Welcome to another instalment of Project America: my ongoing quest to finally experience first-hand all the quintessentially American pastimes I grew up watching on TV in Australia

You’d be hard pressed to find a child of the ’90s who doesn’t have a soft spot for The Mighty Ducks (and to a lesser extent, D2 and a faaar lesser extent, D3). Emilio Estevez, Pacey from Dawson’s Creek, that fat kid who farted a lot, uplifting training montages… fond memories.

Even though, to my knowledge, ice hockey is barely played in Australia, the film succeeded in convincing a generation of Aussie kids that field hockey, which is widely played in Australia, is pretty weak by comparison. In all honesty, I rarely hear anyone talk about ice hockey around here, but it is forever cemented in my mind as “something Americans do”.

My first encounter with ice hockey since leaving Australia was actually in Canada, not the States. In October, the boy and I had to go up to Vancouver to renew our visas. (I didn’t bother to blog about it; the experience was decidedly smoother and less eventful than our original visit to the US consulate in Melbourne, although I will say that the Vancouver consulate made us wait outside, in the Canadian winter, until it was our turn to go in. Other than that, Vancouver is a very attractive, if not particularly remarkable city; people were cool and we ate some great food, but there wasn’t a lot to do there in shitty weather). One of my cousins was living there at the time, in between winter shifts working at Mt Panorama (apparently Canada’s big ski resort towns are staffed in large numbers by Aussies and Kiwis; a journalist from Whistler’s alt-weekly told me the Whistler Blackcomb would barely function without Australians on working holidays. There was a very entertaining reality TV series about this), and had started following the Vancouver Canucks during her residence there, so she took us to a game.

Ice hockey is a big freaking deal in Vancouver, and I would venture to say it’s probably the same everywhere in Canada. Even though the NHL only has seven Canadian teams, versus 23 American ones, 53% of the players currently in the league are Canadian, compared with about 24% from the US (the rest come largely from Europe).

The 18,890-seat Rogers Stadium where the team plays was packed on the cold, drizzly night we saw the Canucks take on the St Louis Blues. I would say well over half the crowd was wearing a Canucks jersey—these things retail for upwards of $100, so that’s no small thing.

Click here to view the embedded video.

The actual game is surprisingly intense in person. For the first ten minutes, I flinched every time the players came *this* close to crashing then turned on a dime. It’s crazy fast and rough and I was very worried that someone would lose a finger.

Some things I really enjoyed about this game:

• There are three periods. I have a short attention span, and four would have been too many. Three is good.
• An enclosed playing field means you rarely have to worry about players or the puck going out. There are very few breaks in action.
• There are apparently some rules about fighting and striking, but clearly not many; the players were constantly body-slamming each other against the sides of the rink with no repercussions. I like fight sports.
• There were, however, pretty strict rules about crowd behaviour. There was a number to text your seating area to in case someone near you was acting like a dickhead. Someone near us started acting like a dickhead (he stripped down to his long underwear and tried to start a Mexican wave), and sure enough, security came and took him away with a few minutes.
• The sticks hitting the puck and ice make these space-age “pew! pew!” sound effects.

Portland does not have an NHL team. It has a WHL team. It is a junior hockey league. That means the players are under 20, and most are younger than that. It is, however, the highest level of junior hockey, and is still considered a big deal.

So a few weeks back, The Boy—not usually known for having any interest in sport whatsoever—sends me a message saying he bought a Groupon for cheap Portland Winterhawks tickets. Sure.

The Winterhawks play at the Veterans Memorial Coliseum, which is the city’s secondary stadium after the Rose Garden, where the Trailblazers play. It seats 12,000, and was perhaps three-fifths full at 3 pm on a Saturday afternoon. Some of the audience wore jerseys, which I’d never seen in Portland before. There were a lot of families there, which is nice, I guess (except for the toddler behind us, who was a brat). I don’t think I would take young kids to see the Timbers—who usually play lateish, outside in the cold, to a crowd of dickheads—or the Blazers—who also generally play late, and decent tickets are really expensive. Hockey is easy to follow, doesn’t require too much concentration, and, as I mentioned, is over fast with minimum interruptions. The Boy observed, “There’s a broader selection of bogans here than I usually see in Portland.” I concur.

The vast majority of the Winterhawks players are Canadian. The WHL itself is actually Canadian. There are a couple of Americans, one German and one Swiss. It must be rough to be drafted to a US-based team in a city that doesn’t really care about you, but these kids played hard.

Click here to view the embedded video.

The Winterhawks were not as good as the Canucks. But nor was their opposition, so the game was far more entertaining—they scored 11 goals (the goalies in the NHL game were too good for many goals to go through) and both teams had two players send off the ice for brawling. That’s good value.

Also, whoever DJd the game was great—lots of Ramones and Beastie Boys, no Jock Jams. They play “TNT” by AC/DC when the team scores a goal.

I would probably go to an ice hockey game again, and I would probably rather go to a WHL than an NHL game.

Coming soon: After only two years, I finally go to an NBA game!

photo by ratterrell on Flickr

I’ve been getting a bunch of hits for a post I did before I moved to the States called “Food carts of Melbourne (all four of them)“, looking at the small number of higher-end street food vendors in Melbourne. At the time I basically said I thought it was a positive trend and I’d like to see it grow. Apparently it has — in Sydney, the city is actively trying to make it grow — and that’s the reason I’ve been getting the traffic. But almost two years and about 13,000 kilometers later, I’m not so sure.

Phil Lees wrote a good post about this on The Last Appetite a few month back:

The depressing secret behind street food culture is that it exists because there is nowhere else to eat. In Phnom Penh, a good deal of the street food exists because it is too expensive for the average worker to leave their job and go home for a cheaper meal. Despite the backpacker authenticity myth, the bulk of it is as nasty as it is cheap; good street food is so rare that it is almost a euphemism. In Los Angeles, food trucks, especially the semi-permanent Mexican loncheras, offer an oasis in the food desert for factory workers and locals. If anything, they’re stuff white people like because they’re beacons of actual food in a grove of Olive Gardens or whatever pretend food is served in roadside mass-market chain restaurants. In Kuala Lumpur, street vendors develop symbiotic relationships with a cafe, multiple vendors clinging parasitically to a single coffee shop. In all cases, food trucks and street vendors tend not to compete with existing businesses because there aren’t any other existing businesses nearby. All are the result of local conditions.

Generally that condition is poverty, followed by richer people lionising food that poor people eat.

…

The unpopular Australian street foods are also the precursor to building a culture of street food but that hasn’t happened because unlike LA or Phnom Penh in the urban centres in Australia there is no shortage of great, easily accessible meals. There isn’t a footy frank vendor on every corner because good food is straightforward to find. In the absence of Michelin stars, many restaurants are awarded imaginary hats by our food press. There’s not even a shortage of good portable food from upmarket pork belly sandwiches to cheap sushi. Beyond the occasional cone of soft serve or post-Queen Victoria Market donut, there isn’t much of a market for heartier food served streetside when you can get a markedly better meal nearby and somewhere to sit and eat it.

I think he makes a good point, but also misses one key element of the street food fad in America: It coincided pretty much exactly with the Global Financial Crisis. At a time when unemployment was at its peak, getting a loan was incredibly difficult, and people were more financially disempowered than ever, a loophole in the food regulations of many cities that allow mobile food vendors to bypass most of the expenses and rules associated with opening a bricks and mortar eatery, provided a way for both cooks with no capital to start their own business, and for consumers without much spare cash to get (usually) good food for a (usually) affordable price. There are some really talented cooks and chefs in this city who never would have got out of low-wage line cook work, and many immigrants whose cuisines would never have seen the light of day, without this way to open their own kitchen on the cheap.

The media narrative has generally been that the audience for this stuff is “iPhone wielding hipsters” which, yeah, there obviously was/is an element of that (given there are now several Food Network shows about food trucks and Applebee’s has one, I think it’s fair to say no one actually considers them “cool” anymore), but I’ve been around quite a bit of this country now, and the people I see eating at food trucks are mostly office workers, teenagers, families… pretty normal folks. Truth is, good food that people can actually afford isn’t always easy to find in many cities in this country, even in the heart of downtown. The choice is usually quick, cheap junk food, or pricey and time consuming restaurants.

Yes, The Gap had a taco truck. No, I don’t know why.

That’s the “good” part. The negatives are that the marketplace has become overcrowded in many cities, and the low barrier to entry means that many people are opening businesses without the research or experience necessary to make it work. Multnomah County, the county I live in, issued 688 licenses to mobile food vendors last year. The numbers are slightly skewed because that includes little coffee kiosks and people who sell corn dogs at fairs, but still, it’s a lot. Too many, really. A lot of them aren’t that good. There are about 50 carts down the road from my house. I’d estimate over half of them aren’t very good. A lot of them will probably close this winter due to the natural drop in customers and tourists. Some will close because they realise the lifestyle isn’t as cool as they’d believed — long hours freezing your nuts off in the back of a van sucks. Some probably never calculated their food, rent or labour costs properly. Some thought they could do it as a part time job. Some didn’t bother to do any research and end up opening the eighth Thai cart on the one lot.

