Hannah Carter Japanese Garden

Photo Credit: http://hannahcarterjapanesegarden.com/ 

     OVER THE weekend I searched for some beautiful nature in Los Angeles, which is hard to come across in a city made of interweaving freeways and buildings. My search on the internet lead me to the Hannah Carter Japanese Garden located in Bel-Air. The garden's website says, "the Hannah Carter Japanese Garden is modeled on the gardens of Kyoto. The beautiful hillside garden was designed by noted Japanese garden designer Nagao Sakurai in 1959 and constructed between 1959 and 1961. It is recognized as one of the finest examples of Japanese gardens in Americas and was donated to the University of California in 1964." I fell in love with this place and the natural beauty before I could see it in person. The pictures I've seen on the internet look like they were actually taken in Japan. There is more green than I thought possible to find in Los Angeles. I could hardly wait to go to this garden and forget what city I was in and maybe even which country I was in.

Photo Credit: http://hannahcarterjapanesegarden.com/ 

      Unfortunately, my internet search of this beautiful work of natural art also led me to the sad discovery that it is now closed to the public and its survival may be threatened. UCLA has decided to sell the garden "citing rising maintenance costs, deferred maintenance, and the lack of attendance due to limited parking" as their reason. UCLA is selling this priceless and iconic garden with no restrictions, so there is a chance it may fall into the hands of someone who will destroy it in order to make a profit. The Los Angeles times has even stated that UCLA has begun removing objects from the garden. The Hannah Carter Japanese Garden is possibly the most beautiful garden in Los Angeles, and we as Angelenos have the responsibility to ensure its survival. The following link has several ways, including an online petition, which we can help preserve this unique natural beauty amongst buildings, freeways, and traffic.

Photo Credit: Bluepupae via Flikr

Please visit http://www.hannahcarterjapanesegarden.com/ if interested in signing the petition

-Nastassja Habers

D'Amore's Pizza - A Slice of Home

LOS ANGELES, more than a large percentage of other cities, has something to offer just about everyone. Naturally, this is one of the reasons why so many people still to this day choose the Southern California city as their choice of permanent residence. In my particular case, this was a slightly frustrating thing at first, but ended up turning into something great. I had just visited the Beverly Hills tapas restaurant, Son of a Gun, with my girlfriend and do to the small size and high prices of the food neither of us were as full as we wanted to be upon leaving. During our time at the restaurant, I had been eyeballing this pizza place across the street called D'Amore's. I had never heard of it before, but when I saw their pizza was supposed to be "Boston Style" I was inherently inclined to give it a shot. I had tried a number of supposed "East Coast style" and "New York style" pizzas during my time here and while some had been good enough to satisfy my craving none had really impressed me and reminded me of something I could order back home. This has long time been a complaint of East Coast transplants to the region, with many claiming the water used plays a factor into the taste of the pie.

I was excited to try D'Amore's in the hopes that they would prove me wrong, and show me it is possible to get a pizza up to my standards out West. I had a good feeling going in due to the specificity of "Boston" style, and my good feeling proved itself to be true after tasting the first bite. As soon as I took my first taste, my brain recognized everything instantly and I was assured that it was indeed the real deal. Everything about it was consistent with what I would qualify as a pizza done right. The dough was stretched thin but not too thin, the crust was cooked enough so that it was slightly crispy but not burnt, the sauce was distributed evenly and had a bit of a tangy zest to it, and the layer of mozzarella covered the sauce but was not an overpowering amount of cheese. All it took for me to become a convert was two slices, I have found my favorite pizza place in LA and my search is over. After checking out their website it seems as though they import the water they use for the pizza dough from Boston - so my question of whether it actually has something to do with the water still lies unresolved. To be honest though, as long as D'Amore's is still around I don't care what the magic is.

