.” It’s a forest of redwoods that is, reportedly, full of mystery. What exactly could cause redwoods to be $15 worth of mysterious is anybody’s guess: “Look out, kids! This tree is really big! And really tall! And it’s red!” Right outside is a massive talking structure of Paul Bunyan and his blue ox Babe. Yes, talking. There’s a dude with a southern accent sitting inside somewhere, spying on you as you walk by, and making wisecracks worthy of the great Paul Bunyan himself. Most kids get quite a kick from talking to him. J. Wong and I got quite a kick out of the fact that incontinence appears to have hit Ol’ Paul rather hard in the pants department. A biker gang visiting the forest walked by and began to comment on the pants, and ol’ Paul told them, “I know where you’re going, and I don’t want to talk about it!” That’s a rather gutsy thing for a guy to say to a full black leather clad biker gang in eighty degree heat, but then again, Paul Bunyan is sixty-feet tall.
In the same parking lot, we see a guy with a restored 1920’s Bentley. He was tinkering with it, and attracted more tourists than some boring ol’ mystery forest did with his awesomemobile. I consider offering a trade – my lovemobile for his, but decide against it lest he attack me with his greasy wrench.
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You have no idea how hot this makes me.
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We turned onto Highway 1 and continued southward along the coast. Highway 1 is an awesome highway because:
– The speed limit is 55
– The speed limit should be 35
– There are no places for cops to hide
– Everyone goes 70 anyway
Suffice to say, it was the ride of everyone else in the car’s life. I secretly imagined I was James Bond racing through windy roads to evade pursuers, or maybe Michael Schumaker in a Forumla-1 Car, or maybe James Bond in a Formula-1 car, or some combination thereof.
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Redwoods are huge, dude.
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We stop inside the Redwood National Park, and Jimmy gets a picture of his legendary treenis. The place is gorgeous, and I had a great panorama shot that I lost because Photoshop crashed. I may put it up eventually. There’s no way a picture can give you a sense of scale of these things. They’re bloody huge. Like CRAZY huge. Imagine a tall building. It’s kind of like that, except a tree.
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Me, enjoying the "Whale of a View." The fog burns off in the afternoons, and the loft got hot hot hot.
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When we finally made it to the little house we’ve rented, it was already quite late. Jimmy and I got a loft room that overlooked the sea. Should be awesome in the morning, I thought. The next morning, I found last night’s notion completely off-base. Fog rolls in during the night and sits there until afternoon here at Gualala. The house was whimsically called “A Whale of a View.” I can only assume that in Galalaese, “Whale of a” means “Lot of Fog Obstructing What Would Have Been a Great.”
We spent a great deal of time driving around to various locales, and just walking around. Boring is an understatement, but my parents insisted on this mandatory bonding time between us before I leave them for good. After a few days, they’re sick of us, and they call up my cousin who lives in San Jose, and my brother and my cousin (who has also come along, with my uncle and aunt) and I decide to spend the last couple of days living it up in San Jose while the adults drive around Napa valley and get wasted on testing wine and champagne and driving home through the fog at night through fast windy roads. So with a phone call, we’re off.
My cousin and my brother and I are going to spend a couple of nights at my cousin Derek’s place. He has gone through a military high school, and can probably kick your ass. I haven’t seen him in years – he stopped by Seattle while I was in India and Jimmy showed him around. Reportedly, he was unimpressed by what our fair city had to offer.
And I can see why – Seattle’s nightlife could learn a lot from San Jose. We saw the magnificent Collateral at the AMC 20, a 20 screen theater surrounded by Starbucks, Ben & Jerry’s, In-and-Out, etc. Every square inch of that little complex was drowning in delicious consumerism sauce. We’re cheap little turds so we bought three tickets for the four of us. They checked your ticket right at the door to the theater, but it’s not uncommon for people to leave and go to Starbucks before the movie or something. So three of us entered and Jimmy went out with two ticket stubs, one for him, and one for Derek. Derek showed the stub and gets in for free. We’re obviously not that cheap – we could’ve only bought two tickets. Derek himself has used this method to sneak into fifty+ movies, which means he’s saved himself somewhere around five hundred bucks. And considering the quality of movies these days, he still probably got ripped off.
Afterwards, we headed to the Santa Clara Pool Hall, which was pretty full even at 2 in the morning. Noting the disproportionate number of Honda civics outside, I concluded this was a ricer hangout and lo and behold, I’m right. I had made myself to be some sort of Minnesota Fats, and can only whimper as I’m whupped by my girl cousin who had never played before. We shot pool for a grueling hour and then returned home to play Hold ‘Em until five in the morning, at which point we fell asleep for a few hours and began that wild charade all over again.