And not only is much of the food kinda shit, a lot of it is super unhealthy. The other big food trend that naturally came along with the GFC was a fetishisation of comfort foods — put bacon on it, deep fry everything, etc. For whatever reason, there is/has been a sort of legitimising effect of those foods when they’re served by an independent food truck with a clever name and locally sourced ingredients, instead of KFC. And there was also an element (also present in Australia) that it was somewhat counter culture to say “woo, butter!” in defiance of the diet food trends that had defined the preceding few decades. In turn, the media (and I’ll include myself in this, I’ve definitely done it) has paid far too much attention to this stuff because of its shock value and because it makes for easy linkbaiting online slide shows. As a result, Portland has vendors serving sandwiches stuffed with fries and bechamel sauce, burgers that come between two grilled cheese sandwiches, and deep fried pies. Food trucks became a really cheap and easy way to sell crazy carb and fat concoctions.

Another problem is the effect it can have on regular eateries. It’s less of an issue here because few of the vendors are mobile, but it has been an issue in LA, NYC, SF and others. The savings food trucks make on rent, electricity, employees, etc are (or should be) passed on to consumers by either offering cheaper food than bricks and mortar places, or better food for the same prices. That’s good if they’re parked in areas where there’s little good food to eat, or little portable food to go, but it can be an unfair advantage if trucks are able to park in front of direct competition—especially en masse. The catch is that a lot of trucks don’t want to go out to the parts of town that probably most need affordable, quality food. They want to park in high-traffic inner city areas which are often already well serviced by cafes, delis, and lunch spots.

photo by Roadsidepictures on Flickr

So this week I read that one of Melbourne’s new trucks is:

Gumbo Kitchen, a food truck focusing on the Cajun food of New Orleans, particularly the spicy stew traditionally served with rice, which gives this eatery on wheels its name. For the brainchild of Michael Cotter and Patricia Stanton, whose visit to New Orleans this year sparked the idea, Gumbo Kitchen’s chef Elvin Ho (MoVida Aqui and Bar Idda) will also turn out po’boys and the fried cornmeal dumplings known as hush puppies… At the end of last month, Cotter relaunched Camberwell’s Bar None.

It’s nice to see some under-represented regional US cuisine come to Melbourne (though I’m no expert, but I really don’t think po’boys or hushpuppies are technically “Cajun”. Po’boys are from New Orleans and New Orleans ≠ Cajun; hushpuppies I think you’d just generally call “soul food”. I could be wrong), but I don’t really understand why people who already operate a hospitality venue and a chef already working at good restaurants need or want to sell fried food out of a glorified Mr Whippy van.

According to its Facebook page, the truck parks on Sydney Rd Brunswick and High St Northcote (from what I understand, Darebin and Moreland councils are the only ones allowing food trucks at the moment). Another truck cruising High Street:

Le Sausage, a type of gourmet sausage sizzle on wheels, also operates in the Darebin area.

Laura Thompson and her partner chef Alex Talimanidis, formerly of A la Grecque at Aireys Inlet, put the van on the road in October.

….

Other chefs are considering jumping on the bandwagon, including Shane Delia of Melbourne’s St Katherine’s and Maha Bar and Grill. “I think if you could come up with a couple of quirky dude-food dishes it could be what your van is about,” he says.

Huxtable’s Daniel Wilson, meanwhile, is busy setting up HuxtaBurger restaurant, but says he has long been nursing an idea for a food truck.

Now, on the face of it, it’s all free market and free will. If chefs and restaurateurs want to be hot dog and sandwich vendors, and people want to buy their snags and sangas, then whatever. Here’s where it becomes an issue:

High Street and Sydney Road are both areas with lots of affordable take-out food options, much of it run by immigrants. So say I run a souvlaki store. I pay rent or rates, electricity/gas/everything bills, have multiple employees, pay more to put some chairs and tables on the footpath, probably even more to do a bunch of things I don’t know about. Then some chef from a well-known restaurant pulls a van up down the road from my shop. He doesn’t have half the expenses that I do. He’s either undercutting me on price, or using super fancy ingredients I couldn’t possibly afford because my overheads are much higher. Every food writer in the country is creaming themself over his truck (and having now read the majority of press about this from around Melbourne and Australia, it has been pretty over the top for what is a sum total of like 10 trucks and some food that sounds pretty fucking average). Is it fair? I dunno. But it’s something councils and consumers need to ask themselves.

Or scenario two: Enough councils hand out enough permits for this scene to grow unabated. There’s great chefs involved, and all this press buzz, so more and more culinary industry amateurs and people with less capital and backing decide to open their own. Then the hype, inevitably, ends. The chefs and media move on to the next fad. And all these people are stuck with failing businesses, serving mediocre food, which no one cares about, and unlike B&M owners, they can’t even sell their premises because no one else wants to open a food truck, either.

(none of this is a dig at any of the trucks mentioned, or any specific ones not mentioned—I live half a planet away and have no idea how or why they’re operating—just some hypotheticals)

So, here is my undoubtedly unwanted advice: Councils might want to consider capping how many permits they hand out to food trucks. They might want to make potential vendors actually put in a tender for these permits. And they might ask that those applications include a business plan that breaks down how they’re actually going to turn a profit. And they might even preference those business plans that are actually small timers looking to build their business into a bricks and mortar operation (because I do not know a single person who has run a food cart more than a year who doesn’t hate working out of a tin can and dream of going B&M; food trucks are not, for most people, viable long term businesses), and not, say, established chefs and restauranteurs who already own them and are just looking to make a quick buck off hype and low overheads. And then they might want to look at less fortunate areas in their districts where good/inexpensive food is actually needed and consider making trucks go there instead of the major retail strips and just the “cool” suburbs. And they may also want to consider how to handle businesses who own private parking lots allowing trucks to park in them, because that could undermine efforts to keep competition fair. And THEN they might want to consider what the applicants are actually selling, because even gourmet hush puppies, po’boys, hot dogs and burgers are about as healthy as pies and fish and chips and sending that stuff into food deserts could actually be a negative.

photo by Joseph Robertson

Phil Lees is probably correct that Melbourne, in general, doesn’t “need” a high-end street food scene. But if people are going to make it happen anyway, let it be a way for talented people who couldn’t otherwise open their own food business to do it, and let it benefit the neighbourhoods that really need some good food.

And to the media: Learn from America’s mistakes. Judge this food and these businesses as you would any other eatery. Stop writing about it all so breathlessly. You are, in fact, the ones who determine whether something becomes a flash-in-the-pan fad, or a cool, neighbourhood thing that retains some of its underground appeal.

If there’s one word I never need to see or hear again, it’s hipster.

It’s a word I’ve used before, it’s a word I’ll probably use again and a word that’s written in the right-hand column of this blog, but 90% of the time I hear it, it raises bile.

I don’t even know what it means any more. I’m not sure I ever knew. I’m pretty sure it doesn’t mean anything, and if it does, it’s just a vague word for “those who subscribe to the predominant fashions and trends of youth culture.”

It’s a word used constantly in and about Portland, increasingly angrily. It is a word that is spat with hatred, and frequently prefaced by “dirty” or “filthy”. Every day I see comments on Willamette Week and the Oregonian and Reddit Portland blaming or railing against hipsters. It’s always their fault. And whatever the article is about, it’s a stupid hipster trend that isn’t worth writing about and proof that all journalists are stupid hipsters themselves. Here is a recent sampling from WW:

“the whole article makes them come off as hipster dilettantes who are trying to do something “cool”" (about taxidermists)

“Just another sorry hipster, “look at me, look at me, I DON’T CARE!”" (about an author and assistant professor)

“oh boy, another hipster figured out his laptop can make thin, weak music for him with the right cut copy paste program.” (about an electronic music artist)

“You sound like a cross between a socialist and a dirty hipster.” (about a coffee shop owner)

“I’ve been making software for 25 years, and only hipster dipshits and marketing wanks would say something like “I’m a member of the tech community”" (about someone who is, apparently, not a real member of the tech community)

“Charging outragous prices for product you can buy through local farmers market and stores such as Sheridon’s and Barbur’s market just because it is cool and shiek and the hipster thing to do” (about the owner of a local supermarket chain)

The more this word loses any meaning it may have once had, the more the people using it sound like old men waving their fists and shouting “cut your hair, hippie!”

And that’s pretty much what it is. You think “hipsters”—whoever the fuck they are—look stupid? So did these guys:

And these guys:

The truth is, young people dress like idiots. They’re just trying to express themselves or fit in. That’s what young people do. That’s what just about everyone in the first world does. If the way other people dress actually makes you angry, perhaps it’s because you, on some level, feel alienated and out of touch.

I think the reason it irks so much is because it all just feels like an extension of Gen-Y bashing to me. Oh young people, they’re all so lazy and selfish and none of them have real jobs and they’re too busy with their cellular phones and X-wiggies to contribute to society.

But older generations always hate on their juniors. Boomers hate Xers, Xers hate Ys, and I can’t stand those God damn toddlers with their talking books and their drooling. Filthy toddlers. What’s disturbing is it has become a slur amongst Gen Ys: “You represent all the stereotypes about our generation!” “No you represent all the stereotypes about our generation!” Were other generations so self-loathing?

I get mocking young people. Mock me all you like: I have half my head shaved off and about 50 ironic t-shirts and the attention span of a lobotomised newt. But why the rage? There are bigger problems in our society than three wolf moon tshirts and lomographic cameras.

Young people are dickheads. Always have been, always will be. Get over it.

