So even though I’ve done a horrible job of posting updates so far about my decision to move, I finally made a trip over to Los Angeles this past weekend to find a place to live.
This was supposed to be the post where I tell you all about how I found my overpriced and under furnished apartment, maybe posted some pictures of a room that, in terms of size, was nowhere near worth the amount of money I would have to put it out per month to maintain it, but hey, it’d be mine.
In case you haven’t noticed where this part of the post is going… I wasn’t able to find a place. After spending a month of trip preparation, figuring out where to stay, where to visit, calling dozens of apartments (only to call a dozen more once I got there) and driving through most of the San Fernando Valley, I couldn’t find anything that I could afford. However, I did learn a lot of useful information from my first of many trips to Los Angeles.
1.) Almost Every Area is a mini City:
I’m from Miami, so I’m used to large areas all being placed under the same city name. For example, if you were to look at an area like South Beach, it would still be considered a part of Miami. In LA, an area like Reseda, is considered to be the city of Reseda, in the city of Los Angeles, in the State of California. Very Strange.
2.) Parallel Parking Skills have to be on Point:
I’m from a city where there’s a lot of driveways and parking lot spaces. Los Angeles is a city where parallel parking reigns supreme. So while my parking skills are like this:
Living over there, I can see that my skills will quickly have to turn to this:
You have to Parallel park in order to go anywhere. Unless you happen to live in an area with assigned parking, you have to parallel park outside of your own house. This is probably very common in most places but it threw me off seeing people just pull over on the side of the road and get out of the car like it’s all good.
3.) Most Store Plazas are for Corner Stores:
Plazas around my way are usually have a Foot Locker next to a McDonald’s next to Subway… basically a bunch of chain restaurants and retail stores. Los Angeles is like a 7-11 next to a Chinese Restaurant next to a Mom and Pop Store, etc etc. It was weird to me because I felt like how can I find anything? Where’s the convenience of Miami? But the longer I was there the easier it started to become to find places, malls, etc.
4.) In-N-Out Burger is slightly overrated:
Most cities and States have at least one exclusive restaurant that people tell you that you HAVE to go to whenever you go there. For California, it’s this fast food restaurant called In And Out Burger.
In and Out Burger was really good, not Five Guys and Fries good, but good enough that on any given day I’d probably choose it over McDonald’s or Burger King.
5.) Too Many Pedestrians:
There’s certain places where a car is a necessity (Miami) and other places where you can probably get by without one (New York) and to me, Los Angeles is more like Miami as far as getting to and from certain places. So I couldn’t understand why no matter where we went, there were people walking as if their destination was only up the street.
Not only where they walking, but they would cross the street as if they were untouchable. I felt like I was in a school zone for Adults the way they were so oblivious to everything around them as they crossed from street to street.
Bonus LA Radio Loves “Earned It “ by The Weeknd and “Uptown Funk” by Mark Ronson:
Riding around with my Dad in our rental car, we didn’t really know of any radio stations, so it ended up being a “Scan until you hear something familiar” situation. For the two radio stations we were able to find, “Uptown Funk” and “Earned It” literally came on every 30-45 mins.
I know radio as whole is starting to sound like one big playlist that’s been put on shuffle all day, but those songs came on TOO often. It’s good to know that not all radio stations play the same thing (down in Miami it would’ve been Rae Sremmurd and Migos) but I’m in no hurry to hear Bruno Mars yell “Don’t Believe Me Just Watch!” for what will seem like the millionth time.
Side Note I actually really like “Earned It” so hearing it a couple more times wouldn’t be all that bad…
I still have my eye set on moving in July.. I’m not quite sure how it’s going to work but I have faith that all things will come together for my best interest.
