About the journey....!

So it’s January again (2012 edition) and I’m back once more to tell you all about my annual pilgrimage back home to see family and friends.  

My high school class met up at held an unofficial “ten-year reunion” at Kochi’s this year and while I didn’t go (it was scheduled for a few days before I went back), I got to hear from a few of my friends who did what everyone’s been up to. 

LONG STORY SHORT - A lot of us are still in school (as teachers or students). 

Hearing about everyone this year showed me how “grown-up” we’re all becoming; several of my friends have already bought their own houses.  It makes me feel like I should start looking into that too.  But I can’t picture myself living in Hawaii (or LA) long enough to do something like that yet. 

It’s like that movie, “Big Fish,” where the young Edward Bloom, played by Ewan McGregor, finds the perfect town of Spectre.  It’s a wonderful town where the grass is always green, you never need to wear shoes, and everyone is really relaxed and happy all the time.  

And while everybody likes him and wants him to stay in Spectre, he says he can’t because he “arrived there too soon.”  To him, it was a place you “end up at, not pass through” and if he stayed there for a while, he knew he’d never leave. 

That’s how I feel – if I ever move back to Hawaii, I know it’ll be for good, so I don’t want to until I’ve had my fill of the rest of the world. 

PS – Big Fish is a good movie; if you haven’t seen it yet, I suggest you do.  Don’t worry, I haven’t spoiled the plot for you. 

OTHER THINGS I LEARNED IN HAWAII THIS YEAR: 

• There’s a secret ingredient to Zippy’s Chili; it’s either mayonnaise or peanut butter. 
• Hawaii has way too many geckos. 
• Television is my Kryptonite; it makes me lazy and gives me an amazingly short attention span
• Some of my friends from high school are now amazingly racist against Filipinos. 
• Generally speaking, people in Hawaii are short.  I’m only 5 ft, 6 and I felt tall there. 

My Theory on the L.A. Hate

So I think I’ve found one of the reasons why “people from L.A.” have such a bad reputation:

Los Angeles is one of the largest cities in the U.S. As such, a lot of people who want to “make it” in the world eventually want to move here - the logic being that larger cities have more opportunities, ensuring its inhabitants a greater chance of success.

And while this is true of all major cities – such as New York, which some consider is ‘the greatest city on Earth’ –L.A. stands out from the rest of them in the way that, over the years, it’s become increasingly notorious for making people “famous” for no apparent reason.

Because of this phenomenon, Los Angeles has become known as this place that grants fame to people just for living here. And this “fast track to celebrity” (which we so often mistake for “success”) attracts a certain kind of people – the kind who want to be noticed.

Keep in mind that I don’t think there’s anything wrong with wanting to be noticed or appreciated. It’s a very human trait that’s inside all of us at some level. But some people want / need it more than others and those are the ones that flock to L.A. (specifically Hollywood)

But what these people fail to appreciate when they finally get here is that everyone else has the same goal. And it is incredibly difficult to achieve that goal in a city this large with that much competition against you.

For a person to truly stand out, they need to market themselves..… constantly….to a greater degree than everyone else….who are already doing the exact same thing.

And it’s this kind of 24/7 “mega-marketing” that has them practically shouting LOOK AT ME! all the time (to no one in particular) that creates the kind of self-absorption, elitism and conceitedness that everyone hates about this city.

But the only reason people think “everyone from L.A.” is like this is because that’s how well those people market themselves.

So….yeah. L.A. attracts a lot of obnoxious people that get a lot of attention. And I think that’s one of the reasons why people from here get such a bad reputation. Am I right / wrong?

What do you all think?