If you’d asked 10-year-old Ruth to name her dream holiday, I believe the answer would, unequivocally, have been Los Angeles. (Actually, it probably would have been California, because I doubt I had any understanding of the distinction between the two; but what I meant was LA). Movie studios, theme parks, the home of Beverly Hills 90210, Baywatch, malls, fast food, hip hop, California Games — in my shaky understanding of world geography, Los Angeles was America, and it was all amazing.

I think this is a fairly accurate illustration of my conceptualisation of America at the time:

(Though actually, I’m not sure I knew that they were on opposite sides of the country. I think I imagined them to be next door to each other)

Sadly, my family vacations tended more towards the Third World than Disney World. But one friend, whose family always seemed to go on much cooler holidays than mine, did make it to the promised land, returning with stories of swimming pools and movie stars. She also reported that the streets of LA were lined with homeless people and panhandlers, which I naively believed to be bullshit. My family had just returned from India, where this much was true, but how could it be the same in a rich and powerful country like America? It didn’t fit with my fantasy, so I dismissed it.

In Portland, people constantly shit-talk LA — either because that’s where they moved from or they’re angry that Portland is full of immigrants from California. It’s too big and you have to drive everywhere and it’s expensive and shallow and blah blah. But that’s how I feel about Sydney, and I wouldn’t discourage tourists from visiting there, so I held fast to my desire to make the pilgrimage. The only problem: The Boy did not share my desire. He’d been there for work, thought it was shit, didn’t want to go back. He does not share my love of tackiness, cliche and people watching.

So with a bit of time between office-bound employment, I decided to organise a solo sojourn down south. Despite the years of yearning, it was all very last minute, really. I booked on Monday and flew out Thursday, with very little planning.

I decided to stay in Hollywood for maximum touristy cachet and its vaguely central location between the beach and downtown.

I got in late, and walked to Hollywood Boulevard in search of food. It was exactly as I expected it to be: tourists, cops, preachers, Scientologists, impossibly thin people, impossibly fat people, pushers, spruikers and people dressed in tattered superhero outfits. Constant police and ambulance sirens. It was tragic and cheesy, but also kind of neat that it really was exactly like on TV.

With no concrete plans, I started Friday in a Starbucks-style coffee shop. The sad but universal truth of Starbucks and its copycats is that it is one of the few places you are guaranteed good free wifi, air con, a power point and a piss when travelling. All for about $1.50. It’s loud and smells like burning and the music is terrible, but when you’re using Twitter, Google Maps, Yelp and Instagram all day, these things are important. (Hot tip: if ALL you are after is the wifi, Starbucks’ wifi is so good, you can usually just sit across the road and still get full signal strength). I sent out questions about what to do in LA into the social media ether, and let the good citizens of the internet be my guide for the next three days.

First thing: Santa Monica. Now, when I told people I’d be public transporting around LA, all I heard was how bad/non-existant the public transport is. So let me address this myth: the public transport is fine. Maybe it sucks more when you get out into the boonies, but in your standard touristy bits, it’s fine. There are plenty of buses, they have TVs that play Spanish language programming, it only costs $1.50, the buses were as good/bad as buses anywhere, and they showed up on time. The problem isn’t the public transport. It’s that the city is stupidly large, and the traffic is awful. So yeah, it took a long freaking time to get to Santa Monica, but I doubt it would have been much more pleasant in a car.

I saw so many celebrities!

Once there, I headed for the beach. It looked like the beach from Baywatch. There was no surf, but an abundance of confused tourists being bused in in “Learn to surf!” vans. I hired a clunky bike and rode down the beach to Venice Beach, which includes a lengthy touristy market and many dubious looking medical marijuana “clinics”. I felt like I’d ridden right into the ’90s, when everyone wore board shorts and people still rollerbladed and bleached their hair. Venice Beach itself — the neighborhood, not the actual beach — held a little more charm. I had lunch at an overpriced macrobiotic vegan cafe while observing a group of teenagers from Orange County flirt awkwardly with each other. I rode back, feeling like I should have been more awed by the idyllic beach and the very attractive people with gleaming, heavily tanned pectoral muscles, but I found myself entirely dispassionate about the whole experience. I’m really not a beach person.

Another excruciatingly long bus ride back to Hollywood, and the day was basically gone. I wandered up to an area Google maps marked as “Thai Town”, which was mostly strip malls housing surprisingly decent-looking Thai eateries. I had  a pretty decent pad makua yow for some criminally cheap price and was on my way. I had an hour to kill, and nearby, I saw the kind of faux-antique wooden sign and bullshit name that screamed “craft cocktails!” My spidey senses had not failed me: behind the understated Harvard & Stone exterior was a large, dimly lit cocktail bar — the decor was more wild west steampunk than the now tired prohibition-era speakeasy schtick and, refreshingly, the bartenders did not wax their moustaches or CosPlay (yes, it is CosPlay) in tweed, arm garters and pocket watches — with solid cocktails.

After passing the time with Fernet, I wandered up to the Upright Citizen’s Brigade theater. I was too early for the next show, but was entertained on this apparently hip little stretch between Hollywood and Los Feliz. Young, vaguely alternative things were spilling out of the bars and restaurants. It appeared a place to be seen amongst a certain crowd, though I was almost certainly not worth looking at, and slipped into a second hand book and record store until it was time for the show. A full house packed into the theater, most brown-bagging cheap wine and beer, to watch improv groups. I hadn’t watched improv in forever. It’s usually shit (OK, you’re a goat who likes pole dancing, you are trying to build a life-size replica of  Yao Ming out of Graham Crackers, and YOU are cowboy with performance anxiety. Go!). This wasn’t. For $5, it was well worth going.

The Twitter provided me with my destination for day two: Universal Studios.

I’m not sure why it hadn’t occurred to me. As you can probably guess from my earlier comments about family holidays, my parents did not take us to theme parks. Oh how I longed to go to a theme park. The closest we came was the Big Pineapple, a giant fibreglass pineapple in Queensland with a little train that takes you through fruit and nut plantations (and is tantalisingly close to WB Movie World, Sea World and Dreamworld, just to rub it in), which doesn’t count because the “theme” is fruit (at least they didn’t take us to Wobby’s World, I guess).

But I’m an adult now, mum and dad, and I can go to a theme park if I want! So I did. It was the middle of school holidays and a Saturday and a bajillion degrees outside, but I went. I went on the studio tour (meh), the Simpsons ride (awesome), the haunted house thing (meh), saw the Water World show (actually awesome; far better than the film) and some sort of special effects show (meh). By this point, the lines for each attraction were about an hour long and I was hungry and hot, so I bailed. I’m glad I went, though. It was cheesy and silly and the lines were priceless people watching. I imagined that all the children around me were poor little waifs whose families had scrimped and saved all year for this one day and that made me want to strangle them considerably less.

I went back to Hollywood and caught the underground train downtown. Again: good public transport. I hit up the Grand Central Market next to the station for a late lunch. I had imagined it to be, well, grander, but it was still a great little market, a mix of mostly Mexican and Chinese produce and prepared food stalls. I got a tamarind aguas frescas from a Mexican place and a cheese and basil papusa from a Salvadorian place. I don’t think I’d ever had a papusa before — they’re stuffed corn masa cakes and quite delicious. Mine came with a plastic pouch of vinegary cabbage Wikipedia tells me was curtido.

I wandered around downtown for awhile. It was pretty much a ghost town on a Saturday, which was kind of nice for a break but a bit dull. I guess I always envision cities like those I’m used to: with the central business district as a major cultural and social hub. Most of LA was exactly as I’m imagined it, but downtown was not. I made my way down to Little Tokyo, which was livelier. There were some newish looking apartment buildings there, and there seemed to be a community of some kind. In a courtyard between some shops, people were doing karaoke and dancing and eating and drinking in the sun. I had dinner at the Lazy Ox, which had been recommended by a few people. It was quite good; I couldn’t quite pinpoint exactly what cuisine it was going for, but it reminded me of an Americanised Mod Oz, if that makes sense (by which I think I mean, Asian and Mediterranean influence, but more American and less French). The cook/owner/guy-in-an-apron-acting-important came out and told one table it was a “gastropub”, and I’m increasingly convinced that no one in this country actually knows what that means. It is the naked emperor of American dining.

Bargain!

I trained it back to Hollywood and decided to see a film. Twitter chose X-Men over Captain America for me, but the movie wasn’t on for a good hour. Yelp told me to go to a nearby Iranian ice cream parlour called Mashti Malone’s, and fuck me if this wasn’t the first time Yelp had actually picked a winner. It was in this dark, out-of-the-way strip mall and the decor clearly hadn’t changed a whit since the early ’80s, but I got this crazy dense scoop of rosewater ice cream with pistachios and saffron, and it made my night.

I had designs on more exploring the next day, but when I woke up, I was totally buggered. My feet were sore and blistered, my lips were sunburned, and just the thought of locating, waiting for and catching a bus was tiring. I shuffled down Hollywood Boulevard in search of breakfast, and stumbled across a farmers market leading off down a narrow street. It looked like a little one, but I figured some fresh fruit would be fine, so I walked in. And walked. And walked. Turns out it was not such a little farmers market — it stretched all the way down to Sunset Blvd, and broke off in several forks. I went nuts eating nectarines.

Hey Hollywood Farmers Market: you are pretty delicious, but you need some recycling and compost bins.

