this time i tried to be timely and have uploaded a selection of l.a. pics under the tag losangeles (102 so far). go see to appreciate how many places we ended up going to.

can you believe people laughed and didn’t seem to understand that we went to museums and the universities in l.a. and would you believe we didn’t make it to the beach in seven days there??? i got tanned enough just from walking around. =P

as you can see, i found this time a family of geometric structures to hang around….

once thing that strikes me the most about l.a. is the diversity. multiculturalism is present in that city to the hilt! in the 2000 census of l.a. and l.a. county, hispanics made up 46% of the population. the asian population is also different from any one i’ve ever encountered – one where chinese people (1.71%) weren’t more numerous than other asians. in fact, they are overwhelmed by filipinos (2.74), japanese (1.00), korean (2.48), and vietnamese (0.53). they have a thai town and when departing through lax, i was mistaken for the first time ever to be thai.

(i am supremely happy to have had the opportunity this summer to go to three cities i’ve never been to – seattle, calgary, l.a. – to be exposed to canadian and american cities where the demographic make-up is different from anywhere where i’ve ever lived.
to wit, on more than one occasion, my sister and i were the only non-hispanic and non-black passengers on the bus. this scenario was drastically different from the surrounding demographics when we were visiting, say, ucla or universal studios. this served as a immersive view into the gap that exists in l.a. between cultures and economic classes.)

we also learned that americans know how to do universities! we visited usc and ucla. a large number of their buildings are gorgeous and perhaps a little daunting if you’re a first year, away from home for the first time. so, after visiting sfu, ubc (b.c. schools), uc (calgary), i like best the grounds of my alma mater, dalhousie, when it comes to canadian schools. the american ones we visited are just sprawlingly spectacular, and in a league of their own.

when you’re in the right area, there is a great deal of star power present. that famous people also reside in the city is often a reminder. like when we were walking down rodeo drive on a thursday night and we came across a crowd of people standing across the street from the bcbg/max azria store. a white background with the store logo had been set up and photographers surrounded the background, taking pictures, calling out the name of invited guests to stop and pose before the background. apparently sharon stone attended that party.

then there was the time we were sitting at ucla and were approached to participate in “man on the street.” we declined. we also attended a t.v. show taping and tickets to tapings of other shows were often offered as prizes.

an unexpected bonus occurred on the flight home. i was awake for the flight (amazingly) and was kept constantly busy because we could see land throughout the entire flight. flying along the rockies was simply spectacular and i was taking so many pictures of odd sights (a lake in the shape of a shoe with mount baker in the background) and spectacular sights (flying over mount rainier).

On this day..

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