FrogBlog | Translating Los Angeles – Page 37 – We like it here! One Germerican and one American translating Los Angeles for the World.

The Good, The Bad And The Ridiculous

The Good: Nearly all of the states in the West of the US are Paradise when it comes to food. Whatever cuisine one has a yen for, whatever the time of the day one feels peckish, whatever ingredients one needs to cook up a storm to delight the palate (or shock same of some), one can find it without going on a lengthy excursion. From the 5-star-places (for eating out and shopping) to the delightful holes-in-the-wall (for eating out and shopping), eating out and shopping for food is fun.

The Bad: Even after all these years I have not grown used to the heaps and heaps of food one is served so often. Maybe it is just me, but heaps of food, no matter how tasty, do not appeal to me. I look at the plate and my stomach (S) and I (I) have a little conversation along the lines of:

S: You’re not going to make me tackle this, are you?

I: Gosh, no. Just a bit of it.

S: Why did you order this anyway? You know it’s too much for me.

I: Well, I thought it would be different this time, smaller portions, you know?

S: Geez, will you NEVER learn?

Actually, I did learn and pretty fast – the best friends of a person not used to eating until bursting are side dishes. So I learned to combine them to form a meal. Another lesson: the more upscale the restaurant, the smaller the portions. (We will leave all irony aside and accept that as a fact.) And there is always the trusty box for the leftovers – many a dinner has made a reappearance as breakfast the next day and oftentimes the leftovers of the leftovers even made for a nice nibble at lunchtime. In Entertainment Industry parlance that would be: Texan Barbecue, Texan Barbecue / The Sequel, Texan Barbecue / The Final Chapter.

The Ridiculous:

The size of this… thing… was roughly 6″ x 6″ with a width of 3″ at the widest point (15 x 15 x 6 cm). And that was dessert. After a delicious meal in a top-notch restaurant where the rule “the higher the price the smaller the portion” just for once did not apply.

I assume it was delicious. I would not know, because my outlook has always been: “Cakes are cakes and carrots are carrots and never the twain should meet.” (But again, that is just me. And I don’t like sweet stuff anyway.) I know however that a slab of cake this size after a full meal is more than even the heartiest American can manage. I swear they can’t – I saw how defeat was declared. And I chuckled.

Yes, I know I. I shouldn’t have.

After The Fire Is Before The Fire…

…this iron rule was brought back to mind sharply yesterday when once again a fire broke out in Griffith Park, near the Observatory. Thanks to the firefighters, who immediately set to work to battle the fire on the ground and with water from helicopters the fire was contained rather swiftly and the damage was minor, compared to the huge fire in May.

Even though they were in no immediate danger, all visitors at the Observatory (approx. 700) where evacuated and bussed to safety. It might even be that the odd tourist will forever entertain others at home with the story of “how I escaped the raging fires in Los Angeles.”

But one should not joke about the current situation. The park, Los Angeles, the county, it is dry, dry, dry everywhere. So the danger of more fires is imminent and not always is this danger battled as swiftly as yesterday. None of us will forget the big fire in May – 820 acre (3.31 square kilometer) of Griffith Park were scorched, with the fires even threatening private residences, the Zoo, the Observatory and the Greek Theater.Thanks to the relentless work of the firefighters (not only from Los Angeles) none of these became a victim of the flames in the end, but it is heartbreaking to see large areas of the park with nothing left but ashes on the ground. Even today one can sniff the acrid smell in the air and the burned areas are still not open to the public.

One important lesson learned from all this is that it is imperative that residential areas surrounding the park have to be protected. The best way to do this is to clear a wide path between the brush areas and the houses, as can be seen in this photo:

Fire Griffith Park_Blog_1360.jpg

The hills on the left side show part of the burned down area, on the right side one can see houses and adjacent to them a wide strip cleared from all brush – that is the fire protection strip, newly cleared and kept in shipshape order, because everybody knows that the next fire of this hot and dry summer will come.