The rest of the day was pretty uneventful. I went to the insanely large Amoeba Records LA before remembering that I don’t actually buy physical CDs or DVDs anymore, dug around some stores that were the same as stores everywhere but with a higher sales tax, finally spotted the “Hollywood” sign through a chain link fence, and saw Captain America after all (nice call, Twitter — X-Men was way better).

I ended up in some sort of laneway thing, where there was a vintage market and a DJ was playing, and as I sat in the afternoon sun watching very attractive people go about their Saturday, I concluded, “You’re alright, LA”. Over the preceding two days, I had been jumping wildly between disliking and enjoying the city. It’s sprawling, the traffic is ridiculous, the level of poverty is depressing, the conspicuos consumption is depressing, the miles and miles of neon strip malls full of fast food outlets are depressing. But it also has a rich artistic and cultural life, incredible ethnic diversity, historical importance, plenty of lovely people, and parts that are quite beautiful.

It also has a Starbucks on every corner, so you’re never without free wifi.

photo by Marionzetta on Flickr

One of the longest running TV soaps in Australia is a relatively wholesome* and slow-moving series called Neighbours. It’s filmed in a cul-de-sac out in the Melbourne ‘burbs (well, it’s filmed in a studio out in the ‘burbs, but the exterior shots are done in a cul-de-sac). For some reason, it is far more popular in the UK than in Australia. When British tourists visit Melbourne, they often do a bus tour out to the cul-de-sac to stare and take photos and tell their friends back home. Melburnians do not understand why they would want to do this. I mean… it’s Neighbours.

But I think I get it now. A few weeks ago, The Boy and I decided we were going to visit Las Vegas for a weekend. Most Americans I told could not understand why we would want to do this. It’s tacky and expensive and seedy and sweltering hot and full of rednecks. EXACTLY. I had to see for myself. I have no doubt most British tourists visit Pin Oak Court with their tongues firmly placed in their cheeks, but I also have no doubt they enjoy the experience throughly and feel like they’ve seen and done something truly Australian. And indeed they have.

Las Vegas — as far as the rest of the world is concerned at least — is truly an American experience. It’s over-the-top greed and excess and lust. It’s the dream that anyone can make it rich and the reality that most people are broke and up to their necks in debt.

The thing that struck me most when flying was that it really is in the middle of a dessert. I mean I knew that, but when you see it from the sky, it really is just a strip of casinos and a piss poor downtown area, surrounded by generic urban sprawl and then… nothing.

photo by Evil Yoda on Flickr

It’s quite a silly place for a city, really, as evidenced by the oppressive heat and sudden freak storms both days. It reminded me of those sci fi stories where the outside environment is inhospitable, so people build entire cities indoor or on a space ship or whatever. Each casino is its own city: restaurants, malls, theaters, shows, rides, animals, nightclubs. The only reason to go outside is to go to another casino, most of which are connected by above-ground walkways and monorails, because the city is really not set up for pedestrians.

We spent most of the first day wandering and looking inside all the buildings. The Boy had been before, but about 10 years ago, and much had changed. The problem with hotels and casinos is that they date. Quickly. It was kind of sad to go to the older end of the Strip and see the once famous casinos from the “Golden Age” that now look like total dinosaurs. The flashy multi-billion-dollar complexes of today will look drab in a decade, and newer, shinier ones will be built, and the area will just keep getting built and knocked down and rebuilt, regenerating over and over again in the pursuit of being the biggest and flashiest.

Caesar’s Palace was easily the most ridiculous casino we saw — the faux-Roman fountains and statues and paintings and Coliseum and staff in togas. The MGM Grand was also pretty insane. The Hooters Hotel and Casino (yes, this exists) was the worst, though I will dedicate a whole post to this later.

Food court at Caesar’s Palace

Neither of us like gambling, but we felt we should try a slot machine just so we could say we had. We put $5 in one. I got bored after about a minute and observed that it was disappointing to see so many big flashing machines with buttons and screens that weren’t video games. So we went and found a video game arcade instead and shot at CGI dinosaurs.

Feeling we should do something cultural, we went to the Atomic Testing Museum which was informative, if a little dull and pro-nuclear. It was kinda disheartening to realise that was about the only “educational” thing to do without heading out to the Hoover Dam or Grand Canyon.

One of the upsides to the shit tonne of money being squandered in Vegas every day is that it attracts a lot of very good chefs and restaurants. We thought “fuck it, when are we going to be in Vegas again?” and decided to eat at Joël Robuchon, which is the city’s only three Michelin star restaurant. It was, in every respect, ridiculous.

The restaurant sent a stretch limo to pick us up, even though we were staying across the road. We were dropped off in some weird secret back-entrance waiting room of the MGM Grand. We could have just found our way to the restaurant ourselves, but they insisted on sending a guide. While we waited, the choice of reading material was Forbes, Cigar Aficionado and Elite Traveller: “the private jet lifestyle magazine” (inside I learned it had also recently launched a new magazine called Elite Traveller Superyacht, which you can find on board superyachts and at superyacht events, just FYI).

We opted to forgo the 16-course tasting menu (it was already 9pm, and were pretty sure it couldn’t be done in under three hours) for a less ambitious five. It was generally very good, with only one dish falling a little flat. The bread cart had about 20 choices, the wine list was longer than a Russian novel and they gave me a free cake and a book of pictures of the restaurant (for what exactly?) to take home at the end. Afterwards, our guide took us back to the room to read more about the private jet lifestyle, and we were driven back across the road.

The bread cart. Seriously.
Photo by niallkennedy on Flickr

Portland really has no fine dining restaurants, and it had been some time since I’d been to one. The previous night, we had been to another well respected local restaurant, Sage, which reminded me of everything I dislike about them: impersonal, boring, awkward. And foam. Joël Robuchon was everything that is good about them: so over-the-top it’s just amusing, top notch sommeliers, ignoring the menu and just letting the kitchen decide what to make you.

By day two, we had kind of run out of things to do. When you’re not interested in gambling or Cirque du Soleil (there were SEVEN different Cirque shows running) there are limited choices. And frankly, there is a fine line between “hilariously tacky” and “nauseatingly tacky”. Watching people stumble around from casino to casino with huge plastic cocktail glasses, cigars and several kids in tow, underneath giant screens pimping semi-naked women and pool parties gets old. So we got off the Strip and went to Las Vegas’s Chinatown. It turned out to be a string of strip malls fronted by dragon statues, but it was nice for a change of scenery and we had some decent banh mi.

I kept missing the Bellagio fountain shows that happen every half hour and was determined that I must see one before we left. So when we got back, I walked down to the Bellagio and waited and waited and waited and then finally the show started. It was disappointingly set to My Heart Will Go On. It was kind of… creepy. I know this sounds weird, but it was like the water was moving to the music like a sentient being and that just squicked me out for some reason. Probably just me. (I am irked out by mussels and oysters and things for similar reasons, so almost certainly just me.)

I’m alive! And I’m going to KILL YOU. (I don’t really know why the fountain would be homicidal if it were alive, it just seems like it would, right?).
Photo by Jon’s snaps on Flickr

Around the same time the show started, one of the aforementioned freak storms also began. There was nowhere to hide, so I just watched the show while getting soaked then ran into Planet Hollywood where I located an H&M and replaced my now soaked-though $12 canvas shoes with an identical pair. Sometimes those little sci-fi cities within buildings have their good points I guess.

After not even two days in Vegas, I think we had well and truly our fair share. Perhaps we will return in another 10 years, when everything is new again.

*except that time Dr Karl and Susan went skinny dipping

My parents recently came to visit America for three weeks. They’re both well travelled people, both avid followers of US politics, but neither had ever been to the the country before, and I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t have come if I hadn’t been here. They visited us in Portland, before heading of to the east coast to see Washington D.C. and New York, then I met back up with them in San Francisco. On our last day, I interviewed them about their experiences and impressions:

Ruth: Alright, you have to be honest

*they look pensive*

Ruth: What does it matter, you’ll be in Australia

Dad: But we don’t have to agree?

Ruth: Agree to what?

Dad: With each other.

Ruth: No. You should say what you think.

Dad: Well, what are the questions to which we’re providing answers?

Ruth: What were your impressions of America before coming here?

Dad: Well, I always thought of America as essentially being very materialistic, very driven by individualism, very right wing, very — almost sort of mono-cultural in a way, which is absurd, but that was the sort of the mental image that I brought. It was a rather stereotypical sort of image.

Ruth: But then did you have different associations with different cities? Because even though you think of America as one thing, but then you think New York is one thing and LA is one thing—

Dad: No, I didn’t really have a preconception about the cities, I suppose. I sort of thought of them as being variations on the same theme but in different places, which is also absurd. But I knew that Portland was more progressive, in terms of its local government and social organisations—

Mum: But that’s only because of Ruth. We wouldn’t have heard of Portland—

Dad: Yes, I didn’t have any concrete sense of that. No, my overwhelming impression was a stereotypical view that everybody in America was driven by the need to consume, everybody was overweight, they were all right wing and they were all xenophobic and all only interested in American affairs, not interested in the world at all.

Ruth: [to Mum] What about you?

Mum: I think I had a slightly more nuanced view! [laughs]

Dad: Yes, mine was knee jerk, A very un-thought-through—

Mum: Well I’ve probably had more to do with Americans. When I was in the Tibet movement, that was very international, so I used to meet lots of Americans.

Dad: Intellectually I know that’s a very narrow, simplistic interpretation, but that was probably my overriding instinct.

