LA trip (part 1)
Aug. 25th, 2016 08:52 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sarea
Here's the LA trip recap! adelagia wrote the entire thing up, so it's written in her perspective; she also coded the page while I did most of the photo taking/processing. My additional comments in bolded brackets []. :D
Summer vacation ahoy! Earlier this spring,sarea_okelani and I decided, after discovering that The Wizarding World of Harry Potter was opening up at Universal Studios LA, that it was imperative we be there. And, of course, no trip of ours is without amazing food; we split our trip up into first, an Asian Food Odyssey, and then Universal, and a handful of other tentative events in between.
DAY 1: YOU WON’T LIKE THAT
Our flight was in the early afternoon, so we started our day at IHOP to fill our tummies enough to tide us over till arrival in LA. Sarea’s cousin was kind enough to offer us a ride to the airport; we got there early and through the security check with no trouble at all, so all we had to do was wait at our gate. Sarea got us a lovely hot chocolate from Dilettante Mocha Café.
Waiting…
Sarea: "I just had a horrible thought. I’m not sure if my aunt’s house has wifi."
Adelagia: "[gasp] How will I send my Sims to work?"
Sarea: "How will I update my farm??"
We arrived at our destination with little fuss (aside from the lady sitting opposite the aisle from me chomping her way through a neverending bag of Doritos – I find the sound of open-mouthed chewing one of the most gut-twistingly annoying things in the world, so this was, suffice it to say, unpleasant). Sarea’s aunt picked us up and also let us stay at her beautiful house. There was, thank the gods, wifi.
[Unfortunately, my aunt's house is large and their wifi is weak, so it only worked in one 'wing' of the house. It is just as ridiculous as it sounds, in all the ways you can imagine. So I didn't really get to update my farm all that much, because the wifi worked in the part of the house that was STIFLING HOT, due to the fact that the house was having major repairs done to its air conditioning, which had failed when K., D., and the kids were there visiting a few weeks earlier. The air conditioning did work in the room we stayed in, and we had the overhead fan on the whole time.]
She and her husband then took us out to dinner at Upland Kebab. They know the owner, so asked him to serve whatever he wanted. Sarea asked about their yogurt drink and was told she wouldn’t like it, but he brought her a sample of it anyway. It turned out quite tasty, as expected. What do you take us for, sir? Amateurs?
[It was a lightly 'seasoned' plain yogurt drink. I'm guessing most people don't like it because it's not sweetened...]
We were served a platter of ground beef, chicken, salmon, lamb, and more beef, plus salad and rice.
He also recommended that we sprinkle sumac on the meat – it’s a red spice made from grinding up a sour berry – and brought us a lovely homemade garlic paste, both delish.
[They were so good! I was really surprised about the sumac. It was amazing seasoning on the meat... and yet when eaten alone, it really did taste just like a sour berry, which is what it is.]
DAY 2: STOP YELLING AT ME!
We had a leisurely swim in the morning untiljade_okelani arrived, and we carried on our merry way to Garden Café, a Chinese American restaurant – they put a Chinese touch on American food, so you get things served with a side of your choice of rice or spaghetti. With a pre-arrival phone call, Jade used her magical charm to get the host to seat us ahead of other people even though they don’t take reservations and there was a line out the door when we got there.
Jade got a chicken steak and pork chop, Sarea the braised oxtail, and I the baked ox tongue spaghetti. They also came with soup and a drink.
[All the entrees at this place come with a side of rice or spaghetti. Because we're on vacation, and don't have a great way to store/eat leftovers, my desire was to not have any. And thus the following conversation ensued:
Waitress: Rice or spaghetti?
Me: Neither, thanks.
Waitress: No rice? No spaghetti?
Me: Yeah, just the ox tail. Thanks.
Waitress: *takes other orders*
Waitress: *to me* It won't taste good without rice or spaghetti.
Me: Uh...
Waitress: You should get one.
Me: Okay... which do you recommend, then?