-- Derek Dellovo
photo: LA pizza blog

May Day 2012

    TODAY ANGELENOS, will need to give themselves even more extra time to get from point A to point B. Today, May 1st 2012 there will a protest organized by Occupy L.A. The protest is planed "around a “4 Winds” People’s Power Car and Bike Caravan through the urban sprawl of Los Angeles that will culminate in Direct Action in and around the Financial District of downtown LA." According to the May Day website the protest will be, "beginning in the late morning, coming from the North, South, East & West, will be an amalgam of cars and bikes, occupiers and unions, community orgs and organic communities — taking over our streets on routes designed to bring to light to societies ills, past and present, and engaging with residents and workers as we connect the disparate voices, races, classes and nationalities that make up Los Angeles. The caravans will stop at flashpoints along the way. Flash occupations, food giveaways, and other direct actions targeting the foreclosure crisis and police brutality will be undertaken at these flashpoints on our slow, city-paralyzing, carnival-esque descent into the center of the city." What this really means is even more traffic! For those of us who have finals today, be sure to give yourself plenty of time to get to school since the traffic may be even more ridiculous than normal due to the wet roads from last night's rain and L.A.'s 99% occupying our roads.

When I was in the art district a few weeks ago I stumbled upon the cloth advertisement with May Day 2012 spelt out in red and green with a heart of the A that reads "Somos 99%." I liked the advertisement, and not knowing what May Day meant I took it down to take home as a souvenir from my trip to city when I ventured out from the South Bay.

.

-Nastassja Habers
-Photo Credit: Nastassja Habers

Genius Loci: Painting L.A.'s Story

Earth Crew "Undiscovered America" for L.A. Cultural Affairs

Photo Credi: Nastassja Habers - Taken in the Art District

Saigon Dish: The Best in Los Angeles

MY FAVORITE thing about Los Angeles is that it is home to Saigon Dish, arguably the best Vietnamese restaurant with the best prices in Los Angeles. The small restaurant is located in Lawndale off of Hawthorne Boulevard and Manhattan Beach Boulevard. I discovered Saigon Dish when I was fifteen and have been a repeat customer ever since, and is the first restaurant I go to if I have been out of town for a while. However, the delicious food is not the only reason I find my self returning for the high school special, which is not on the menu and is known by few.

The owner John remembers every face and name of his returning customers, even if they’ve only come in once before, and he somehow creates the feeling of eating at a good friend's house and not in a room full of strangers. John will also have a chat with you before asking you for your order, though if you are a repeat customer he probably already knows what you want. The restaurant is decorated in a simple fashion. There is a row of tables on each side of the restaurant and in the middle, tables are pushed together for big parties or when the lunchtime rush arrives. Each table has Sriracha sauce, Brown sauce, and chili paste, and red and white paper placemats with the Chinese zodiac. There are two paintings, one on each wall. Saigon Dish doesn’t need to try very hard to draw in customers like other Vietnamese restaurants that need catchy and comical names like “Pho Sho” or “Pho Ever.” People keep returning because of John’s hospitality (which is hard to find in a restaurant these days) and the inexpensive and tasty food.

Nothing on the eight-page menu is over ten dollars. The most expensive dish is called Com Bo Luc Lac, which is marinated diced cubes of filet mignon, stir-fried onions and rice, and goes for $9.90. But if you know about the high school special, you can get a smaller portion of this plus a small warm bowl of Pho, which is a noodle soup, usually served with thinly sliced beef that cooks in the broth of the soup for under ten dollars! And if you are really hungry you can ask for a bigger sized portion of either the Pho or the beef for a little bit more. Everything on the menu tastes fresh from the Pho to the spring rolls. And usually when you find yourself in a restaurant that offers cheap food they only accept cash, but this little gem accepts cash or plastic. The only flaw I can find with Saigon Dish is that it is closed on Sunday. I have tried plenty of other Pho restaurants in Los Angeles, New York, and even London, but nothing comes close to the taste or atmosphere of Saigon Dish. I recommend all lovers of Pho and Vietnamese food, and those who have never tried it to go check this place out, and I guarantee you will not be disappointed and might find yourself returning on a weekly basis like myself.