Ruth: There is a lot of, I have realised, there is a lot of xenophobia in Australia against America and Americans. It’s OK to be racist — well anti-American. It’s kind of encouraged.

Dad: Yeah I think so, it’s partly a throwback from the British heritage, sort of by way of  contrast. Sort of identifying Australia more in a British mould than an American mould.

Ruth: Well I think Australia has an inferiority complex — Australians — I think.

Dad: Possibly.

Mum: It’s probably gone through waves, though, because of the generation we came from and the Vietnam War, possibly our generation are more anti-American. Whereas our parents’ generation, who would have seen the Americans as the saviours in the second world war.

Dad: But it’s a very two dimensional attitude, and once you start to investigate it—

Ruth: But it’s an accepted two dimensional attitude.

Dad: I think those sorts of stereotypes are more accepted in Australia. And it’s probably due to lack of exposure to Americans.

Ruth: True, because Americans don’t travel a lot, and for a long time, it was just prohibitively expensive for Australians to come to America because the dollar was so low.

Mum: A lot of Australians do travel to America, though.

Ruth: Aww, not percentage wise.

Dad: And they go to Disneyland. The thing which strikes me in counter to that, is that as soon as you get here, you start to realise the complexity of the situation and the many different cultures that exist and the local history and how local conditions are very different. It’s very obvious that the country is made up of people from very different backgrounds.

Mum: I’m just thinking of more exceptions to your statement, because people in Australia were very excited by Obama, weren’t they?

Ruth: Yeah but was that a pro-America thing, or just because they hated Bush and because it actually has an impact on our country?

Mum: Yeah, that’s right.

Ruth: Because, see, I find it really hypocritical, because Australians will say these horribly racist things against Americans, but they’re also obsessed with America as well.

Mum: That’s right, and that is because we are so dependent on America. Because we know that the decisions the US administration makes have such an impact on Australia.

Ruth: And culturally

Mum: And I’m sure that’s one of the reasons people are so emotional and, in a way, unfair. Because a country that is — like Greece, take Greece. You can afford to be fairly dispassionate about Greece and think about the pluses and the minuses and what’s the good things and the bad things and what’s going to happen to Greece now — you can be very interested in what’s going to happen to Greece now, but it’s not going to affect your life personally, or my life personally, is it? Whereas what happens in America will affect our lives, and that’s why I think Australians tend to get very frustrated and angry about it when they see Americans making what they see as wrong decisions and electing the wrong president! Because it’s that sort of powerlessness.

Dad: And also there’s that sense in a way that Australia does follow America in lots of senses, and so it’s not hard to see the trends which are developing. And so you almost feel this power that’s dragging you along — whether you want it or not — in a certain direction. So if you feel negative about that direction — I would cite rampant materialism and individualism as a tendency which I would be somewhat negative about — then you tend to see that in CinemaScope on the American scene, and I suspect that’s why there’s that prejudice to start with.

Ruth: So how would you say your views have been challenged — or confirmed? Did it match your expectations? Were you surprised?

Mum: Well I think it’s kind of a dual experience, isn’t it? Because a lot of the time, you’re in places that you’ve seen many, many, many times on television and in movies, so there is one sense in which it’s like, “Oh, Central Park, here it is.” Or: “Here it is, the White House.” So there’s a certain air of familiarity which you don’t always get while you travel. But then it’s not quite the same, is it? Because it’s real. [laughs] I think the size, the size is a surprise.

Ruth: The size of the country?

Mum: The size of the country and the size of the big cities.

Dad: And everything seems to be on such a big scale, whether it’s buildings or museums.

Mum: Because every individual monument or building in D.C. you have seen images of time and time again, haven’t you? But when you see them all together in this one city, it’s almost overwhelming.

Ruth: What about culturally?

Dad: Well, in a way we’re sort of moving around in a bit of a bubble, because as tourists, you’re not actually interacting with the subcultures in the way that someone who’s living here is. We’re moving around in a tourist bubble, which is a bit strange, and some of that is quite pleasant. You get to sample bits of history and culture and so forth — obviously food and art museums and things like that. So it’s a bit like going shopping: a bit here and a bit there. But shopping’s not like real life. It’s sort of an add-on. On the other hand, I’ve had some really nice interactions with people.

Mum: I think one thing, which I knew intellectually, but I think it’s emotionally quite challenging, is just the reality of what, in many ways, a harsh society this is. Because all the time you’re seeing homeless people, you’re seeing mentally ill people on the streets. And you realise that all the other people could very easily end up like that. Like I’m very aware of the fact all the time that the safety nets just aren’t what they are in Australia or many other European countries. I would find it a very anxiety provoking society to live in, I think, to live in America. Because, you know — I mean, maybe it’s true you can go from very poor to very rich in America — it’s possibly still the land of opportunity — but you can go the other way much more quickly. I see women my age [61] begging on the streets. That’s quite shocking to me.

Ruth: But I guess what characterises America is that positive optimism, you kind of need that.

Dad: Yes, but the flip side is that once you’re out of the system, then you’re regarded as fundamentally a failure aren’t you?

Mum: But then a lot of American films and novels and stories are about people who sort of hit rock bottom, and then something turns their life around — often religion or a 12-step program or whatever it is. So it’s one of the kind of archetypal American stories, isn’t it? That there’s hope for everyone. That doesn’t necessarily mean people aren’t critical of them, but there is hope. But I don’t know, because we haven’t met enough people.

Dad: Yes, we haven’t had much exposure to the everyday suburban life, which is obviously the experience for most people here. The only way we experience that is through television, which is pretty limited. The majority of people we’ve been interacting with are people in the service industry or tourism industry. Or tourists themselves. It’s a slightly skewed cross-section of humanity that you come across, inevitably… But you are conscious that people aren’t paid very much.

Mum: Yes, tipping! That was a shock.

Dad: That was a suprise—

Mum: No it wasn’t a “surprise”—

Dad: Well not a “surprise”, but it’s very pervasive.

Ruth: Why is that?

Dad: Well the fact that you know people are being paid a very low wage, so you’re very conscious of trying to compensate for that by tipping. You feel a moral obligation to do so.

Ruth: Did you ever not tip for bad service?

Dad: Not that I’m aware of. I might have inadvertently. I tipped for bad service! Tipping tour guides on buses and things was very strange. That’s an odd experience.

Ruth: Do you think you got better service though?

Mum: No

Ruth: You wouldn’t say the service is better?

Mum: Oh, is service better here?

Ruth: Yeah, and do you think that’s a result of the tipping? Because you have to be nicer?

Mum: I wouldn’t say service is “better”. Sometimes it’s a bit more over the top!

Dad: Yeah, asking you five times whether you enjoyed your meal I find a bit hard to take. I wouldn’t say it’s “better”.

Mum: But then service in Australia has improved over the years.

Ruth: It’s still considered one of the rudest countries, though, when they do polls. Because everyone’s so laid back — I don’t think they’re rude, but people from other cultures do.

Mum: They appear rude. But don’t you think, once upon a time in Australia, service people were almost sort of sullen!

Dad: Well I think the attitude was that you weren’t anybody’s servant, you weren’t subservient to them, therefore why be artificial about it? There is often an exaggerated deference [here] which I find hard to take. Lots of “ladies and gentleman”s, which I find over the top.

Ruth: Yes, there’s a lot of “sir”s and “ma’am”s. I think manners are emphasised more. People swear less.

Mum: Yes, I haven’t heard any swearing, actually, now that I think about it. I’d call that a plus. [laughs]

Ruth: So how would you characterise each of the cities you visited?

Mum: Well, Portland I’d characterise as—quirky?

Dad: Relaxed. Youthful.

Mum: Yeah, very youthful. Very clean.

Dad: Friendly.

Ruth: What about New York?

Mum: Just overwhelming!

Dad: Yes, very fast, very bustling.

Mum: But very dynamic, very vibrant, exciting. Just a kind of miracle it keeps going! It’s just so complex.

Dad: Washington was a bit overwhelming; it’s very overwhelming in terms of its scale. Everything seems to be larger than life.

Ruth: What about culturally?

Dad: Pretty restrained, I thought. Conservative.

Mum: I found Washington very exciting.

Dad: I didn’t find it so exciting, because I probably didn’t have an expectation. But you were jumping up and down like a school girl when we went to the—

Mum: Don’t put that in!

Dad: No, it’s true! “Ooh, I’m so excited!” she said.

Mum: Well, I think because it’s kind of the flip side of what I was saying earlier about what happens in America matters to everyone. And when we were waiting to go into the public gallery at the Capitol, and we were in the queue we could see on the TV they were having the debate and then doing the vote on the American involvement in Libya. It’s that same thing, you just think “Wow, this vote really matters!”

Dad: That’s true.

Mum: And you didn’t know, because the party system is so undisciplined here, you actually don’t know what the final result will be. Whereas in Australia — not so much now because of the minority government — but until recently, you always knew what the result in the House of Representatives would be. Whereas there it was a real vote. So yeah, I thought that was pretty exciting.

Ruth: What was the UN like?

Mum: Well of course, the interesting thing about the UN is that, by comparison, it’s quite low key and obviously not wealthy, is it? The UN building isn’t extravagant or over-awing in the way that the American power buildings in Washington are. And, in fact, the guide pointed out to us that their budget was about the same as the New York Police Department. And they are supposed to be keeping peace in the world!

