City of Angels
Christmas Day (Sydney), Christmas Eve (LA)
1:52 pm Sydney time, 6:52 pm LA time.
Travelling time 17 hours. 16 degrees Celsius.
Don’t cha wish your girlfriend was…
LA locals are sprinkled with Hollywood magic, and Scary Night-time Barbie magic. Walking out of customs to Gate 6 of the US Airways terminal I surely looked like a crazy person amongst Amazons – harem pants tucked high on my waist and into my colourfully striped Tiger shoes, a b(d)aggy grey cardigan, blue beanie, white scarf, bleary eyed and spectacled. But it’s LA and I fit right in. Granny chic is the new black apparently, along with stunning chic, hobo chic, gorgeous chic, transgender chic, zebra-striped sarong and yellow jumper chic…
First impressions
Right off the bat, everyone is really friendly. Despite being told the wrong terminal (they had the best intentions, and I shouldn’t be so lazy to not check my ticket) trekking from terminal to terminal with a 28 kilo (yes, 28 kilos!) suitcase + 8 kilo backpack (I blame my Mac laptop), being helped with said 28 kilo suitcase, being stopped to donate to charity twelve times and it’s Christmas Eve, LA people are very nice and very calm.
But somewhat neurotic
Of course! And I’m glad I heard the following on my shuttle bus:
Woman: “I know we’re not really together, but did she say anything about seeing me?”
Man: “She only set fire to it once. What’s with the attitude? As long as the kids are fine.”
Woman: “Oh, I know. And I’m not being an aunty to them anymore, I will try to be a parent.”
What is with the atti-tood?
It’s not necessarily attitude as it is sitcom-worthy, obvious one liners.
A few gems I heard in my wee hours so far:
“Please turn off your electronic devices. That’s anything with an on/off button. You turn the button to OFF.”
“Wait here, Wait here. Wait here. Where it says “wait here”, this is where you wait. Right here.”
Tourist: “Is this the A Bus that goes to Terminal 1?”
Bus driver staring blankly: “No, that’s the one with the big “A” on it.”
It’s all in the delivery, and the attitude. [I am refusing to acknowledge any ‘you had to be there moments’ as it will only ever be just me at these moments as I jet-set across three US cities solo.]
I’ll win it back in Vegas
I was surprisingly attitude-free myself when attempting to embark the notoriously bad US Airways, especially when handing over USD$75 for check-in baggage (check-in charge and overweight fee). Given my flight from Sydney was late and I had one hour to check in to fly to Vegas, I didn’t have time to pack the extra 5 kilos into my hand luggage to avoid paying the $50 fee. (I blame the wine I am bringing my friend in Atlanta – three bottles!)
…If I get there
There is a hold-up at the US Airways gate. My Vegas flight is overbooked. Chaos has ensued. I just diplomatically extricated myself from a fight between two flight attendants and an older woman demanding me to get the attendants’ names so she can complain about them. Just before I was in the firing line of a man who was waiting 6 hours for his flight, yelling through me and bypassing my inner eardrum at a crew member getting on the plane: “He better have a ticket!”
Now that I’ve slunk away, I can relax with the knowledge of not having an allocated seat on this flight. Oh, and the comforting reassurance I will only find if I’m on that flight 10 minutes before takeoff. And that there are 12 other people waiting to get on this plane.
Love from the bright lights…
From my coveted seat on the US Airways flight LA to Vegas
Keira xxx
[PS I was one of the three people allowed on the teeny tin plane. So I made it to Vegas, baby!]
