This week I celebrated one year of living in Los Angeles. Now you may not think that much of a milestone but I bring it up because, in typical American form, it brings up a whole new set of circumstances. Once again I am reminded of the hoops I had to jump through when I first arrived, and how, now that I have survived a year, seemingly all is forgiven for being a new arrival and I have been accepted into normal society.
All those things that I had trouble initiating are now coming up for renewal for their one year anniversary. It seems 12 months is the yardstick that most companies use to decide whether you are a reliable customer. After struggling to get a credit card, car insurance, health insurance, rental apartment, mobile phone – once you pass go you are welcomed into the family. It would appear that if you are able to survive a year in America without going bankrupt or going home then you must be a citizen of integrity that everyone wants a piece of. Every day I am inundated with new credit card offers, life insurance offers, mobile phone upgrades, discounts on car insurance. I recall when I first got my plates for my car it was required to go through a smog check and a DMV inspection that was akin to having your car checked over my a bomb disposal unit. Which I have no problem with. Every car should be thoroughly checked for road worthiness. In New Zealand your vehicle has to pass a Warrant of Fitness check every 6 months. Which may have something to do with the incredible wear and tear on a vehicle caused by piling 56 Polynesians into a mini van to go to the Mangere Town Centre. But in the US you simply get a letter that your registration is due and you are duly required to send back some money and lo and behold your new registration sticker arrives in the mail. It’s almost as if the DMV has the attitude that they did such a thorough check of your vehicle last year, nothing could possibly have gone wrong in the last 12 months. You’re good to go. No bomb disposal unit required. Of course I wouldn’t be surprised if when the original inspection was done, that GPS homing devices were installed under my car without my knowledge and I have been secretly tracked for a year to ascertain my usual whereabouts and whether that poses a threat to national security. At the end of the day I’m just happy if I can go to bed each night knowing that the President doesn’t think I’m a jackass.
The thing about LA, though, is that it is a city not to be taken lightly. Even after a year, just when you think you have everything figured out, it has the ability to throw you a curve ball or two. Every now and then I still find myself in a completely new situation that the locals take for granted. And it reminded this week of a joke I heard recently:
There is a big sailing boat out at sea. One day the bosun yells down from the crows nest “Captain there is an enemy ship on the horizon”. The Captain looks at his Lieutenant and says “bring me my red shirt”. The Lieutenant immediately runs down below and returns with the shirt and says “here is the shirt Sir, but I have to ask…why a red shirt?” The Captain says “well this way, should I get shot, my men will not be able to see me bleed as it will be the same colour as the shirt and they will fight on regardless”. At that moment the bosun yells down “Sir, I’ve just spotted another 5 enemy ships behind the first one!” The Captain looks at his Lieutenant and says “bring me my brown pants”.
That is LA in a nutshell. You go around confident in your abilities to survive and continue to fight the good fight…and then suddenly you realise you are in a situation where you may just mess yourself.
My case in point this week was this. See in LA, once you deviate from the main arterial roads into the back streets you will be welcomed by a myriad of 4-way stop signs at just about every intersection. You know the ones, where 4 cars all come to a stop at the same time and everyone looks at each other trying to decide who should go first. There’s a lot of edging forward waiting for the right moment like you are trying to join three other people on a skipping rope. Basically it’s like doing a dance and only the strongest will survive. But you get used to it and soon enough you are even doing what is referred to as “The California Stop” – the one where you end up not even coming to a complete stop at all, just continuing to roll on through thereby sending a message to all that you are not to be messed with. Whilst wearing a red shirt.
The other day however I was driving along Santa Monica Blvd and came to the intersection of Westwood Blvd. Now these are two main roads – 3 lanes of traffic either side (not including turning lanes) intersecting with another road with a combined total of 6 lanes of traffic. But the traffic lights were not working. Now in LA, even when they are working, during rush hour you have traffic police directing traffic because, well let’s face, LA drivers are idiots and will block intersections in their haste to get home. Don’t even get me started on those lane splitting motorcycle riders. The bastards. So coming up to this intersection I was not concerned – there would surely be someone in a uniform to control the situation. But no. What happens when traffic signals go down is that it becomes the world’s largest 4-way stop sign intersection. 6 lanes of traffic on one street and 6 lanes on the other taking it in turns to let one car per lane cross the intersection at a time. My awareness of LA drivers’ impatience and willingness to forget road laws was not helping my hesitation. Suddenly I found myself at the starting line, edging into the middle of a ridiculously large intersection whilst 6 drivers in various SUV’s and buses waited to cross, with hundreds behind them and hundreds behind me – all staring at me with that ‘You better know what you are doing or you will die’ look. Bring me my brown pants.
So here’s to a year in LA. A city that continues to inspire, amaze and scare the living crap out of me.
Thankfully I haven’t messed myself yet. Not that you’d be able to tell.
Stop sign image from Adobemac on Flickr