Dad: Yes, it was quite modest in a way, wasn’t it? The whole building was quite modest.

Mum: Yes, I think so. But it was interesting. But it made you aware of the limitations of the UN, in a way — not that your’e not aware.

Dad: But the need to treat everybody equally—

Mum: Yes that’s right, they have these incredibly complicated rituals to make sure no country appears to be getting heard, in terms of their seating arrangement. There was a lot of explanation about the seating arrangements and how they rotate them alphabetically to make sure no one gets a good spot forever. Which is really good, the philosophy is good, but you know the reality is that not every country is equal because there are the five permanent Security Council members. So I guess it really just reminded me of what the UN’s up against!

Dad: The other thing which I’ve been very struck with — I mean, you knew about it — but the security. Not just at airports, but all the major buildings. Just that all pervasive—

Mum: Yes, it’s very oppressive, I think.

Dad: Like when we were going to the Capitol, you went through an initial security thing before you even went into the building, then—what was the next thing?

Mum: The next thing was you had to give in all your mobiles and things like that.

Dad: Yes, and then there was another queue, and then when you finally get to the actual chamber, you went through another security check… there’s just that sense that the memory of September 11 is still very strong, it’s still around. And of course that was reinforced when we went to the site, ground zero. That really reinforced it. You just feel that event is still echoing through US society in quite a major way. And it’s referred to in the media and on television and in papers a lot, in ways in never would be in Australia.

Ruth: What was your impression of the media here?

Dad: It was the expected spectrum of material on television, because you’ve been exposed to it—

Mum: You didn’t find the media as uniformly right wing as you’d thought.

Dad: No, actually I was really struck by things such as Rachel Maddow, there’s nothing like that in Australia, with a very opinionated person from the left expressing very strong views and basically, in this case, attacking the Republicans at every possible opportunity. And other programs on M…N…?

Ruth: MSNBC?

Dad: M-S-N-B-C. Quite a few of those programs are much more outspoken that expected. So that was quite refreshing in a way, to see that diversity of opinion which perhaps I hadn’t expected. Perhaps I knew it existed, but I didn’t expect it to be expressed in the mainstream media like that. The newspapers I haven’t been quite so struck by.

Mum: Well we tried to read the New York Times most days.

Dad: I was conscious of the fact that there was a very strong focus on the Middle East, and predictably, American affairs. The mainstream media was obsessed by things like child murder and various other sensationalism.

Mum: There seems to be much looser restrictions on reporting, like you see live court cases here, and judges and jurors talking about why they made particular decisions, which you couldn’t do in Australia.

Dad: And endless, endless dissection of the case by umpteen experts.

Mum: But I think one of the things that I’ve realised from the media  here — reading it and watching it — is the actual reality of the economic problems here. Like because you only get the most bare summary in the Australian media. You get the headline unemployment rate — it’s still very high or whatever — but you don’t get the itty bitty details that you get in the local media of the closures and the layoffs.

Dad: And I suppose, behind that, you don’t have that sense that America has a very self confident view of its place in the world that it used to have. It’s sort of retreating. There’s a very strong push to cut back on defence. I’m not saying that’s necessarily a bad thing, but it’s almost sort of a withdrawal or retreat back to the mainland and back to local issues and back to solving your own problems. And the hemorrhaging of the economy through the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is obviously costing them a lot, and the huge numbers of people being injured too, which is pretty depressing.

Ruth: What’s the difference in war coverage you’ve seen in both countries?

Mum: Well there’s more here — of course. Iraq hardly gets a mention in Australia at all because we have no troops there anymore.

Dad: Afghanistan gets more coverage, in fact, it’s become more prominent lately as the death rate’s gone up. And the issue about withdrawal has become more important.

Mum: But in any event, I think Afghanistan gets more coverage here.

Ruth: What was your impression of San Francisco? We didn’t get to that.

Mum: San Francisco seems very much like a mosaic to me. I find it very hard to generalise about San Francisco, because you go very quickly from one neighborhood or precinct to another, and it can change dramatically in the course of a block or two, can’t it? So San Francisco as a whole I would find it hard to generalise. It is more laid back than the east, but it’s not as laid back as Portland! [laughs]

Ruth: What’s been you favourite city?

Dad: I think Portland, for me.

Ruth: You might be somewhat biased.

Mum: Whereas I do think if I had an opportunity, I would enjoy to go back to New York again, because I just feel like there were so many things we didn’t see in three days.

Dad: Yes, three days is no time at all.

Mum: But then I feel tired thinking of that [laughs]. You know what I mean? It is a real effort, New York.

Ruth: What’s the best things you’ve seen?

Dad: I loved that lodge in Mount Hood

Ruth: Timberline?

Dad: Yes that was such a unique thing. I liked Whole Foods!

Ruth: Whole Foods was the best thing you saw in America?

Dad: It was great! All that fresh food under one roof.

Mum: The Holocaust Museum was pretty astounding. You couldn’t call it an enjoyable experience, but it was an astounding experience. Very sobering.

Dad: I liked the Museum of Native Americans. That was fascinating and intriguing. For sheer sort of take your breath away stuff, I guess the MoMA in New York was extraordinary.

Mum: Just to see so many famous paintings in one place.

Dad: I thought “My God, are there any modern paintings left in Europe? The Americans have bought the lot up!”

Mum: That is an astounding thing about the US, is the artistic heritage here, just the amount of really important, high quality artwork here is phenomenal. The Library of Congress was pretty amazing.

Ruth: Do you think you’d be more likely to recommend friends and family travel here now?

Mum: Well I guess I just never had a view before. But now I’d say yes, it’s something you should do once in your lifetime.

Ruth: And would you say your impressions of America and Americans are more positive or less positive than before you came?

Dad: In some respects more positive, in some respects less positive. Because they’re more detailed.

Mum: In some ways I’d say I’m more sympathetic than I was. Rather than just seeing America in terms of its implications for me and Australia, I think of it more in its own terms now. I think most people are doing the best they can in a pretty harsh system — a harsher system than ours, anyway.

photo by D-J-C on Flickr

So Monday the other week, I’m checking out waterfalls in Columbia Gorge with my parents, when I get an SMS from The Boy saying he had to go on a last minute trip to Chicago on Thursday and did I want to come? At first I thought no, because I’d had a big week doing stuff with my folks and was going to San Fran the next week and Las Vegas the week after, but my parents were all “Are you fucking crazy? Go to Chicago!” (Except with less swearing, because they are not crass like I am and my mother does not know where she went wrong with me) so I said yes.

It was a pretty short trip, though, so I basically had a day and a half to enjoy the city.

I went into Chicago with very few expectations, which is the best way to travel if you can. It was impossible for cities like New York or London, but what did I know about Chicago? Well, the musical Chicago. The Blues Brothers. Dirty Chicago politics, I knew. And Obama.

I have a bit of a formula for finding things to do when visiting cities. The first is the New York Times’ “36 Hours in…” columns then TIME’s 10 Thing to Do in 24 Hours, then I find the local alt-weeklies (which tend to write up less touristy things to do), then I check Yelp and Chow to find places to eat (it’s easier to plan ahead when you’re a vegetarian).

After perusing the options, my vague plan was “art, architecture and food”. That is basically what went down.

Art

My first stop was the Art Institute of Chicago. I think I planned on spending an hour or so there, but ended up staying way longer — pretty much the entire afternoon of day one. I hadn’t anticipated quite how amazing the collection would be, and I felt obliged to go into every room, lest I miss some really important piece of art and have to live the rest of my life just a litte bit less cultured than I might have been. I think the best thing I saw was Chagall’s America Windows.

The next day, I went to the Museum of Contemporary Art, where, amongst other things, I saw Eiko & Koma writhing around on the floor naked. The bathrooms had speakers playing people making weird noises, which was a bit much. I’m all for weird-arse art, but not when I’m urintating, thankyouverymuch.

This is not the naked Japanese performance artists. I thought it would be creepy to photograph them, though others were.

I wish I’d had time for more. Others recommended the Field Museum and the Planetarium, which both looked cool.

Architecture

Staring at buildings may sound boring, but the architecture in Chicago is just amazing. The Chicago Loop is serious sore-neck territory. I like big cities and I like big buildings and I could probably have spent a whole day just wandering around gawking. But I did not have a whole day, so I contented myself with just staring at them in between other things. It’s a truly attractive city.

I didn’t actually do an official tour or do any research, so I can’t tell you shit about the buildings I saw or what they were called.

I spent an unanticipated amount of time in Millenium Park, which is next to the Art Institute. It’s weird to be in a city that isn’t totally skint again, where they build big, impressive things just for people to see and use and for the sake of being pretty. Case in point: the Gehry-designed Jay Pritzker Pavilion is very impressive and a beautiful place to sit and watch a show. Some band was rehearsing — it was a bit jazz fusiony for my tastes, but a lovely way to kill time nonetheless. Also: free.