-Nastassja Habers

-Photo Credit: Nastassja Habers (I couldn't resist eating some and putting Sriracha sauce all over my food before i snapped a picture.)

Sticking To The Familiar

THERE IS  a popular trend among Angelenos, myself included, to stick to the familiar and refrain from venturing out from their neighborhood. There is so much of Los Angeles that I have never seen, that I have missed out on because I rarely leave the South Bay. Why sit in traffic to go to a restaurant, store, or a park when all these things can be found in my neighborhood. Knowing that what should be a fifteen-minute drive can easily be a thirty-minute or longer drive makes it very hard to find the motivation to go explore Los Angeles. I think if Los Angeles had better public transportation more Angelenos would venture out and explore their city.

The only time I find myself on the other side of LAX is when I am going to school. There have been countless times when I have been driving an LMU student home, or out to lunch, and they have to direct me and tell me which streets are which once I get to them. Saying, “Turn on Washington,” means nothing to me and I would probably go right past Washington. My friends have joked around by saying, “Do you even go to LMU?” because I am like someone who is in L.A. for the first time when I am on that side of airport even though I have been living in Los Angeles for twenty one years. I’m not the only one who sticks to the familiar. I have had friends from LMU come to my neighborhood and they become just as lost. It is common for them to say, “I’ve never really been in this area,” like I say about every other part of L.A.

Mike the Poet touched on this Angeleno trend. Most Angelenos don’t know their own city, but only their neighborhood. Sticking to the familiar and ignoring the unknown is not a new trend in Los Angeles either. I remember in high school I was shocked when I heard a girl ask, “What’s Watts,” as she sat in a classroom twenty minutes away from Watts. I think it is so interesting how little most Angelenos have experienced Los Angeles. There are so many different and iconic places to be experienced, and they should be since L.A. is a city of metamorphosis, always changing, and the old is replaced with the new, but we will never know unless we break the trend and venture out and explore the city we call home.

-Nastassja Habers

-Photo Credit: Natasha Bishop via Flickr

An Exercise in Perspective: A Short LA Story

THE REASON I chose Ally Pawn Shop is cuz no pig would patrol that sleazy-ass joint.  My hole of a home is Vermont, so it'd be easy to run through the ally if some shit went down.  Ally Pawn Shop's got a back exit, so if it started smelling like some bacon, I be gone before they knew shit.  It gone be easy.  I done small jobs here, done small jobs there, but with Jimmy about to cut my throat over 5 grand, I knew I needed somethin bit bigger.  So I chose St. Anthony’s, because it was to be so expected that no one would guess.  That old man runs it and the guy has no clue.  Doesn’t even have the mind to know what his shit is worth.

I’d stopped by there before.  My girl wanted something to flash around in front of the ladies, so I figured I’d get a necklace – so long as it was cheap.  I hustled the sucker, convinced his ass to sell that shit half price.  Shit, I knew it was the place to go to get rid of that debt.  The old man's a moron, but I knew he had enough mind to keep a loaded gun in the place.  So I rolled in with my .45, but with no intention of bloodying up those walls.  Just for protection, you know?  In case shit got uglier than it was supposed to.

So I stroll in and the old fool’s doing a crossword, and I think shit, I got this made.  And he’s got this smile, like this is the best shit he’s ever done.  Didn’t even look up when I walked in.  So I start strolling around, you know, looking half interested and shit, not attracting attention.  And this guy only looks up once.  The whole time.  Shit!  I walked out 2 minutes later with this ring, a 4 karat, right on my fucking hand!  I walk down to the pawnshop a block away, and sell that shit right then and there.  The little fucker tried to give me less than that shit was worth.  But I got him up to where it was supposed to be, took it over to Jimmy and it was done.  Easiest money I ever made.