The Taj Mahal Of The Mojave Desert

Well, not quite, but the story is interesting enough.

This rather strange structure sits in the middle of the Mojave Desert, halfway between Los Angeles and Las Vegas, just a few miles outside of Barstow. Considering the temperatures last weekend passing by this spot (109 degrees Fahrenheit), a short stop to take a dip in the large artificial lake would have been very welcome. But no, that was not to be.

This place used to be called ‘Lake Dolores’, after the original owners wife and it can rightly be attributed to be the world’s first water park. Even though Dolores was still alive when the water park was built, she is dead now. So in a way, “Taj Mahal” is not too far fetched.

More details about “Lake Dolores” can be found here. The story of the place is quite fascinating and makes an astonishing read of the rise and fall of an enterprise from the 1950s to the 1990s.

Maybe one day the structure will be brought back into life. It is certainly well kept even after years of being out of operation. It looks as if one would only need to open the gates and start charging entrance fees and it would be up and running again. Even though I do not really like water parks, should it ever open again, I might go there, because I like the impossible.

And the world’s first water park in the middle of the Mojave Desert – can one imagine anything more impossible?

"Skinner Stinks"

They have been around for 18 years now and they are still delightfully subversive and not at all PC. Although they do look slightly better kempt and less grumpy than in the beginning, they certainly are as dysfunctional, funny, yellow-skinned and in one instance blue-haired as ever.

Right. The Simpsons.

With the first feature film coming up, part of the promotion for said film was the introduction of 11 Kwik-E-Marts all over the US (with one in Canada). As this promotion runs for one month only, a quick trip to Burbank to one of the sites was in order.

Good job, I must say. But my favorite is the grafitti. It is so, so Simpsons!

D’oh.

Something To Talk About – Update

Unfortunately we broke the record – the season 2006/2007 was the driest for L.A. since rainfall records began 130 years ago.

The total rainfall was 4 inches (10 centimeter). That’s less than a quarter of normal.

Even more disturbing is the fact that the snowpack in the Eastern Sierra Mountains, from where Los Angeles gets about 50 % of its water supply, also marked its second lowest level on record this year.

Officials are hinting that this might force the city into full drought mode this summer, with a much higher occurence of brush fires than normal. The first two major brush fires in May alone (Griffith Park and on Catalina Island) might have been only the first ones of many.

I can’t even think of something funny to say about all of this – it is plain scary.

Enjoy Them… They Might Be Gone Soon

One of the symbols of Los Angeles might be vanishing.

No, I do not mean the Hollywood sign – that’s renovated and well and sitting there as a major tourist attraction – this is what I mean:

Sure, the palm is not native to Southern California, but since the 1880s seedlings have been imported, from 1900 on large palm nurseries sprang up everywhere. For the Olympics in 1932 the city of Los Angeles planted palm trees all over town – PR-savy they where already way back then – and since then they really have been a symbol of the city.

Now these palm trees are dying – from old age and a fungal desease. The city of Los Angeles has decided not to plant new palm trees, but to replace them with oaks and sycamores. Residents however can still buy their own palm trees and plant them on private property – which many do. So there will always be palms in Los Angeles. But there might be a lot less in the decades to come.

Granted, oaks or sycamores are lovely trees. But do they have the “SoCal Vibe?”

The verdict is: No.

Another One Bites The Dust

I can hardly remember the times when I did not work with computers. PCs, mind you; the Apple machines were and are something I love for their excellent design, but for me there are several reasons why I can not use them in my line of work.

I can very well remember the endless quest for the perfect keyboard. It began back in those times I hardly remember any longer. Was it too much to ask for a keyboard with clean lines, all functions at your fingertips, the perfect “feel” of resistance when hitting a key? Certainly not, one would think.

