I’m back in Brighton now and as usual, in the midst of essay crisis with a deadline awaiting me tomorrow at 4PM. I’m not sure how the hell I managed to wake up this early (10AM), my bodyclock is majorly fucked. Going to sleep at 4, waking up at 7, sleeping for another 2 hours at 4 and getting up at 6 is not normal. It’s pretty ideal as I wake up early and feel fine, but I’m willing to bet I’m going to seriously crash and burn later on when I’m in the library for 24 hours. Again.

I’m not sure where I’m at! Not long ago I was in Los Angeles, then took a flight to Detroit, going forwards in time by about 3 hours and landing there at 5AM. I’m not sure how I did it, but I spent the next 12 hours in an airport, then took another long ass plane journey to London and went forwards again by five hours. Next day I get up in the morning and head to Brighton, all the while struggling to stress out about the 3000 word paper due in a couple of days.

I’ve lost any sense of academic thinking over the last month. Whilst I was there, I missed Brighton quite a bit and time seemed to go so slowly. But in the last week, it suddenly hit me how fast time had gone and that I had no time left there. I found a lot of downs in my trip and in the country itself, but also a hell of a lot of ups too. For the last month I’ve done no work and it was all pretty much just play. Getting drunk, going to the movies, shopping, eating… coming back here to responsibility and commitments and shit like that isn’t that fun.

A few months ago, I was in India and I couldn’t help comparing the USA to both there and Brighton. India and America in my opinion were on two opposite ends of the scale. I think people usually go abroad to travel or be tourists… as I found in India, I’m much more interested in being a traveller than tourist. When I came to America, I found myself not really being either. There wasn’t a lot of ‘travelling’ to do in LA and if there was, my resources were pretty limited due to the non-existant public transport services and me not being able to drive a car. I kind of thought I would be a tourist then, because that’s the main reason people come to the States. But I found all the touristy stuff underwhelming to the extreme, such as Hollywood, Downtown Disneyland, etc. I would have loved to go to Disneyland though, because it’s the most magical fucking place in the world. And I need Mickey Mouse’s autograph.

I suppose after being in a place like India, it’s ridiculous to expect to ‘discover’ anything even remotely worthwhile in America in comparison. India was so rich in culture and tradition, it was a completely different world to what I knew. Every street had something – anything – new and interesting to observe and appreciate, every corner had you waiting in anticipation to see what strange and wondorous things you would be met with. It was so cheap and effective, getting around was so easy and every time I got on a rickshaw and touched down in a new area, I was dying with a heart stopping tension as to what new adventures awaited me.

America wasn’t THAT different to what I’m used to, so of course, going there was a completely different experience. Travelling wasn’t really an option and the tourist stuff was just very, very boring. So I settled that I had gone to America to see friends and generally just be an observor of how the people are and how they live, in contrast to English folk and Indian people. I’d get to be in the most cosmopolitan city in the world, check out an American University and see how it compared to my home and school, and how it contrasted to India, including the village I was volunteering in.

My time was split between the three friends I met over the Summer; Karla, Janet and Amy. I could tell all of them felt some kind of pressure to show me a good time, constantly worrying about whether I was bored or not and after a while with them, I’m sure they got bored of having to worry about me all the time and wanted to get back into their normal routines. When they weren’t fretting about that kind of thing though, I got to see stuff how it normally is and I got to see and do things I wouldn’t have been able to back home. Although I didn’t really need to come to America to see it either as it’s not really that relevant to American ‘culture’, if such a thing even exists.

I spent most of my time with Karla and her Filipino family and it was the highlight of my trip. I’m not religious in the slightest and I’m not too big on family either, but a lot of the time I went with Karla to Church. It didn’t make me wanna convert or anything, but as someone quite critical of religion in general I think it was cool that I got to actually experience the act of worship properly and came away with a really positive view of it. Her family were ridiculously cool too and being around them made me think a lot about the concept of family and how I know it. So yeah, it was quite the eye opener being around Karla and her family.

Janet let me tag along with her to her family’s Korean New Year’s thing, which was cool and different. I got to eat a lot of Korean stuff (no dog, sadly) which is more or less impossible in this country and if it is available, I’m sure it would be really fucking expensive. It was quite chill with Janet, doing stuff like trying out the public transport, going to movies, eating fastfood and just sitting around, watching TV and playing video games. I got quite attatched to her Dad, who apparently reinforced the Korean stereotype of men who are obnoxious despite not knowing. I found it hilarious though, how he spoke to me about other minorities quite bluntly and assumed my Dad was a yoga instructor, haha.

With Amy, I could say I didn’t really get to see or do much, but I’d risk saying that through her, I got to see the more superficial, self-centered and self indulgent aspects of America. Maybe it’s a bit broad and unfair to say that, and it would be better to refer to it as ‘human behaviour’. Amy wasn’t as considerate of me being around as the other two, which was alright as I didn’t want to get in the way and I wanted to stay under the radar to see things as they were. I got to speak to her mother about Vietnam and the sexist nature of marriage and stuff and she was an awesome cook too, which was nice. Otherwise I just saw the stereotype of American people who are just absorbed in shopping, eating out and spending insane amounts of money on shoes and Chanel stuff, being glued to the phone and… well, not much else.

I guess when people are used to their routines, it’s hard to pick something out that would be interesting to a visitor as it’s all become the same old shit to you. I know I’d struggle to find something interesting to show people in London. For the most part, LA just rubbed off on me as a pretty shallow place compared to what I’m used to, empty and without a soul. Last term, I spent most of my days in a living room with my friends about their countries, religious beliefs, life in general and going on Wikipedia when we didn’t understand something. In LA, I found most people really only just met up for lunch, dinner or meet up at Starbucks to talk about Britney Spears or bitch about their ‘friends’. Or they went to the mall for the tenth time that day to do more shopping.

This is a huge generalisation I know, because I actually didn’t get to meet many people outside of Karla, Janet and Amy as I didn’t bring a phone with me. The majority of the people I met in America were insanely nice, especially compared to the British. If I could swap the population, I think I’d do it in a heartbeat! Karla and her family amongst others were proof that a lot of people there had depth and character to their personalities.

I’d like to think of LA as just a taste of what living in the USA can be like and it can be good, although I can imagine myself getting quite used to everything quickly and maybe getting bored of it? I didn’t get a great sense of the lifestyle in my short time there, but in my last few days I quickly fell in love with the country and the people in it. I can understand why all my friends who have lived there for longer hate having to come back to England. I started to feel it too as I left.

Well that’s a brief account of what happened! Hopefully I’ll get the grades this year to be able to attend the University of Miami later this year and see what it’s like properly. Although in order to do that I’ll have to stop leaving work to the last fucking minute like now.

Other stuff I want to talk about when I get the time include:
The food, girls, transportation, University, technology, bars, people, strip clubs, church, shopping, Christmas, New Years, airports, weather… but mostly the girls.

Toodles for now!