Eight Fifteen Oh Six / Los Angeles I

Hey Everyone!

First off, my apologies for not updating the blog sooner. A number of people I have been talking to recently still think that I'm in Japan...

First to finish off my travels.... My last few days overseas were spent in Kyoto, the ancient capital of Japan, famed for hundreds of intact temples, shrines and sights - the city supposedly spared on purpose by American bombers during WWII.) Yet for some reason, I was not expecting to be impressed. I'm not certain why, but perhaps because I had just spent time in Tokyo, a mega-opolis where nothing seems sacred and progress/technology were the rule, perhaps because it seemed like another tourist destination with requisite temples and palaces. I was, happily, quite wrong... the temples and palaces of Kyoto were beautiful, running the full range from serene and austere to extravagant and imposing. My favorite was the Fushimi Inari Shrine, where thousands of torii (red arches symbolizing the entrance and exit to the spirit world) wind their way up a mountain along side statues of the fox guardian spirit. I'm so glad I went, just to get rid of my askewed view that the whole country is like Tokyo.

Things were busy when I returned to California. Pediatric wards was a very busy month (despite assurances that things would slow down in the summer months), I took step 3 (which I passed... whew), saying goodbye to all the San Jose friends (even now, looking back, I realize again what amazing friends I found there this year), going to Ngoc's wedding (wonderfully simple and she was, of course, beutiful) then whole moving to Los Angeles. Driving the uhaul down to LA was an ordeal in itself (the right side mirror was fixed so I could only look at the side of the truck instead of the next lane) but I did make it down in one piece...

Only to find that I had the wrong address (which I had given out to everyone!)... luckily, it was only a few blocks away and Harsha met me at our real place... Our place is on the second floor of a house done in the spanish villa style. It would need some work but we could see that the place had solid potential with its hard wood floors and large open spaces. The first night I slept alone with my boxes and left half the light on (it's creepy being in an empty old place by yourself). Jeff arrived the next day and since then we have done quite a bit of work on the place - painting several rooms, moving in the furniture, putting up our pictures, getting plants and herbs, new ceiling fans and curtains, building a couch, personalizing our rooms... I feel like we've infused lots of character into the place and now it feels a lot more like home. The only thing left is to meet the neighbors downstairs... And, of course, guests need to visit, so if you're in the LA, drop me a line :)

Sadly, the one thing I don't have at our place is proximity to work. It usually takes me a half hour to get to UCLA and 45 minutes to Oliveview (the two hospitals I mainly work at) but can take over an hour when when traffic is bad - and in LA traffic is almost always bad. Also despite being a pretty calm person, I totally get the road rage when I'm sitting in bumper to bumper traffic - I just don't like losing the hours I have of freedom stuck on the freeway.. d'oh... I think I have to get some books on tape or something.

The other thing is that I have not met a whole lot of new people yet here in LA... well, that's not quite true, I've met lots of new people at work but haven't had a chance to really hang out with them. The problem with Emergency medicine is that at any time a third of the residents are always working and a third are sleeping so it's always tough to find a good time to meet up. But I have been hanging out long time friends who are now here though - previous roommates, people from college and from Boston - and that has definitely been good. But I feel restless when I am not doing new things or meeting new people (as if I'm afrid of becoming stagnant or sluggish - just the way I am, I guess.) So, I've decided to join a couple of new endevours. One is a book club/writing group and the other is Treepeople, which a is a group dedicated to planting and maintaining trees in the LA. This works in well with my recent desire to become more environmental as well...

I always considered myself an environmentalist and have tried to as much as possible given my limited time with work and school. But after seeing An Inconvenient Truth (highly recommended) and reading recent news articles about the state of the Earth today (from massive coral bleaching to acid rains in the tropics to the looming oil crisis), I felt like we should all pay more attention to our world. It's hard to pay attention to the Amazon (over 5000 acres lost everyday) or global warming when we still need to live our lives but I feel like one day, we're all going to wake up and it'll be too late to save the amazingly beautiful places and incredible diversity in the world. And that's just sad. Anyway, I've decided to give up beef and pork (unless it's a special occasion) and try to be vegeration at least one day a week. I am trying to be more stringent on recycling and using energy saver light bulbs and products. And of course, helping to plant trees whenever I can. Not a huge start but every little step counts and it helps me feel a bit better...

And now all of LA lies before us and numerous adventures await... stories will come...

ps. a caption of the last four pictures:

Harsha painting his room... of course, the effort was well worth it as his room now shames the rest of the house... I'm not kidding.. he even put up track lighting...

Us during the first few days living in our place... the pot lids are being used for food because Jeff's plates had not arrived yet...

After things are settled a little more, Harsha and I decided to bake a cake for Jeff's b-day... he was enthusiastic to say the least :)

And, of course, sunny California skies...