Food

One thing I try to do in a city is get out of the downtown area to where people actually lived. My friendly local barista, a former Chicago resident, gave me some suggestions on where to head, so on day two, I caught the train in the general direction of the general Wicker Park/Bucktown area. I got off around the Ashland/Division/Milwaukee intersection (for those who know the city). It was a far cry from the pretty buildings in the city. Based solely on observation, the area appeared to have large Mexican and Vietnamese communities. I had heard Chicago had good Mexicana and I hadn’t had breakfast, so I Yelped it up and was informed a nearby grocery store had a good taqueria hidden inside. Sure enough, round a weird corner in the store was a bunch families eating tacos. The taquerias I saw tended to have more focus on tortas than those on the West coast, and less on burritos, which makes sense, as the latter is, for all intents and purposes, a West coast invention. Tortas are huge Mexican sandwiches made with big white rolls and fillings not dissimilar to what you’d find in a burrito (minus the rice) — refried beans, avocado, crema, salad, jalapenos, various meats. Terribly unhealthy, but entirely delicious. This was a good one (I got no meat, but extra beans) and cost like $3 or something ridiculous. As I walked further into the area, eating my torta, it got increasingly gentrified and bland, but I liked that bit — still a bit grimey and grungy.

There was only one thing I absolutely had to try in Chicago, and that was a deep dish pizza. It’s famous and you don’t really see them elsewhere. I went to a Lou Maltnati’s, because it was close, seemed to be fairly well regarded, and did individual 6″ pizzas to go. It is essentially like a pie — with the pizza base shaped into a crust, and the topping as the filling. I love a great pizza crust and this was not one. However, growing up on unremarkable suburban Australian pizza, I have always been of the opinion that if the crust doesn’t have much going for it, it should just be covered in topping. Deep dish pizza is like the ultimate pizza for topping lovers, because you get about three times as much for the same amount of space. I think it is a wonderful thing and I don’t understand why it hasn’t spread further.

Summary: Chicago exceeded my expectations. Which is easy when you have none. But seriously, it’s a cool city with a vibe that says “Hey I’m happening and important but a bit more digestible and down-to-earth than New York”. I give Chicago a B+.

It’s now been a year since I moved to America and Portland, and I figured that deserved a few words. I don’t know if I have much to say on America—I don’t feel very engaged with the broader country here (and I’ll get to that)—but I can certainly talk about Portland.

I hate when film and book reviewers say “[city/town/house] is a character in an of itself!” It’s a tired cliche and often what they actually mean is “the writer/director conveys a very clear sense of place.” But I do feel like Portland, the city, is a character in my life and those of the people around me. Maybe it’s because I spend a lot of time with journalists and other outsiders, but when we talk about Portland, it’s always like we’re talking about a friend we can’t decide if we love or hate. It is always discussed as if it is its own entity, with its own ideas and personality and free will. It does what it does, is what it is, and we just stand by applauding or covering our eyes. We’re embarrassed by it and inspired by it, it disappoints us and impresses us, it’s too hipster and too daggy, we attack it and defend it, we love living here and want to get the hell out. It is the focal point of so many conversations every day: it needs more of this and less of this, it used to be like this and I hope it never gets like this, and so many discussions involve the lines, “The problem with Portland” or “Only in Portland” or “One of the reasons I love Portland is…”. And then there’s the weather conversations—my God, the weather conversations.

I actually knew it was my Portland anniversary because of the Starlight Parade. The Starlight Parade is one of the many festivities in the Rose Festival, which is, I guess, Portland’s equivalent to Moomba, (without the very elaborate bum joke). When we arrived here last year, I was excited to see people setting up for a parade outside our hotel. And then the jet lag hit and all I wanted to do was sleep. It’s really hard to sleep when there is an endless stream of marching bands playing outside your window. But I was determined to see some parading, so I made sure to go downstairs for the bigger Grand Floral Parade the next week. I thought it was hilarious and surreal. There were rodeo riders and Indian tribes and beauty queens and cheerleaders and it was like this wonderful parade of American stereotypes. Delightful.

photo by pdxjeff

This year I was annoyed when I saw them setting up for the Starlight Parade. I live downtown and it was a lovely 28 degrees (Celsius, you morons) Saturday and I didn’t want my “backyard” to be chock full of people. By midday, people from the suburbs were beginning to camp out on the footpath, basically recreating their entire living rooms where people are supposed to be walking. I had places to go and things to do and found myself muttering under my breath about how stupid fat bogans should stay in the suburbs and keep their shirts on grumble grumble grumble. When the parade started, I was even more annoyed to discover I was actually fenced in by the thing and short of running through the parade itself, couldn’t get out of about a ten block radius.

That kind of contrast makes you stop and think about everything else that has changed over the past 365 days. Here is a list of the way living in Portland for a year has changed me:

1. I have a better work-life balance. The Boy and I go out several nights a week. We do things with friends. We go to see bands, movies and shows. At points it has probably skewed far more to the life side, but I have spent the past few months working full time, and still retained a healthy social life.

2. I am a better writer. Although I have worked solidly as a writer for the past five or so years, the kind of writing I’ve been able to do here — lots of room for creativity, interviewing interesting people, reviewing interesting things — has challenged me to be faster, tighter and more original. Working alongside intimidatingly smart, funny and talented people scares you into doing better. At first, I found Americans’ extreme enthusiasm and willingness to share their feelings and opinions a bit hard to take. But it really does make for a positive and productive working environment. Knowing that people will openly tell me if they hate something I’ve written, or praised and encouraged if they like it, is quite motivating. Sometimes a bit of good old American “sharing” can go a long way.

3. I am a cyclist. I rode my bike a bit in Melbourne, but trams and trains were always my primary form of transport. I hate the cycling subcultures here and how people define themselves so much by it. They gloat as if cycling makes them a better person than drivers. I don’t wear the lycra or the funny shoes or “I heart bikes” tshirts. I took up riding more as a form of necessity — for all it’s praise, the public transport in Portland isn’t actually that good, and Portland is small enough that I can basically ride anywhere I need to go within half an hour. Bike racks on buses and trams make it less of a gamble to go riding on a cold or wet day. But I’m not sure I could return to living by other people’s timetables anymore, either. If I moved back to Melbourne, I would probably invest in a decent bike and ride almost everywhere.

4. I’m less fit. When I left Melbourne, I was training several hours every day. I’m glad I have more of a social life now, but I miss being super super fit. I really miss fighting and Thai boxing and being part of a close knit gym. I still run most mornings. If we move somewhere with better Thai boxing at some point, I may take it up again.

5. I cook less, although I am a better cook. At home, I cooked almost all my own meals every day, but it was very utilitarian. Here I tend to buy meals a lot. Part of it is the more relaxed lifestyle, part of it is sheer economics and convenience. It really is cheaper here to buy food than to cook it a lot of the time. Most nights of the week, we just get dinner at Whole Foods. It’s lazy, but it’s usually something healthy, and it’s convenient and we don’t have to debate what we feel like. We probably eat out twice a week, maybe more. Some might think it’s extravagant. But we don’t buy expensive clothes, shoes, cars or TVs. We live in a tiny apartment. We both love food, wine and spirits. There are so many good restaurants and bars here, and they’re so cheap (though most Portlanders will tell you otherwise; people here whinge endlessly about the cost of things), there’s too much to tempt us out of the house. When I do cook, however, I put a lot more effort and creativity in to it.

6. I have come to appreciate more about Australia. I miss BPAY, the ABC, the metric system, strict gun laws, universal and health care. I have come to appreciate Melbourne more as a big, international, culturally diverse city with a lot of intelligent people and interesting, important things going on. Portland is a very vibrant place, especially given its size, but it feels very cut off from the world at times. People are hyper focussed on local issues, which is great, but it’s a rare day I hear anyone discussing international news — even national news, really. Maybe it’s just the circles I move in. In a broader sense, I think I’m more aware of cultural identity. I have always abhorred patriotism and nationalism, and never thought much about being “Australian,” but I have come to realise how much my personality, beliefs and tastes are a function of where I was raised.

7. I’m a sloppier dresser. I’ve always been a sloppy dresser, though I started to put a bit more effort in the past few years. In Portland, there’s really almost never an occasion for which you actually need to dress up. Dining, theater, whatever, no one cares what you wear. As I brought very few clothes with me, and I have had little occasion to purchase anything fancy, I have regressed back into jeans, runners and hoodies for all occasions. I don’t own a single dress. At 25, I’m quite at peace with this, but I have a feeling it will bite me in the arse one day.

8. I appreciate my family more. That’s a pretty natural one, I guess, and less to do with the city I am in so much as the city I am not in. I speak to my mum a lot on Skype, and everyone else whenever I can. I send a lot of postcards and packages. The guys at the post office know me by name. I’d like to think that if/when I go home, I will make more of an effort to see them regularly. I think I only ever had my side of the family round to our house once. That seems crazy now.

9. I am less sure of what the future holds. I’ve never had any particular life or career goal to work towards — I’ve just taken opportunities as they’ve arisen and that has worked out pretty well for me. I meet these super ambitious J-school grads and I feel bad, because they’ll almost certainly never attain their grand Pulitzer prize winning dreams. I’m still surprised anyone actually pays me money to write, so any work I get just feels like a bonus. I have never had a vocational goal beyond not being unemployed. Still, in Melbourne I guess I had some vague plan that I’d keep doing online media stuff and eventually just get paid to show people how to do it properly and live in the inner Northern suburbs forever and… I really hadn’t thought any further. Now I have no idea where I want to go or what I want to do. That’s not a bad thing.

But much as this city (and this country) may frustrate me at times, I haven’t once been sorry I came.

I’ll be interested to see how my list looks in another year’s time.

