Wednesday, 27 March 2013
Arrived at the airport 3 hours before my flight to LA. Got on the $16 Air Shuttle bus. Somehow I stupidly got off at the domestic terminal stop. Went inside the terminal, wondered around lost & confused for a bit, then realised I was in the wrong place. After walking for 10 minutes I got to the international terminal. Had to wait in line for an hour just to check in. Was near the front of the line and I noticed a New Zealand Maori family skip the queue and go straight to the front. I just laughed that they managed to get away with not waiting line, like the rest of us.
Had my sun cream taken off me at the security checks. Forgot it was in my hand luggage.
Got on the plane at 7pm. They make you walk through business & premium class and you get to look at all the lovely and comfortable seats you can’t afford. Great way to start a plane journey.
Sat down and I was a metre away from a baby that wouldn’t stop crying. My headrest was also broken and the little kid behind me kept on kicking my seat. Fantastic ಠ_ಠ. On the bright side, I was sat next to an elderly women who gave me her ice cream that she didn’t want. She was really friendly because she was from New Zealand.
Managed to get some sleep during the 12 hour flight. I dreamt that I nearly got run over by a bus, which freaked me out. When I did wake up, it felt like I was fully paralysed for a bit, because I was sitting still for ages and not moving.
When we were arriving in Los Angeles, I heard the little kid in the seat behind me say “the cars below look like different coloured ants”. This made me smile.
Travelled back in time and got off the plane at 11:30am on Wednesday 27th, 8 hours before I had left Auckland. Because of the time difference I had to relive the same day again. Really fucked up.
Waited for an hour in the immigration line. When I was near the front I had to move to an even longer line for some reason. I was too tired to even care.
When you get to the front and start taking to a member of staff, they ask you a lot of questions.
Where are from? What are you doing here? Where are you staying? How long are you staying here for? What’s in your bag? Did you pack the bag yourself? What do you do? And so on. I understand they’re just doing there job but the whole thing is just a bit shit really. Apparently you can’t trust anyone anymore.
After making it through immigration I somehow needed to make it to my hostel in Hollywood. I asked the staff at the information desk and got some directions. Needed to get the free bus to the Metro station, then from there I had to get on the blue line, then change to the green line and change again and get on the red line, then I should arrive in Hollywood. Needless to say, I was confused.
When I got off the free bus, I didn’t know what the hell I was doing. I found out I needed to get a ‘TAP’ card, but I didn’t understand what a ‘TAP’ card was. I’ll explain what it is now, for anyone who might go to Los Angeles in the future. You need a tap card to pay for public transport. It will cost you $1 for the card, which you can top up again and re-use. A one way journey will cost $1.50 and using the card all day on either a Metro bus or train, will cost you $5. It is basically the same as an Oyster card. Really easy actually, but I didn’t know this at the time.
The machine to get a ‘TAP’ card wasn’t accepting my notes for some reason, so I decided not to buy one and managed to get on the train for free.
When I sat down on the train the person to the left of me was rapping out loud badly. Later someone walked onto the train with a suitcase. He open the case and it was full of food and drink. He started walking down the train saying:
“Cold water, Sneakers, Twix. One Dollar”
I was tempted to buy a bottle of water but I decided against it for my own well being.
Got off at the next station to change but there was a ticket machine man, checking tickets. I didn’t have one so I had to use the complicated ticket machine. For whatever reason I ended up putting a $20 note into the machine and getting a shit load of coins back as change. American coins are really confusing. It is really difficult to tell apart which coin is which, because they all look the same. There is also three different types of one dollar coin! A gold one and two different shaped silver ones!?
After getting on another couple of trains, I somehow arrived in Hollywood. In my mind I expected to see lots of street performers and glamour, however when I got off the Metro at the Hollywood and Vine station and walked outside, I soon realised that Hollywood is in fact a very dirty place. There was no glamour and instead of street performers there were homeless people. It was a lot to take in. Completely different atmosphere to New Zealand.
Took me a while to get use to it all and not feel intimidated by random crazy people who are very in your face.
One of the main attractions in Hollywood is the walk of fame. If you ever go to Hollywood you will soon realise that the walk of fame is pretty shit. I walked out of the station and it was just there. Most of the names I had never heard of, so to me, it really wasn’t that great.