Jimmy was visiting a friend who was attending summer school at Stanford. This friend is a “she,” and since it would appear that Jimmy had journeyed 700 miles for the pleasure of her company, we gave him a good well-deserved ribbing for it.
He was in a sour mood. Hopefully he didn’t bring that to Stanford with him.
When we picked Jimmy up, the four of us head to the Great America theme park. There, we partake in some mad rollercoastering. Jimmy and Derek both win something at the booths. While Derek won a basketball due to skill, Jimmy plopped his bony ass down at a “shoot the water gun at the hole” game and played until he won a coveted “LOL” pillow. It’s lush, plush, and a bright neon green, and it has “LOL” printed on it in big bold letters. It’s hard to imagine circumstances where some Chinese cheap toy maker decides that this internet lingo thing is something that could be capitalized on in the form on twenty-cent mass produced pillows sold to the greedy capitalists running fifty-dollar entrance fee amusement parks. But then again, this is a Great America, after all.
We caught another movie at the AMC 20. This time, it’s the lighthearted comedy romp through America’s social consciousness known as “Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle.” Having done a report on Blaxploitation cinema for Culhane’s Film Studies class, I find it interesting the roles that Asians have taken these days. It is a muted echo of African American actors in the early twentieth century.
Until Sydney Poitier came onto the scene, black actors were confined to stereotypes, that is, assuming the actor himself was black (never mind female actors). Early 20th century American cinema and theater (and to a limited extent, European cinema and theater) saw white actors playing blacks with a good dose of shoe polish smeared over their faces, or what came to be known as “Black face.” Notable examples include the cinema classic “The Birth of a Nation” and “The Jazz Singer.” Compare that to the lesser documented “Yellow Face,” with white actors slanting their eyes and playing Asians. The most notable examples is perhaps Mickey Rooney in “Breakfast at Tiffany’s,” playing the stereotypical bucktoothed slant-eyed horny Jap.
As the social climate changed, such depictions quickly faded away into bad memories. This still didn’t stop the way blacks and Asians were depicted. Movies like “Gone With the Wind” still portrayed blacks as simpletons. Some movies edited out black characters entirely for audiences who wouldn’t agree with one on the silver screen. As the civil rights movement progressed in the late 60’s, Sidney Poitier stepped up as black actor who broke the stereotypical character roles assigned to black actors in the past. Hilariously, filmmakers felt perhaps that something needed to be made up for his “blackness.” In “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner,” Sidney Poitier plays an absurdly cultured and educated black man. In a way, the polar opposite of the stereotype is perhaps slightly better.
The early 70’s saw the birth of “Blaxploitation” cinema with “Sweet Sweetback’s Badassssssss Song” (nobody knows how many “s’s” are in “Badassssss”) directed by Mevlin Van Peebles (Recently a documentary on this movie and the blaxploitation movement directed by Melvin’s son Mario, entitled “Badass,” or more colorfully “How to Get the Man’s Foot Out of Your Ass”). Basically these were trashy movies with sex, drugs, and action with black actors playing leads. Movies like “Superfly,” “Shaft,” and “Coffy” came out of this era. Although the movie subject matter left something to be desired, the blaxploitation movement was a step forward towards equal screen representation.
Taking these two traits from the history of black cinema, we can draw likenesses to “Harold and Kumar” as well as Justin Lin’s “Better Luck Tomorrow.” In “Better Luck Tomorrow,” you have Asians playing leads in a movie depicting Asians as hard core mutha’s rather than honor roll math geeks (in this movie, somebody gets killed!). The smarty-pants obedient geek is countered by MTV’s “ground breaking” “The Perfect Score,” where we have an Asian kid who doesn’t do well on the SAT’s! And to top it off, he smokes pot! Yes truly we finally have broken the stereotypes by giving viewers the exact opposite. “Harold and Kumar” too has Harold being a pothead, but we have some good natured ribbing at the stereotypes as well. As far as I’m concerned, the opposite of something is just as bad, because the opposite can’t exist unless that initial stereotype was there in the first place. It’s just hidden an additional degree.
Asians are either the stereotypes, the exact opposite of the stereotype because that stereotype is offensive, and being the opposite is better, or kung fu megastars that are forced to fight against their will.