______________________________________________________________________________

It started like a normal day.  Washed some punk’s puke off the sidewalk before I could even unlock the place.  I looked at the crumbling bricks seasoned in graffiti and prepared myself for another day.  And it was just another day, though it coulda been different if I had tried to be the big man.  Put up the open sign and just sat, waiting for a con.  You know, if I had just stuck to the right hustles, it woulda been different.  Never shoulda learned to bet on those horses.  And I’d never have met the whiskey if I hadn’t lost so much on those damned tracks in Santa Anita.  Coulda got out of this shit hole.  The only good thing about the jewelry shop was the profits.  People don’t know nothing about jewelry.  They know as much as I know bout the horses.

This tough looking thug walks in about 9 o’clock, and I think, this hood aint buying jewelry at this hour.  I seen him before too.  Sold him a necklace for two bills and it wasn’t worth ten bucks.  Put a smile on my face, remembering that easy money.  This time, he wasn’t buying nothing.  Thieves, they all got the same tell.  They stand there looking at a piece, but they’re not looking at it.  They’re looking through it.

He thought he was smooth.  Picked up two rings, put em on the same hand, then only took one em off.  I’da said something – made him pay, but he had a gun.  Got a bookie after me, so I been keeping the gun at home, for protection.  So I was sitting there like some chump, figuring out what to do.  So I decided not to be a hero today, cause the hero always dies at the end, you know?  I asked myself, your life worth risking over that 5 dollar ring?  Probably isn’t, but at the time it felt like it.  Plus, I’d already swindled him for two hundred.

-- Carey Uhl

*Photo via  http://www.city-data.com/businesses/477671853-ally-pawn-shop-los-angeles-ca.html

On the Road: Finding Literary Los Angeles

TONIGHT -- Friday -- you might want to check this event out at the Echo Park Time Travel  Mart.
It's an event celebrating L.A.'s literary landscape and the publication of a map that will help guide you through it.   It traverses some of the territory we've covered over the course of the semester -- voices and boosters, etc. . . . . It might make for a good event to cover for one of your postings.

For more information about the event, sponsored by 826 L.A.  click here
 It's $12 admission and that includes a copy of the map.

Go forth!

L.G.

City of Sunlight: L.A. Through the Prism

SOMEHOW, I ended up with the film Cyrus, staring John C. Reilly, in my Netflix queue. It was suggested for one reason or another -- one that I'm still not quite clear about. It's a romantic comedy with a tilt, I guess you could say.  Once I began watching it, however, I found myself more interested in not what was going on plot wise, but what was going on in the background --  literally.  The backdrop of the film is Los Angeles.

The architecture, the slope of the hills, the quality of sunlight: Much of it looked as if it was shot in Northeast L.A. -- Silver Lake, Echo Park -- or was meant to be translated as such.  The houses the characters inhabited were California Bungalows or modest stucco domiciles surrounded by vibrant  tangles of bougainvillaea and agave. It was Paradise enclosed and protected by a picket fence or a brief retaining wall. For each character, that plot of land was the postage stamp of Los Angeles' promise -- despite the mayhem exploding in their personal lives. 

This on-screen glimpse, through a filmmaker's eye made me think about how enchanting this Los Angeles looked through the camera and about other films that have chosen to focus as well that quiet natural beauty -- that Arcadia, we've been talking about --  rather than the forced Hollywood plastic glam Los Angeles often seems to be defined by.

Have any of you seen Steve Martin's Shop Girl? I remember watching this film and also making an mental note that Steve Martin really does see the beauty of Los Angeles alongside the complicated lives we work through. Light too plays an important part, as well as the architecture (and the defining characteristics of neighborhoods) that help to delineate  communities and sketch characters.

So, I thought I'd put together a brief list of films that show off Los Angeles' nuanced beauty -- the light, the flora, the sense of personal space and the freedom that comes with that.




Here's the trailer for Cyrus:

This film, Quincinera, also set in Echo Park, feels very much like a walk through the city during a very particular time in L.A. -- the early to mid 90s as the neighborhood began to gentrify.