Waitress: Why don't you get the spaghetti.
Me: Okay.
I really felt like I had no choice at that point but to cave. People of my culture are so pushy!]
We went to Half & Half Tea Express after lunch (despite not being able to finish all of lunch). Sarea really likes the honey boba they have here, so we all got variations of ice milk with honey boba (and pudding). It was very sweet; none of us could finish!
[I have since learned that the kids are into a different drink place now; Half and Half Express is passe. I can't keep up.]
During trip planning we were also searching for other things to do between meals and trawling events on GoldStar. We came across tickets for Escape LA, an escape room experience where you’re locked in a room for an hour, during which you have to solve myriad puzzles to get out. The trouble was, it preferred bookings to be at room capacity (10-12), which meant that we’d very likely get lumped in with several other groups. Not the greatest of circumstances for us – I mean, who likes being locked in a room with a bunch of strangers? Also, we wouldn’t have felt comfortable enough to either pitch in ideas or to stand our ground if others disagreed.
This led us to searching for other places that would take our group alone, and we found one that not only guaranteed we’d be the only group in there with a minimum of three people, but it also had a Harry Potter-themed room! It was meant to be.
And so we arrived at Square Room Escape, ready for the Chamber of Secrets challenge, the "story" being that, unbeknownst to everyone, the basilisk that Harry had defeated had laid an egg and it was up to us to find and destroy it. This was the first escape room we’d ever done so we were not really sure what to expect, except failure. We lived up to expectations, getting stuck and/or misdirected multiple times. In fact, our deep knowledge of Harry Potter lore hindered us, as we got much too far into HP trivia to try to solve things when we should have just used normal logic or observation skills instead.
Most escape rooms will let you ask for hints, and the guy who helped us out was incredibly nice. When our time ran out, he let us finish the rest of the challenge as he said we were fairly close to the end and the next group hadn’t arrived yet – though he probably wasn’t banking on us taking an extra half hour, by which time he had to chivvy us along by telling us exactly what to do ("It’s on the paw. It’s on the paw!") though he then immediately apologized, as if he’d broken some kind of gamemaster code.
Jade: "Excuse me, sir, the puzzle is at fault."
[I'm pretty sure she was yelling that from within the bowels of where the basilisk resided, so had an exclamation point at the end. :))]
Even though we didn’t escape properly and made the next group start late, the guy was still nice and said we did fine, considering it was our very first one (and, as we later found out, the Harry Potter room was rated hard). He also warned us that it would be addictive, and he was right. The experience awakened some kind of collective escape room monster in us and we all wanted to immediately do another one.
Instead we went to dinner at Sam Woo, despite still being kind of full from lunch/bubble tea. Sarea got barbeque pork/roast duck with noodles; Jade got the same but with rice; I got fish congee. We didn’t take pictures of any of this, for some reason, and none of us realized until several weeks later.
Ice-cream at Handel’s was planned after this, but we were all full to bursting, so we wasted time by wandering around a Dollar Tree, where Jade got some picture frames and we all got cute sunglasses.
And then to Handel’s – Jade got a four-scoop sampler of chocolate, vanilla, strawberry, and Graham Central Station; Sarea got an ice-cream sandwich; I got pistachio ice cream.
We went back to hang out at Sarea’s aunt’s pool for a while and made plans for doing another escape room. …Or two.
DAY 3: IT’S JUST WATER
Sleep will not come to this tired body now…
Sarea: "[awakens to find Adelagia reading, again] Have you been doing that all night?"
Adelagia: "No, thankfully. I think I got about four hours."
Sarea: "Oh good. That’s more than I thought you would."
Adelagia: "Well, it was good enough for Margaret Thatcher."
Sarea: "Is that the nerdiest thing you’ve ever said?"
Adelagia: "It might be."
Breakfast was at Le Pain Quotidien, as recommended by Sarea’s cousin. Sarea had forewarned me that all waiters in the LA area were going to be hot ("Don’t just go with the first one you see. You have options"); lo and behold, our waiter was indeed.
