Mi ciudad
No plastic here. The LA I grew up knowing and loving (1970-something).
I hear the same reasons over and over why people don’t like Los Angeles. In fact, it seems like lots of LA people here the same things. The reasons usually follow along these lines:
Reasons? The traffic, the smog, the $60/one hour cab ride from the airport, the plastic people, mindless conversations about long work commutes, oddball posers on the street, the pretense…and did I mention the traffic?
The guy who wrote that doesn’t live in LA. I suppose if you did you’d know better than to take a cab from LAX and would have a friend or family member come pick you up. Despite that, he doesn’t bring any intelligent arguments to the case against LA. Yeah, this city and the region are not perfect. We know there are smog problems (hello, smog days), that traffic sucks and that our public transportation is far from being what this city needs. Still… the complaint that LA is full of “plastic people” and there is some kind of “pretense” are exaggerated, and in my opinion utterly false.
I’ve lived in LA since I was 17. Before that I lived just east of the city yet still in the county. The only LA I knew most of my life was East LA. There were no fake, shallow or plastic people in the neighborhoods where my grandparents and tíos and tías lived. Pretense? None of that either. Instead, I saw hardworking families, immigrants like my own parents, people who came to LA for something else besides “the industry.”
I started hearing all these arguments after I left Hacienda Heights and got to UCLA. Most of the complaints didn’t even come from Bay Area transplants (who love to hate on LA). I heard these things from people who had only visited LA and never spent a significant amount of time here. I just dismissed them, but the same stereotypes kept coming up over and over. It’s as if all these people watched was “Melrose Place” and only spent time in West Hollywood, not even in the city of LA, on the Sunset Strip without bothering to venture into other areas of LA.
Come on now, if you’re going to dislike this city, at least do so for a well-informed reason.
With all that said, below is a list I wrote about two years ago on why I love this city. I did it at a time when I had been admitted to all my graduate schools of choice. I was 23 and had been working and going to school at UCLA since 1998 and really wanted a change. It didn’t look like there would be a change since UCLA was and still is the best place for me to study in my field. So yeah, I was feeling a bit resentful that I wouldn’t get to live in a different part of the country for a short time.
I’m going to make a list about all that I like about Los Angeles so I don’t feel so bad when and if I decide to stay here for another X amount of years.
I’ll start with the simple things:
- My family is here
- Most of my best friends are here, minus the ones in school somewhere else
- The weather
- Lots of Mexicans and Central Americans
- I know my way around
- There’s always something going on
- The beach is close by
- So are the mountains
- The diversity, you can meet people from all over the world
- I feel at home
I’m sure I can add more…
If you’re wondering, not one of those reasons has changed since then and I don’t ever regret passing up on offers from east coast and midwest schools for grad school.
Note: this was all inspired by 5000!’s response to the “I hate LA guy” I linked above and other people who make the same complaints. Losanjealous and Hexodus also wrote similar posts about the real LA a while back.
You know what, I’ve never been to LA, but just reading this makes me want to go. I’ve been to California though, but I didn’t like the weather in SF. I bet coming up with a list about Dallas would be even harder, but I’d leave the challenge to Cad.
I will acknowledge though that ever since I moved back to Oak Cliff things are looking nicer.
You know what? the reasons I would love to visit CA are basically because I’m Latina, some people who are not surrounded by their own kind, feel left out of place and start to complain without giving it a second chance.
That’s just the way it is, over there. . and here as well. Dallas has traffic, smog, a not so GREAT public transportation system, but you know what, a lot of wht you have there in LA is what I got here in Dallas, and wouldnt change it for the world.
Yeah, so the beach is 8 hours away or so from right here, but u know what, road trips rock!
L.A. sounds like the bay area. i might like LA, i applied for a job in the area, still havent’ heard from them. i might become your vecino.
That guy must have only gone for Hollywood. I went to LA a couple years back for NACCS and I loved it. I was really sad to go. The city has so much character and I would love no more than be able to spend more time there. Funny thing too, when I was there, we didn’t go to Hollywood everyone had already been and I really wasn’t interested.
See, now, your post got me singing Gladys Knight and the Pips
“LA….too much for the man…”
I love LA too. I was born there, but I’ve never lived there as an adult. My dad Don Fon and nephew like to take the greyhound bus from New Mexico to LA.
LA is racialized in a certain kind of way. I mean, people will say “LA’s gotten so bad” as a way of saying “I don’t like Latinos, Mexicans, and Black People.”
L* likes Fruitvale (in Oakland) because it reminds her of living in Echo Park.
I am one of those people that hate L.A. now.
I grew up in L.A.
I lived in L.A. since I was 11 months old till I got married which was when I was 20.
I am a military wife so I’ve lived in various other states. Including one other country.
So based on those experiences I realized that L.A. is definitely not a place for me. Even though I lived there over 20 years.
The first thing I notice when I get here are the people… I guess it comes with the fast pace lifestyle. I don’t know… but compared to San Antonio, TX well, in “my” opinion there is a big difference. When I fly into San Antonio,TX from Los Angeles, you can just feel the happiness in the atmosphere… I don’t know how to explain it.
I guess it’s different for everybody. And everyone has their “valid” reasons for it…
But I guess “L.A.” has just grown out of me that’s all cause I’ve lived away from it for so long now.
If it wasn’t for family living here, I honestly wouldn’t come back.
That’s just me though.
Living and working in the WeHo/Hollywood area i can definitely see why people can get such a bad impression of la. I guess that’s why i’ve gotta trek back to Highland Park a couple times a week.
Well, I like LA, but I definitely prefer Denver. To me, the big drawback to LA is that the city is so big you have to drive a really long time to be really out in nature. For a vacation, though, that isn’t a problem.
Cindy,
I know whereyou are coming from. When we moved here [Nebraska] from Colorado, people thought we were nuts. Now when we go back to visit, everyone makes comments about how Nebraska is 1. flat, 2. full of meth labs, 3. everyone here is a Husker fan, 4.everyone here is overweight, etc., etc. It gets so old! And these people have never been to Nebraska! I get mad when people judge a place they’ve never been…it’s so ignorant.
My husband and I miss Denver, but the comments people make when they find out where we live now get old, fast.
Seyd,
I’ve never been to Dallas so don’t know anything about why you would or would not like the city. SF’s weather is funky, but the “personality” of the city and people make up for all the fog.
Cad,
Going to a grad school in a city with a lot Latinos was really important to me, so I can understand you.
Tin,
Have you ever heard that the Bay is just a whole lot more chill than LA/SoCal?
Geo,
Hollywood is worth visiting too. It’s not all about the “industry.” I wish I was going to NACCS this year…
Ktrion,
I’ve been to Fruitvale once, but didn’t spend much time there. I like Oakland, at least where I’ve been.
Bella,
I’ll let you have a pass. I’ve never had the chance to live anywhere else and LA is really the only city I’ve ever lived in. I have visited other places, but only for vacations. I do intend to live somewhere besides LA, I think I’ll have to.
Brenda,
I think WeHo might be the epitome of the fake LA. Just kidding… not really. I can’t stand the Sunset Strip (except for the House of Blues).
Luis,
Maybe for LA people a 2-3 hour drive is not a long time to trek out in to the mountains or the deserts.
Jenne,
Maybe those people just don’t have anything else intelligent to say. My grandma was born in Nebraska, so I feel some connection to it even though I’ve never been there.