In any case, Asian cinema mirro
rs Black cinema. Neither are at any place to brag about. Black actors are a limited few, and they get called upon all the time. You probably can’t name a single Asian actor (ahem – non martial arts) working in America right now. Action movies with Asians are a while away, so you might as well start looking to Hong Kong to get your fix. And let’s not even begin to talk about the possibilities of dramas or romantic movies. The truth is, Hollywood is white as fresh snow. Interracial topics are seldom approached, and the very notion of, say, an Asian guy in a romantic comedy of all things is absurd to audiences right now.
For some more: (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackface) and (http://www.brightlightsfilm.com/18/18_yellow.html)
So it’s getting better, but that’s like saying bringing a super soaker to the great Chicago Fire is making things “Better.” The problem is nobody wants to see colored folk up on the screen. We’re content with bland whiteness because we can’t wrap our minds around the hurdles that color throws up there. Maybe we never will – for white folks, you’re a person first, and a white person later. For everyone else, we’re whatever ethnic group and all the weight that carries first, and we’re people later.
Obviously people tell me I’m Asian. But to a lot of Asian’s, I’ve been “Honkified,” so to speak. To a lot of those who still speak the language fluently, are active in the culture, etc., I might as well be a white guy. It means selling out, dating/marrying a white chick, listening to white music, hanging out with white friends, or what have you. To white people, I’m Asian. To Asians, I’m white. I’m not sure where the hell I am – I’m busy enough already, thanks.
In any case, after much machination, we are in L.A. and I’m moving into college. The kids at the University of Spoiled Children certainly live up to their name – there are kids with boxes upon boxes of stuff, along with expensive computers and large televisions. Everything I have in my dorm currently can be carried by a single person in one trip. Some of these kids probably have their butler’s lugging their stuff up the floors, but if so, they’re probably out of uniform.
I flip a coin and pick one side of the room (my roommate isn’t here, so I figured this was the fairest option). I get my proverbial shit in order, and my family is off to Target to purchase some necessities that I’ve overlooked. For example, L.A. is hot. These rooms don’t have air conditioning. The solution is a Honeywell Commercial Grade fan, which, when set up, proceeds to whup tail on any fan in my entire building. It’s refreshing to open the door and get pushed back into the hallway.
My roommate Brett is, improbably from Bainbridge Island. He and I appear to be the only people from Seattle in the entire school. Most of the folks here are from California, and often the oft-repeated question of “Where ya from” is reduced to “Are you from Norcal or Socal?”
The first few days of introductions and repeated introductions is about the most tiring thing in the world. The first night consisted of pizza for the building (New Residential College, dorm of choice for frosh), and standing around in the dark in awkward circles randomly dispersed across the courtyard with an empty can of soda in your hand you can’t throw away because you certainly don’t want to appear anti-social (especially on the first night), and introducing yourself over and over for each new person who enters the circle, going around in circle saying your name, where you’re from, and your major, extending your hand and getting it halfheartedly shaken every time. I can’t understand why we bother with this useless putting on of airs to make ourselves appear sociable – nobody could remember anybody’s face or name, and most of the time, they forget it almost as soon as they’ve learned it. Most of the circles I stood around in were awkwardly silent, listening with polite intentness to the most absurd people carry a monologue about themselves and their lives back at home. Me, I’d rather get to know a few well than a smorgasbord of shallow impressions of every single person in the building.
But things settle down, as they are apt to do, and people on each floor get to know each other better, and names are remembered and friends are made. I’m on the third floor. It’s been designated as the “Cinema Floor,” not because only cinema majors are here, but for anybody who was interested. Of course, many cinema majors naturally gravitate towards this floor, and there are a few. Freshman Cinema Majors, and especially production majors, are a rare breed (50 or so out of the 500 to 1000 that apply, from what I’ve heard), and it appears to carry a lot of weight as far as majors go. People, upon hearing you’re Production, will either express surprise, or more often, mumble “Yeah, I tried to get into that.”
Naturally, the selectivity of a production major would lead one to assume that those who are production majors are, in fact, massive douche bag toting assholes. Indeed, this has been the reputation that this major has received. But refreshingly, nobody I’ve met so far gives that impression. Everybody is extremely modest of his or her accomplishments and talents. I guess everyone heard about the stereotype, and wanted to avoid it. Strangely, the admissions folks, during a production orientation meeting, commented that, every four years they get a group that is not comprised of huge douches.
The Olympic Games happen every four years. Coincidence? Who cares!?
So it’s turned out great. My fears upon coming here about the people were thankfully completely unfounded and false, and there are some great folks on my floor.
I have much more to say, but I’m running on. Another time, perhaps. I need pictures of my dorm, etc.
-f.w.