We both got the toasted Paris ham and gruyere croissant. Sarea wanted their watermelon cooler, but they hadn’t started making it yet, and I had coffee, which was awful. Sarea also, on our waiter’s rec, had their five-grain bread and the Petit Dejeuner to go, for her aunt and uncle. It came with juice and coffee (that neither of us wanted), and the waiter dropped in an extra brioche for her.
Next, shopping! Sarea wanted to get a tank top for our day at the beach the following day, so we stopped at Goodwill first. She found a couple of cute tops, but not what she actually went in for. I found nothing except a sneezing fit, because I am apparently allergic to thrift. We tried our luck at Ross after that; Sarea got three more tops and I continued sneezing at the low, low prices.
We went back to the house, fished out a few leaves and bugs from the pool, and had another relaxing swim until we got hungry and headed out to Spicy Home, a Sichuanese place. We got the dry hot pot with pork intestines and vegetables, an appetizer mix of pig’s ears, wood ear fungus, and cucumbers, and non-spicy dan dan noodles.
[Despite the fact that it was all unnecessarily spicy, this was probably one of my favorite meals of the trip. It was delicious! I just wish my mouth wasn't numb halfway through.]
The hot pot was SO SPICY our mouths went numb. We had to give in and ask for ice water, bringing shame upon our houses and ancestors.
To further remedy our burned, tingling mouths, we went for Taiwanese shaved ice next, but not before calling a nail salon to see if they could take us afterward. The woman who answered the phone agreed that they could, but at precisely five o’clock and not a minute later.
We waffled a bit on whether we had time for shaved ice, given how salty the nail salon lady was, but decided to go for it anyway. At Class 302, we created our own shaved ice wonder: milk snow, mango, strawberry, and passionfruit jelly.
Doesn’t that look scrumptious? Believe me, it was. Oh, how it was. How do they do it? It’s ice! How do they shave it into ribbons? How is it so creamy? I have so many questions! It was also quite large, so we struggled a bit towards the end.
Sarea: "I can’t eat anymore."
Adelagia: "It’s just water. Have some water."
We did manage to finish it all, and got back on the road to Princess Nails. Traffic was heinous – everything they say about traffic in LA is true; it’s terrible all the time everywhere – so our ETA was about 10 minutes outside of what we’d initially aimed for. Sarea called the salon to say that we’d be late. This time it was a guy who picked up; he seemed unconcerned and told us to take our time.
Sarea picked a deep red for both her fingers and toes; I went with a pinky lavender for my fingers and sparkly periwinkle for my toes. They all turned out fine, though we both kind of regretted our color choices a little afterwards. While we were sitting and waiting for our nails to dry (and lamenting the fact that no nail salons seem to use Seche Vite even though it is the quickest drying top coat in the known universe), we examined the different types of nail styles they had on display.
We agreed that the ones that come to a point were too sharp (stiletto), the next grade down still too sharp (ballerina coffin – who names these things??), and their opposite, the flare duck, was incomprehensible except in the case of needing to engage in some light digging.
At this point in the write-up, I have discovered that the style of the tapered nail with a flat top is called either ballerina or coffin, not a ballerina coffin, which makes much more sense now.
Dinner was at The Congee. It specializes, as you may have guessed, in congee. We got a preserved egg/shredded pork one (which was recommended by Sarea’s mom) and an abalone/chicken one. The former was fine – it’s a classic and hard to really improve on; good ones are good – and the latter was surprisingly good; we weren’t expecting actual slices of abalone for the price that it was. Well done, The Congee.
[I have no idea why my family -- not just my mom -- recommended the preserved egg one. I don't know if they just didn't season it when we got it, or what, but it was practically flavorless! Esp in comparison to the abalone one. When I told everyone that we liked that better, they were like, oh we didn't even try that one, because we figured there wouldn't be any actual abalone in it! THIS IS WHY YOU SHOULD TRY NEW THINGS, FAMILY.]
