random post I didn't post last fall 2010

The summer has flown by again-fast as ever.

I'm back in Los Angeles spending my time between sitting in bumper-to-bumper traffic that would put parking lots to shame while juggling a cigarette and a mug of scalding coffee, or straining to pay attention to my irrelevant anecdotally inclined professor ramble on about meeting porn stars with tropical fruit allergy rashes in Belize in a freezing classroom at Santa Monica College at 8 am, or nodding off while perched on a precarious stool in front of an ancient computer at mom's flower shop whittling away the hours until 6 pm only to sit in more traffic puffing away and occasionally shaking my fist at the cars next to me.

Despite this summer of marine biology classes and GRE prep classes and driving back and forth and across Los Angeles in ridiculous traffic during all hours of the day, there have been several noteworthy, truly "summer-y" moments interweaved through the routine tedium.

• 1 lb. ground Lamb
• 1 lb. ground Beef (20% fat)
• 1/4 cup chopped Onion
• 1 tsp chopped Thyme
• 1 tsp minced Garlic
• 1 tsp Sharmula (cumin, cardamum, ginger)
• t tsp Harira
• 1 tsp Salt
• 1 Tsp Olive Oil

שכונה שלי

I spent much of last summer on my bike.

There's nothing quite like a long bike ride through the cool breeze at twilight as the unbearable valley heat ebbs and the sky streaks a deep auburn across the horizon into a lush golden lavender that beckons a deep blue balmy night. I pop my head phones in and a soundtrack accompanies my solitary ride through the smooth back roads of the neighborhood.

Cars whiz by, wistful couples stroll hand in hand, intrepid joggers weave through the mostly sparse foot-traffic, kids with scooters wearing colorful, goofy helmets haphazardly dodge other pedestrians as their exasperated parents chase after them dragging their overtired miniature dogs, and fellow bike riders switch on their blinking night lights as the neon sun expires beneath the cool blanket of night.

Most times I stick to this road that parallels the busy, honking mess that is Ventura Boulevard because it offers a mobile serenity much needed after a long, sticky day stuck on the 405 or the 101. Sometimes I bike through and to the park where I spent so many of those summer afternoons spread across the grassy knolls listening to the chorus of ducks and geese, gliding through the nostalgic haze of summer time barbecue smoke only to reappear on the other side onward past a somnolent golf course where I spent weekends of my youth lugging around my cumbersome clubs.

I've been a valley girl, if you will, for more than a decade now, and it's still a facet of my identity that surprises me despite the vehement pride I unhesitatingly express for the valley to the chagrin and mocking incredulity of other, "real" Angelenos.

Having grown up in the heart of Hancock Park on the edge of Beverly Hills where I spent the formidable years of my childhood collecting leaves and roly polies with Tiffany in the backyard, my move to the valley some eleven years ago still seems just like yesterday. Much of highschool was spent at Blue Cafe, the drive-thru of In-N-Out and couches at friend's houses. I walked and ran with Polly every night for six of the past ten or so years, but I never ventured much further than my usual route, and if I did, it was only within a block radius of my house. It was only recently, during my short vacation bouts at home that I really started to explore my neighborhood.

Maybe it was my time spent abroad for a year, especially the time spent in Israel that has opened my eyes to the substantial presence of Israelis in my neighborhood, but whatever it was, I've noticed more than ever before, the Middle Eastern tang that permeates this stretch of Ventura between Winnetka and Hayvenhurst.

I'd always known there were many Persians in my neighborhood because most of my neighbors seemed to have these beautiful, exotic yet difficult to pronounce names. And I knew of the Jewish presence because of the Orthodox jews who would walk to the temple in front of my house every Saturday. However, I don't think I was aware of the extent of this Mid-Eastern presence in my neighborhood and on my daily life. Maybe all along it was subliminal messages that surrounded me for all those impressionable years of highschool that pushed me to learn Arabic as soon as I entered college and then find myself traveling through the Middle East. Mom, there's your explanation!

Having come back home after such an incredibly difficult and wonderful semester in Israel, nothing made me happier than having uncharacteristically taken the Ventura route one day on my bike to rediscover my neighborhood with the addition of Hebrew interspersed with Farsi along every block and at each corner Starbucks.