Anyway, the search came to an end last summer when by happy coincidence I came across an Apple keyboard. My, such a pretty little thing, not at all like the cockpit panel in a bad sci-fi movie. I hit a few keys at random and was sold. A quick trip to the Apple store later I was the owner of the keyboard of my dreams, because yes, one can run them with a PC.

This, however

is a dead Apple keyboard. # 3 since last summer. The cause of death was not sheer exhaustion from being pounded on too much. No, it drowned, like #1 and #2 before. A quick spill of a drink, and #1, #2 and #3 were dead as dormice.

Therefore I would suggest one further improvement to an already near to perfect keyboard: liquid-proofing it.

That would bring me as near to perfect bliss as possible while on this Earth (computer keyboard-wise).

Do High School Students Dream of Beautiful Architecture?

Actually, I dont’ know. But one thing I do know: I wish I could be a student here:

Even though I am long past the age of attending high school, I occasionally drive out to South Pasadena just to look at this amazing example of a school evolving through time into what it is today – an architectural monument and a testament to the good sense to keep what is beautiful and impressive. In short, a piece of the past for present and future generations.

South Pasadena High School was build in 1906, with Art Deco additions in the 1920s, bungalows in the 1940s and tilt-up concrete buildings in the 1970s. In 2002 NTDStichler (Architects) finished the project of renovating and restoring the complex, while putting in some additions in perfect keeping with the Art Deco Style.

Yes, it is a place where I would gladly go to school every day. With my mindset of today… it might be different if I were really of high school age.

Something To Talk About

What’s that to talk about, one might say. It is just a photo of some plants and a tree, dripping with rain. Some might even say – hey, there’s nothing dripping there, that are just wet leaves, come here and we’ll show you what rain is.

Well, for us here in Los Angeles, this is all we seem to be getting this year. Rainfall is always measured from July 1st to June 30th, with the rains concentrating on the time from December to February. According to the records, this season might end up to be the longest dry spell in 130 years of recorded weather. Contrary to the usual 13.94″ (34,4 cm) of rain during the rainy season we have clocked up 2.47″ (6,27 cm) as per April 02, 2007. There is some hope that more rain might drift in by the end of April… but we all know what to think about weather forecasts. Good try, but we’ll see the rain when we get it. Or not.

There is after all a record to break, the season of 2001-2002, with all of 4.42″ (11,22cm) of rain. From July 1st 2001 to June 30th 2002.

Somehow I hope we won’t break this particular record.

Herbs, Ginger & Spaghetti

A stroll through Chinatown is always quite an experience. Even though it is a tourist destination, the overwhelming majority of people one sees are Chinese. The babble of voices around one is Chinese. All shops sport Chinese lettering, although the larger ones also give at least their names in English too. Not all of them, mind you, but one does try to accommodate the “round eyes”.

This is Chinatown, quite obviously.

However, when one walks down the crowded main street of the quarter, suddenly one sees this strange sight:

An Italian Restaurant? In Chinatown? Yes. Of course. Because what is Chinatown today was until approximately 1920-1930 the largest Italian community in Los Angeles. The former Chinatown was located in the area where today Union Station stands.

When the plans for building Union Station were drawn up, the decision was made to relocate the old Chinatown by about a mile, adjacent to the Italian quarter. The good Italians took a close look at their new neighbors and fled. Herbs, ginger and spaghetti did not mix well in their opinion. The main thrust of the evacuating Italians was in the direction of Lincoln Heights, but one would be hard pressed to make out any significantly Italian area in Los Angeles today. The Italians by that time and a bit later were so much assimilated into the American culture that they did not need a quarter of their own any longer and dispersed themselves all over Los Angeles.

The only “relic” of that time was Little Joe’s. Yes, sadly, was – the restaurant had to close down in 1998, due to the fact that the structure was not retrofitted to withstand earthquakes. The building is still there, as is the sign; the location is available for filming today.

The city has toyed around with plans to use the building – after retrofitting – as yet another store location for Chinatown. Which brings up the interesting question: How does one write “Little Joe’s” in Chinese characters?