DAY 4: WE’RE BOYCOTTING THIS BEACH
We packed up early and left Sarea’s aunt’s house for the breakfast special at The Noodle – a main, side, and a drink. Sarea had the pig hock noodle, zha liang (rice noodle wrapped around a Chinese donut – which another cousin of hers hilariously calls ‘oil stick’; to be fair, that’s how the Chinese literally translates, but I still laughed and laughed), and Hong Kong milk tea. I had dumpling noodles, xian jian bing (Chinese salty donut – though not actually salty), and milk tea.
CostCo next, because we needed to get gas and also Sarea wanted to check if they had gift cards for a restaurant in the area. We had checked another CostCo the previous day without luck, but a guy working there assured her that this CostCo would have what she was looking for. How wrong he was.
We stopped by Dollar Tree again, as we had accidentally left our sunblock at her aunt’s house. We stood in line behind a woman who appeared to have depleted the store’s entire supply of assorted stuffed animals, primarily frogs. Sarea thought she might be trying to recreate Lady Gaga’s Kermit coat.
Laguna Beach was next on our hit list. We walked along the water’s edge for a bit, sidestepping all kinds of seaweed and kelpy things, and picked a place on the sand to sit down for a while.
Sarea: "Oh, we should’ve brought our books."
Adelagia: "I guess we’ll just have to enjoy each other’s company."
Sarea: "Nonsense!"
We’d parked ourselves close by to a large family group, who seemed to have no end of complaints about the beach, such as lifeguards wanting to avoid them and also having no wifi. At the beach. At one point, after speaking to a lifeguard (unfortunately I couldn’t hear their conversation, but it seemed to have had something to do with the length of his rescue tube), one of the women came back to the group to announce unhappily that "we’re boycotting this beach," despite then taking a seat and staying for longer than Sarea and I did.
[What was wrong with those people, seriously. You're at a fucking gorgeous beach, you're not working, and it's a beautiful day. Stop your braying and sit the fuck down.
Also, here's a gif of beautiful Laguna Beach. It might take awhile to load, but I think it's worth it!
]
Also overheard at the beach, somewhere behind us: "It burns!"
And: "I ran a half marathon in May, and then my toenail fell off." This, in response to her friend, whose big toenail had just come off.
We both got sunburnt.
A pit stop at Trader Joe’s for cold drinks, and then towards Tavern on 2, a "dive" that Sarea had seen on Guy Fieri’s Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives and featuring a surf and turf of pork belly and octopus that we were very keen on putting in our mouths. Tragically, they did not have this dish anymore. We tempered our misery with sticky pig tails, crispy Brussels sprouts, bone marrow, and a short rib sandwich.
For some reason I felt slightly ill towards the end of the meal – possibly from the long afternoon in the sun – and so we packed up all the leftovers for Jade, apart from the Brussels sprouts, which we took back with us to the hotel, and it made our fridge reek something awful.
[It makes me sad that this meal made you ill, because it was actually quite good, I thought! I wasn't as enamored of the sticky pig tails as I thought I would be from watching the show, but everything else was really good, esp the Brussels sprouts and short rib sandwich, mmm. The bone marrow wasn't very bone marrowy. Also, after this meal I went to Banana Republic and bought a couple pairs of shorts, because the only kind of shorts I'd brought to LA were athletic/workout shorts, and those went with exactly NONE of my outfits. Yet it was so hot that I really wanted to be in shorts!]
Afterward, we met Jade at Salt & Straw. We’d initially encountered Salt & Straw during our travels in Portland a couple years ago; it was and continues to be the best ice-cream place we have ever been to. As such, it was with immense joy that we discovered that there were several LA branches as well. However, to my great disappointment, the Portland and LA menus are slightly different, to account for local ingredients, and the LA branches didn’t have the flavor of my heart, Arbequina olive oil. I went instead for the roasted strawberry/white chocolate, which was good and what Sarea and Jade also got (along with Sarea’s perennial favorite, sea salt/caramel), but still not quite as satisfying as olive oil.
