L.A. Lesson #142: Be Careful Who You Listen To

Well, it’s 12:00pm here in Costa Mesa, California. In less than 12 hours, Dave and I will be off on a 15 hour non-stop flight to Taipei. The time here in California has been lovely, if not idyllic. The weather here has been ridiculous compared to what we would have had in Nova Scotia. Try: 20-25 degrees C every day since we’ve been here. In Nova Scotia, it’s rainy and nasty.

We did do a bit of exploring in L.A. before we came to my grandparent’s place here in Costa Mesa. If there’s anything I learned from that, it’s this:

Do not believe what the media tells you about any given place you’d like to travel.

That is, at least take it with a grain of salt. Of course you can’t throw caution to the wind entirely, but you have to question the motives of media giving lavish negative attention to one community of people in a particular area. In the case of L.A., I’m talking largely about the black community. Dave and I ventured to an open mic featuring jazz and poetry. We were the only white people there, hands down. We couldn’t have been treated in a nicer manner. Even when we walked in, we weren’t greeted with aggressive stares or disdain. Instead, we were approached afterward with handshakes and heartfelt appreciation for coming out and making an attempt to really see their culture firsthand. It was packed full of support and talent – the last thing the media seems to want us to see.

One musician we spoke to said when new music started coming out claiming Compton was so terrible, he said all his friends in Compton took a look out their windows and doors and said, “Really?” He knew people there who didn’t lock their doors.

I wonder if George Carlin locked his doors.

Again, I don’t think people should pretend that this whole world is carefree and everyone wants gumdrops and love, but we should also be careful about who is telling us what information. I felt so much love in that room, probably more than I have in many other places that I’ve lived that are supposedly “safer.”

A blog reading I recommend that is related to this topic can be found here. This guy is an American who wrote 20 things he learned about travelling in 70 countries. Now, the only point I disagree with him on is #13: America and Canada Share a Common Culture. Certainly we both speak English and we have a lot of the same media (mostly because the U.S. dumps their media on us), among many other things. But the biggest difference between the U.S. in Canada, not counting pockets of culture like the Southern states and Quebec, is the political climate. In the U.S., generally people are much more paranoid and much less trusting, and this attitude naturally lends itself to the general state of the country. Being a Canadian who has spent a lot of time in the U.S., I can definitely attest to this. That being said, I love both countries. I’m proud of being a Canadian, but I have a lot of American friends and a lot of family in the U.S., and I love and adore all of them. That being said, claiming Canada and the U.S. are essentially the same is like telling a Norwegian that Norway and Sweden are essentially the same. (I know that all of my Norwegian family here in California are cringing at that comment.)

In conclusion: be aware. That’s all. Don’t let what someone says limit your perceptions. Everyone’s got pockets to fill.