Hollywood.

After so long, I finally stepped foot on the United States. Landed in Los Angeles at about 11.30 in the morning local time (add 15 hours to get Singapore/Hong Kong/Shanghai time). To be honest I didn’t really enjoy the flight, but probably because I’ve been kinda expecting a bit too much from Cathay Pacific. So perhaps when it didn’t turn out the way I wanted it to be, I was kinda disappointed. The worse part probably is the not able to get to sleep part. I kinda stayed awake for the whole 12 hours of the flight and it was really unbearable. The strange thing is that I’m fine doing a 28-hour train journey but not a 12-hour flight. Oh well.

LA was kinda cool as far as the weather is concerned. I think the temperature must have been around 20 degrees and I think that’s OK for me. After getting out of the airport I took a shuttle to get to the hostel that I’m going to put myself up for the night. A pretty decent hostel, I must say, though i would probably need to get use to staying in a room with 7 other guys.

After putting down my stuffs I went for a walkabout in Hollywood, where I’m staying in right now. Saw the famous Chinese Theatre and the Kodak Theatre, took some pictures of the Walk of Fame, basically doing what other tourists would do (and also saw that big big Hollywood sign up on the hills!). And then I took the LA Metro to try to go to other places, but ended up going to only Chinatown because I was too tired to go anywhere else. Ended up falling asleep on the train, but I managed to make it back to Hollywood alright.

Basically my first impression of LA is that it doesn’t seem to be a very warm city as far as the people are concerned. I mean, the roads are clean, there aren’t that many vehicles and people, so life is relatively much quieter. But then for one reason or another I don’t seem to feel that the Americans are as friendly as all my friends have been saying. In fact somehow I kinda think they are a bit cold towards others. Hopefully this first impression is not going to be a lasting impression.

And the thing now is that somehow I have this feeling that I might not enjoy this US trip after all. Perhaps it’s too early for me to be making such a comment, but somehow I don’t seem to be enjoying myself any more than the way I do in Hong Kong. Perhaps the reason is that I’m not familiar with this place, but somehow I find that I’m too scared about everything here. I know perhaps I should keep an open mind about everything, so I shall just contribute it to the initial fear that everyone would have when they are in a new environment alone. I think as the days go on I’ll get better.

I know US is not an easy place to hang around in, but I guess I’ll manage somehow. Wish me luck.