We then drove to our hotel, The Garland, and weren’t quite sure where to park. A helpful valet motioned us over, and after a cheerful barrage of questions and directions, said, "I see that I am confusing you," and told us to park in a valet spot while we checked in and then get back in the car to find a real parking spot afterwards.
The young lady at the check-in counter was similarly confusing as she gave us the daily schedule for the free shuttle to Universal Studios, informing us that the driver follows the schedule, but that there was "no pattern, so don’t try to find one. Just follow the schedule."
We later realized that "no pattern" meant that it didn’t run hourly or half hourly or anything like that, but it would have been less perplexing had she simply given us the shuttle schedule and let us figure out the timetable ourselves.
Part 2 awaits you!
adelagia wrote the entire thing up, so it's written in her perspective; she also coded the page while I did most of the photo taking/processing. My additional comments in bolded brackets []. :DSummer vacation ahoy! Earlier this spring,
sarea_okelani and I decided, after discovering that The Wizarding World of Harry Potter was opening up at Universal Studios LA, that it was imperative we be there. And, of course, no trip of ours is without amazing food; we split our trip up into first, an Asian Food Odyssey, and then Universal, and a handful of other tentative events in between. DAY 1: YOU WON’T LIKE THAT
Our flight was in the early afternoon, so we started our day at IHOP to fill our tummies enough to tide us over till arrival in LA. Sarea’s cousin was kind enough to offer us a ride to the airport; we got there early and through the security check with no trouble at all, so all we had to do was wait at our gate. Sarea got us a lovely hot chocolate from Dilettante Mocha Café.
Waiting…
Sarea: "I just had a horrible thought. I’m not sure if my aunt’s house has wifi."
Adelagia: "[gasp] How will I send my Sims to work?"
Sarea: "How will I update my farm??"
We arrived at our destination with little fuss (aside from the lady sitting opposite the aisle from me chomping her way through a neverending bag of Doritos – I find the sound of open-mouthed chewing one of the most gut-twistingly annoying things in the world, so this was, suffice it to say, unpleasant). Sarea’s aunt picked us up and also let us stay at her beautiful house. There was, thank the gods, wifi.
[Unfortunately, my aunt's house is large and their wifi is weak, so it only worked in one 'wing' of the house. It is just as ridiculous as it sounds, in all the ways you can imagine. So I didn't really get to update my farm all that much, because the wifi worked in the part of the house that was STIFLING HOT, due to the fact that the house was having major repairs done to its air conditioning, which had failed when K., D., and the kids were there visiting a few weeks earlier. The air conditioning did work in the room we stayed in, and we had the overhead fan on the whole time.]
She and her husband then took us out to dinner at Upland Kebab. They know the owner, so asked him to serve whatever he wanted. Sarea asked about their yogurt drink and was told she wouldn’t like it, but he brought her a sample of it anyway. It turned out quite tasty, as expected. What do you take us for, sir? Amateurs?
[It was a lightly 'seasoned' plain yogurt drink. I'm guessing most people don't like it because it's not sweetened...]
We were served a platter of ground beef, chicken, salmon, lamb, and more beef, plus salad and rice.
He also recommended that we sprinkle sumac on the meat – it’s a red spice made from grinding up a sour berry – and brought us a lovely homemade garlic paste, both delish.
[They were so good! I was really surprised about the sumac. It was amazing seasoning on the meat... and yet when eaten alone, it really did taste just like a sour berry, which is what it is.]
DAY 2: STOP YELLING AT ME!
We had a leisurely swim in the morning until
jade_okelani arrived, and we carried on our merry way to Garden Café, a Chinese American restaurant – they put a Chinese touch on American food, so you get things served with a side of your choice of rice or spaghetti. With a pre-arrival phone call, Jade used her magical charm to get the host to seat us ahead of other people even though they don’t take reservations and there was a line out the door when we got there. Jade got a chicken steak and pork chop, Sarea the braised oxtail, and I the baked ox tongue spaghetti. They also came with soup and a drink.