Unlike most kids, Easter was not one of my preferred celebrations as a child. My parents were not big on feeding us sweets, and the cumulative bounty of chocolate eggs between my sister and I rarely amounted to more than one bag of little eggs from the 7Eleven. And once we admitted to knowing the Easter Bunny wasn’t real, the chocolate ended. I bluffed my way through a few years, but once the Father Christmas cat was out of the bag at age 7, it was only a matter of time. That wasn’t really the issue, though. Most years, my family would go to our beach house for Easter. Yeah, I can hear you getting out the tiny violins, but Victoria’s coast — the “Surf Coast”, as it’s marketed — is pretty much good for just that about 10 months of the year: surfing. In a wetsuit. By April, it’s cold and wet.

“But there’s nothing to dooooo there!” I’d whine. “Nonsense!” my father would say (which is basically his response to everything, even if it is perfectly sensical), “There’s bushwalking, and bird watching and walks along the beach, and collecting sea shells and cuttlefish…”

Yeah. To their credit, my folks did try to make a big deal out of Easter (sans the Jesus part). For some reason, my mother wrote a book a million years ago on Easter activities for children from around the world (side note: I used to mock her often for this, then a few weeks back, found myself researching international easter traditions for this article and wished I’d paid more attention. Sorry mum!), so she’d get us to dye eggs and make Easter bonnets and such. In the chocolate receiving years, they would put quite a bit of effort into hiding the eggs for the hunt and would sometimes bribe our older siblings into wearing bunny ears and bouncing outside the window.

Easter bonnet, apparently. Seriously Mum? What. The. Fuck.

As an adult, Easter has become one of my preferred celebrations. For a start, Australians get two public holidays — Good Friday and Easter Monday. Secondly, hot cross buns. My tradition is to eat so many that I’m utterly sick of them by the end of the holiday, and then it takes a whole year for me to want them again. (For those who feel strongly about such things, my allegiances are: mixed peel; currants over sultanas; toasted and buttered over plain; and I think chocolate chip ones are an abomination but also a delicious abomination, so I occasionally partake quietly).

Most things are usually closed Easter Sunday, which normally shits me, but means there’s little else to do but hang out with your family, and if the rest of mine were not at the beach house collecting cuttlefish, this is what I would do.

This year, I spent Easter alone. The Boy was overseas, I wasn’t very well and it was a shitty day outside.

Easter seemed less of a big deal in secular America than in secular Australia, though my observations may be coloured by the fact that I wasn’t celebrating it with anyone and I may have become more accustomed to the fact that Americans are always celebrating something and I no longer notice the excessive decorations. That said, there are no holidays, for a start. Some businesses were closed or had shorter hours, but not many. Many restaurants were offering Easter brunch, which is apparently the thing to do (‘[insert holiday here] brunch’ always seems to be the thing to do in Portland, though). Ham is apparently the food of choice, closely followed by lamb (not such a popular meat here otherwise, and, according to The Boy and other Australians and Kiwis at least, typically of not-so-great quality).

Hot cross buns are also not such a big thing. I found some, but they weren’t great. So I baked my own. I’d never made them before, so I was pretty happy with how they turned out. My workmates seemed to enjoy them, but most probably had little basis for comparison, and also free food is always well received by journalists.

But the major American Easter tradition is one I suspect most Australians have never heard of. I certainly hadn’t. We were in the States on holidays some time before Easter last year. We were in a bar in San Francisco with American friends and somehow the topic came up: Peeps.

No, we didn’t know what they were, and no we hadn’t tried them.

A few days later, we were marched into a Rite Aid in Oakland. As I’ve suggested before, Rite Aid is usually a good canary for upcoming American holidays, as there is always an entire aisle dedicated to cards and candy for the next big celebration. And sure enough, much of the aisle was dedicated to Peeps.

Peeps, we discovered, are marshmallow lollies shaped like chicks and bunnies and covered in fluoro-colored sugar. I actually like marshmallows quite a lot, but Peeps are made with particularly nasty, cheap marshmallow and, of course, corn syrup. The Yanks love ‘em, though. The Washington Post holds a Peeps diorama contest every Easter, where people build scenes starring Peeps. This year’s winner was a diorama of the Chilean mine rescue:

Classy.

Here is me eating my first Peeps after that visit to Rite Aid last year:

Here’s a box I picked up from Rite Aid this year. It cost 99 cents. It’s a bit squished, but they’re supposed to be chicks:

Here is one with its head ripped off, so you can see inside:

It occurred to me that, like normal marshmallows, they might be better toasted:

I’m melting! Meeeeltiiinnng!

The answer? A resounding YES. With the outside all caramalised and the inside all gooey, they improved by oh, say, 400%:

So there you have it: Easter in America. Shitty hot cross buns and no days off work.

In September last year, I attended the final baseball game of the Portland Beavers. A lot has changed in the six months since then. PGE Park is now Jeld-Wen Field, home to the Portland Timbers, the country’s newest Major League Soccer team. At the time I speculated a lot on how the city’s sporting culture would change after that day, so it seems fitting that I was at the first Timbers home game in the freshly made-over stadium, and appropriate that I offer an update.

Walking home that day, we passed a few billboards proclaiming “Pure Portland, Pure Soccer”. In my post, I said they “looked a bit menacing”. I don’t remember if that was true or just lazy hyperbole, but the statement is hilarious in retrospect. A few months later, these billboards started appearing around town:

photos courtesy of portlandtimbers.com

Little bit of context here: the Timbers have been around in one form or another since 1975. From what I can glean online, around 10 years ago, the serious supporters formed a proper fan group—the Timbers Army—and quickly earned themselves a reputation as some of the most vocal and hardcore around. They go for a European style: drinking, chanting, drumming, scarf waving, smoke bombs, rituals. Some love them, some think they’re hooligans, some love that they’re hooligans.

For the Timbers itself, I suspect, they pose a bit of a quandary: one the one hand, their power and dedication has been credited as one of the big reasons the team was accepted into the MLS; on the other, they’re a bunch of raging soccer fans, and that just isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. The Timbers had to sell a heap of season tickets. The Army isn’t big enough and its members aren’t going to buy box seats, anyway. The advertisers basically had to sell the city on a team that didn’t really exist yet.

The above billboards must have seemed like a big risk for the team. They’re huge, they’re everywhere, they involve children wielding axes. Some people hated them. But they were brilliant. They involve children wielding axes, for a start. There are no jocks or sporting cliches. They look like Portlanders. They are Portlanders. Who doesn’t want to look like a badass with a chainsaw? (OK hippies, true, of which Portland has many, but they were never going to buy tickets, anyway.) And then the even more brilliant twist: they actually let everyone look like a badass with a chainsaw, holding public photoshoots where fans could get their “No Pity” picture taken, then upload it to their Facebook.

Evidently it worked. The Timbers sold out all 12,500 season tickets. The Boy bought one. He’s never cared about sport before, to my knowledge. He never went to a Melbourne Victory game. He obviously never been to a Timbers game before. But he was quite keen about this. I bought him a jersey for Christmas.

Click here to view the embedded video.

So this is how we came to be at the first Timbers home game the other week, seated with a bunch of pretty serious fans (or so they appeared. Maybe it was their first game, too; the marketing campaign was very good). The stadium had been given a lick of paint, and had cooler sponsors (except for Jeld-Wen, which makes pretty daggy doors), but it was much the same as on our visit six months ago. Other than that, the experience couldn’t have been any more different. There were some families, but for the most part, it was 20-40-somethings drinking and screaming. The Army was indeed impressive: coordinated signs, chants, trumpeters, streamers—the whole ultras schtick. It sung the national anthem:

Click here to view the embedded video.

This caused a bit of a stir, for some reason. Apparently the anthem is supposed to be sung by a melisma-abusing pop star. No one disrespects their national anthem more than Australians, though, so I didn’t quite see the fuss. Its a fucking song, and at least they appeared to know all the words—probably more people than in the entire country of Australia who know the words to “Advance Australia Fair” (“nah nah nah GIRT BY SEEEEEAAAA!”).

One big difference was that there was no bad arena rock. The Army chanted, sang and played music through the entire game. That sometimes got annoying, but we didn’t have to listen to “Thunderstruck” once.

Another was that everybody stood for the entire game. This was actually just annoying. It was cold and wet and my feet were aching, but I couldn’t see the game without standing like everybody else. Really? Do we need to do this? The team won’t play any better, we won’t cheer any louder, we won’t see any better, by all standing up.

The game itself got off to a slow start. It was all feeling a bit like this:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Then the Timbers got its shit together and scored two pretty quick goals. There was a third early on in the second half, but then the opposing team, Chicago Fire, got one and the Timbers scored an own goal, putting it uncomfortably close for a bit, until the Timbers scored another and it was all over.

After every goal, the team mascot, Timber Joey—who is, not shockingly, a lumberjack—would use a chainsaw to saw a piece off a giant log. He also moved through the stadium, revving the chainsaw. As team mascots go, he’s a pretty awesome one, though it’s slightly intimidating to have a chainsaw buzzing what feels like meters from your head. The guys in front of us—who looked like 40-something stockbrokers—celebrated every goal by making us high-five them and shouting “YEAH BITCH!” at each other.

Blurry photo!

It was a good game and a good way for the team to christen its new home turf. I’ve no doubt many new Timbers fans were made that night. To be honest, though, I haven’t heard anyone I know mention them. They’re all still obsessed with the Trail Blazers.