Check out the Lincoln Lawyer for views of Highland Park and georgeous Echo Park sunset-to-twilight. 

What are some of your favorites? Images of L.A. on film that stick with you?

We Tell Stories: Joan Didion

PUBLISHED IN 1970, Joan Didion's The White Album is a scrapbook of the political/pop culture landscape of California of the late 60s and 70s. California, and Los Angeles in particular, was lucky to have such an eye turned on the length of its expanse. Deeply reported and even more deeply felt, Didion is able to convey not just political climate, social disarray and personal upheaval but the very texture of the era's tensions, fears, confusion and sense of possibility. As a journalist and essayist, Didion set not just a tone but presented a different template. She was a model for many aspiring reporters and writers who wanted to dig deeper and peer behind perception. Her stories had more than resonance they left an afterimage.

As we turn the corner and begin to contemplate your final pieces -- writing the Los Angeles you see into being, we'll be looking at different writers -- journalists, essayists -- who have left indelible impressions about their Los Angeles. As you think about putting together your reported observations, think about creative ways to weave the facts with observations. Details, very simply set down, are often key in writing prose that draws you in with its careful rhythms.

Here is a sample from The White Album in which Didion recollects the night that the Manson Family murders were set in motion:

"We put 'Lay Lady Lay' on the record player, and 'Suzanne.' We went down to Melrose Avenue to see the Flying Burritos. There was a jasmine vine grown over the verandah of the big house on Franklin Avenue, and in the evenings the smell of jasmine came in through all the open doors and windows. I made bouillabaisse for people who did not eat meat. I imagined that my own life was simple and sweet, and sometimes it was, but there were odd things going around town. There were rumors. There were stories. Everything was unmentionable but nothing was unimaginable. This mystical flirtation with the idea of 'sin' -- this sense that it was possible to go 'too far,' and that many people were doing it -- was very much with us in Los Angeles in 1968 and 1969. A demented and seductive vortical tension was building in the community. The jitters were setting in. I recall a time when the dogs barked every night and the moon was always full. On August 9, 1969, I was sitting in the shallow end of my sister-in-law's swimming pool in Beverly Hills when she received a telephone call from a friend who had just heard about the murders at Sharon Tate Polanski's house on Cielo Drive. The phone rang many times during the next hour. These early reports were garbled and contradictory. One caller would say hoods, the next would say chains. There were twenty dead, no twelve, ten, eighteen. Black masses were imagined, band bad trips blamed. I remember all of the day's misinformation very clearly, and I also remember this, and wish I did not: I remember that no one was surprised."

-- L.G.

photo credit: us mcmillian

(repost)

"I'm Alive in Los Angeles"

PROPS TO Mike the Poet! (Also known as Mike Sonksen) A million thanks for coming to illustrate and illuminate. Beautiful flow, I know, we all have to say!

One of the key things he said tonight, that I think you should all thing about, is letting the journey of the writing lead you someplace. Have fun with it and having fun with it means locating what's at the heart of it -- for you and for the story you're telling.

Happy travels around the Southalnd.

Here's a revisit:  Mike doing "I'm Alive in Los Angeles"

-- L.G.

Charles Lummis: L.A. Booster

YESTERDAY was L.A.'s uber-booster Charles Lummis' birthday. You all read a little bit about him in David Fine's piece early in the semester -- Lummis and his brave long walk 3,507 miles from Cincinnati to Los Angeles.  Check out this link: http://lahistory.tumblr.com/post/18551953575/happy-birthday-charles-lummis-born-march-1-1859 and you'll find more.

Also, this Tumblr is  actually a really wonderful treasure trove of L.A. history in photographs, a rabbit hole for sure.

Enjoy!

-- L.G.

Iconic L.A.: Nine Letters, One Dream.