I spent a solid week biking up and down Ventura capturing the best and most typical scenes and images that represent what really is a taste of the Middle East in who knew?, the valley. Let me share with you these vignettes I so cherish into my neighborhood. And man, that's real LA when you can find a kosher sushi bar, and a random Korean girl can read the Arabic script on your Farsi signs and tell you she met your uncle, the one that drives a taxi, in Eilat last January.

Welcome to my hood-we even have our own Aroma!

Let's start this again

Woke up this morning feeling less than fabulous. Thus, I'm still frolicking in my pajamas listening to John Mayer, and I've never quite appreciated how nice barefoot and flannel feel in lieu of the usual scratchy slacks and hells (excuse me, I meant heels) on an early friday afternoon.

It's almost been a year since I've updated this blog, and it's quite sad because I come up with post ideas more often than I have the time for. I'll come to this page every so often ready to write, but then I reminisce about all those past posts that never were, and I get disheartened and then distracted by something on perezhilton.com (LaLoca did what?) or by mama checking in to ask if I'm eating (yes.), then if I've gained weight (maybe.). And of course, school started again for me this past year..real school, I mean including all the reading (huh?) and studying (what's that again? No lo ha(th)emos en Cadi, pichaa.).

Since my last post finishing up my roller coaster semester in Cadiz, I took off for two weeks traveling in Italy (with Karia and meeting Jeni in Rome) before spending two last nights in Cadiz eating diablillos and professing our love to the server at Cumbres Mayores, walking up and down the coast with Paco trying to beat the sunset back to downtown and drinking Cruzcampo with the Italians while burying our toes in the cold sand next to the waves.

Returned to Los Angeles, plumper and tanner, around the end of June and spent that summer...wow, I can't even remember what I did that summer that was remotely productive. But that summer was marked by long bike rides at dusk with Arya, lots of movie watching, (re)discovering my hood and trying out different Israeli and Middle-Eastern restaurants, afternoons laughing at ducks at the park while we sprawled across the warm grass, improv comedy shows at the Upright Citizens Brigade, random "Hollywood" nights, hiking on weekends, fires that lasted for days, and long car rides to nowhere because we had nothing to do and nowhere to go. And that was fine.

Nothing could have mentally prepared me for the culture shock I'd feel upon returning to Wellesley. What a rough start that was...this excerpt from an email sums it up nicely:
" Returning to Wellesley was difficult-readjusting to the intense Wellesley bubble, re-acquainting myself with old friends, reassimilating into the community...there was a lot of re-doing going on."

Despite the rough start, last semester at Wellesley could really vie for one of the best. (No, who am I kidding. Second semester sophomore year at Casa was the best.) SKEMjay and Skulls was established, I was going out to Boston at least three to four times a week, I had visitors come share my humble yet cozy abode with a most spectacular view of the lake especially at sunset, visited my St. James' crew down in NYC, drove to Vegas for a weekend of debauchery during Thanksgiving break with Neese and Sean to celebrate my 21st (also when Sean got swine flu LMFAO, sorry dude. Glad you were there!), reconnected with the K-posse from freshman year from insane asylum Freeman, and I met someone, as someone else put it, "just like you, but with eyebrows."

After a whirlwind winter break of numerous family dinners, weekend trips to the mountains so my mom could "see snow", bonfires at the beach and subsequent drinking reunions, lots of driving back and forth across the 101 and the 405 at three in the morning, day trips to Santa Ines and San Diego with long stops at the beach, adventures in the kitchen with some pretty incredible and tasty creations, dates to the museum, the zoo, the bowling alley, the blacklight mini golfing, more visits to downtown LA than ever before in my life, first tattoos and more family hiking and photography trips to Malibu, I scrounged up a place on Craigslist, and here I find myself, on a friday afternoon in mid-March, staring out the window on a rainy, dreary day, still in my pajamas, still listening to John Mayer, in Falls Church, Virginia.

More updating later. I have too many nostalgic thoughts swimming in my head.

ps. miss you lots SKEMjay.

Finish off strong, friends, and see you soon!!