So yeah I walked out of the station and I was lost. However, this time I was lost, tired and desperately needed a piss. I didn’t want to use 3G to find out where the hostel was, because it would cost me a shit load of money. I ended up using the Starbucks for Wi-Fi. Thank god for Starbucks!
Somehow I still managed to walk down the wrong street after looking on Google Maps. I blame the Road signs, and not me being idiotic. To be fair the road signs are confusing but whatever.
4 hours after the plane landed in America, I finally arrived at the hostel and the bloke who worked there looked like Skillix. I checked in and went to my room. The first thing I noticed was the shower. It was 10 times better than the shit shower in the Auckland hostel. The hostel is called ‘USA Hostels’ and I would highly recommend staying there because they have free breakfast. Not cooked breakfast unfortunately but free bread and a toaster. If you wanted you could make your own pancakes (but I never did because I’m far too lazy). Found out by Skillix that the tap water was safe to drink. Always good to hear.
Put my stuff away, FaceTimed my family to let them know I had arrived and then went out looking for food.
Had no idea where I was going. I crossed the road and this crazy black man wouldn’t get out of my way. Ended up going to a place called Juicy Burger and OH MY GOD! It was the best burger place I have ever been to. The burger I ordered was the size of my face. It made the Baconator burger I got from Wendy’s in New Zealand look like shit and I loved the Baconator burger. The fries were amazing, the burger was incredibly juicy and the sauce was amazing. Everything was just perfect.
After eating the best burger ever, I tried to walk to the Hollywood Sign. I soon found out that this was pretty much impossible to do by yourself. You can’t just see the sign in the distance and try to walk towards it because you will get lost. After walking around in circles I ended up walking down Sunset Boulevard. There is a really cool comic book store there and also a place called Amoeba Music, which I highly recommend you check out if you do ever go to Sunset Boulevard in the future.
Later at night, after a lot of walking, I was hungry again. Went to this Italian place and ordered a calzone and was given plastic cutlery to eat it with. The only problem was the plastic knife wouldn’t have been able to cut through butter, let alone a calzone. While eating, this bloke sat next to me starting talking to me. To my surprise he wasn’t a murderer, rapist or a drug addict. He was a man named Michael and was the owner of Red Carpet Tours. He seemed friendly enough. Chatted to him for a bit and he gave me his business card. Said he would give me a discounted tour. I said I would think about it and left.
Thursday, 28 March 2013
The next day I went to Universal Studios! If you ever go to Universal Studios I recommend going on the Universal Studios tour first. Got to see a shit load of cool stuff, like the Psycho house and the Desperate Housewives Wisteria Lane set. After the tour I went on The Simpson ride and it was brilliant. Went to the gift shop afterwards, or the Kwik-E-Mart as it was called. They had your typical key chains for sale with names on. Was going to buy one but they didn’t have Dean as a name. Just reminded me the episode of The Simpsons when they are in Itchy & Scratchy Land and Bart tries to buy a license plate with his name on.
“Cool! Personalized plates! Barcley, Barry, Bert, Bort…come on…Bort?”
Went on the new 3D Transformers ride next. Outside they had people dressed up as Optimus Prime, and Megatron! Needless to say it was awesome. Managed to skip the long queues by going on the single rider lines. Must have saved myself half a day by doing this and I’m not even over exaggerating. Two hour wait on the normal queues and only 15 minutes on the single rider line.
Had lunch in the Jurassic Cafe. Paid $14 for the driest piece of chicken I have ever had the misfortune to eat.
The scariest ride I went on was the Mummy ride. I nearly shit myself. Fucking terrifying.
Later I got to see the original DeLorean Time Machine from Back to the Future!
At night after an amazing time at Universal Studios I went on the Universal CityWalk. I bought a hot dog to eat and I somehow managed to pour all the sauce on my hand :/
Five things I have learnt so far:
It is impossible to eat any fast food without making a mess.
Most places in Hollywood smell like weed.
Almost everyone on the street is crazy and talks to themselves
Sign posts are confusing and you are going to get lost
Hollywood is a very dirty place.
Part 2 coming next year....
Was impossible to take a photo of the Universal Studios Hollywood sign without anyone getting in the way so I ended up taking a photo of this family instead (and no I am not related to them)
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