LOS ANGELES is known for it’s vast, eclectic social climates. In one part of town one may indulge themselves in spices and cuisines of far eastern traditions while thirty minutes north west a similar set of residents find themselves enjoying the posh environment of the elegant part of their city of quartz. However, no social habitat is far greater than the infamous realms of the Entertainment Industry, which continues to mesmerize millions of dreamers every year with glittered dreams of fame, fortune, and the lifestyle of the rich and powerful written about in Rolling Stone. Yes, Los Angeles is the entertainment capital of the world and it is beneath the eyes of Hollywood where individuals, young and old, dare to put their dreams to the test. The Hollywood sign's nine letters serves as an iconic metaphor for ambition, success, and glory. Los Angeles’ unofficial “great wonder of the world” has, for more than eighty years, served as not only a worldwide symbol of a sensational wonderland you can only find on the big screen, but also a constant reminder to work hard so that my reputation will be colorfully associated with the word.


Originally commissioned in 1923 by a Los Angeles Times’ publisher as an ad campaign for suburban housing, the “Hollywoodland” sign billboard was intended to draw in wealthy settlers to the Utopia of a popular, ever-growing city. The sign was said to only last about a year and a half, but after the explosive boom in the Movie and Television Industries, and a bit of surgery to the name in 1949, the “Hollywood” sign became the symbol we all know today. Attending a university which overlooks west Los Angeles, the thirty-five foot sign can be seen from the edges of the university's bluff. Working toward a career in screenwriting, my dream is to be known among the entertainment elite and in high demand for my talents in writing. Seeing this sign inspires me to work diligently, creatively, and vividly.


The sign can be seen as far as Santa Monica and near the boundaries of LAX to the eastern parts of downtown where a mass of freeways intersect each other. Built at the top of one of the largest hills in Los Angeles, just on the other side of Burbank, the large white letters serve not only as a very popular tourist destination, but also as an elusive promise that one day, a person’s name may be linked with the powerful associate of it’s meaning.


Los Angeles changes every year: businesses come up and go down while pop culture painted on the sides of buildings and highways reflect the rhythm of modern times. However, the perilous nine white letters have remained a constant in the city’s history. While Los Angeles endured many economic and archetypal changes, the sign is intended to be seen from afar as an elusive lure into success and achievement in the city. Every state has their own iconic structure to boast about: South Dakota pays tributes to our great presidents with Mount Rushmore, Missouri has their Gateway Arch, and for California, the Golden Gate bridge and the Hollywood sign share the coast both serving as symbols for a new dream. But it is only with the Hollywood sign where your imagination has the space to run wild.




-- Micahel Flores


photo credit: Michael Flores

It's the Water

L.A, as we've been discussing, had to be wrestled into existence. One of the tropes you will hear, time and again, is the saga of the water wars. L.A. was --and is -- a desert. Without water, the city wouldn't have bloomed. Boosters -- businessmen, land speculators, the railroads -- had already embroidered more than a little on the L.A. narrative -- remember the citrus crate boxes we talked about last week? -- but big business saw a Utopia in the parched desert so close to the sea.

History tells us that what became to be known as "the water wars" began when Frederick Eaton was elected mayor of Los Angeles in 1898. He appointed his friend, William Mulholland (yes, that Mullholland), to head up a new city agency, the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP).

Eaton and Mulholland's vision stretched far greater than the little Pueblo that was founded in 1781. They set their sites on the run off from the Sierra Nevada river that ran through Owens Valley. The plan was to build an aqueduct that would deliever water to the basin -- essentially literally de-hydrating the Owens Valley -- its people and its prospects -- to allow L.A. to flourish.

It took nearly eight years,2,000 workers and the digging of 164 tunnels to complete the aqueduct in 1913. Water from the Owens River reached a reservoir in the San Fernando Valley on November 5. During the opening-day ceremony, Mulholland spoke these famous words: "There it is. Take it."

After all, he did.

-- L.G.

photo caption: Dynamite found during a string of sabotage incidents along the Owens Valley Aqueduct

photo credit: image via Wikipedia Commons, circa 1924