[All the entrees at this place come with a side of rice or spaghetti. Because we're on vacation, and don't have a great way to store/eat leftovers, my desire was to not have any. And thus the following conversation ensued:
Waitress: Rice or spaghetti?
Me: Neither, thanks.
Waitress: No rice? No spaghetti?
Me: Yeah, just the ox tail. Thanks.
Waitress: *takes other orders*
Waitress: *to me* It won't taste good without rice or spaghetti.
Me: Uh...
Waitress: You should get one.
Me: Okay... which do you recommend, then?
Waitress: Why don't you get the spaghetti.
Me: Okay.
I really felt like I had no choice at that point but to cave. People of my culture are so pushy!]
We went to Half & Half Tea Express after lunch (despite not being able to finish all of lunch). Sarea really likes the honey boba they have here, so we all got variations of ice milk with honey boba (and pudding). It was very sweet; none of us could finish!
[I have since learned that the kids are into a different drink place now; Half and Half Express is passe. I can't keep up.]
During trip planning we were also searching for other things to do between meals and trawling events on GoldStar. We came across tickets for Escape LA, an escape room experience where you’re locked in a room for an hour, during which you have to solve myriad puzzles to get out. The trouble was, it preferred bookings to be at room capacity (10-12), which meant that we’d very likely get lumped in with several other groups. Not the greatest of circumstances for us – I mean, who likes being locked in a room with a bunch of strangers? Also, we wouldn’t have felt comfortable enough to either pitch in ideas or to stand our ground if others disagreed.
This led us to searching for other places that would take our group alone, and we found one that not only guaranteed we’d be the only group in there with a minimum of three people, but it also had a Harry Potter-themed room! It was meant to be.
And so we arrived at Square Room Escape, ready for the Chamber of Secrets challenge, the "story" being that, unbeknownst to everyone, the basilisk that Harry had defeated had laid an egg and it was up to us to find and destroy it. This was the first escape room we’d ever done so we were not really sure what to expect, except failure. We lived up to expectations, getting stuck and/or misdirected multiple times. In fact, our deep knowledge of Harry Potter lore hindered us, as we got much too far into HP trivia to try to solve things when we should have just used normal logic or observation skills instead.
Most escape rooms will let you ask for hints, and the guy who helped us out was incredibly nice. When our time ran out, he let us finish the rest of the challenge as he said we were fairly close to the end and the next group hadn’t arrived yet – though he probably wasn’t banking on us taking an extra half hour, by which time he had to chivvy us along by telling us exactly what to do ("It’s on the paw. It’s on the paw!") though he then immediately apologized, as if he’d broken some kind of gamemaster code.
Jade: "Excuse me, sir, the puzzle is at fault."
[I'm pretty sure she was yelling that from within the bowels of where the basilisk resided, so had an exclamation point at the end. :))]
Even though we didn’t escape properly and made the next group start late, the guy was still nice and said we did fine, considering it was our very first one (and, as we later found out, the Harry Potter room was rated hard). He also warned us that it would be addictive, and he was right. The experience awakened some kind of collective escape room monster in us and we all wanted to immediately do another one.
Instead we went to dinner at Sam Woo, despite still being kind of full from lunch/bubble tea. Sarea got barbeque pork/roast duck with noodles; Jade got the same but with rice; I got fish congee. We didn’t take pictures of any of this, for some reason, and none of us realized until several weeks later.
Ice-cream at Handel’s was planned after this, but we were all full to bursting, so we wasted time by wandering around a Dollar Tree, where Jade got some picture frames and we all got cute sunglasses.
And then to Handel’s – Jade got a four-scoop sampler of chocolate, vanilla, strawberry, and Graham Central Station; Sarea got an ice-cream sandwich; I got pistachio ice cream.
We went back to hang out at Sarea’s aunt’s pool for a while and made plans for doing another escape room. …Or two.
DAY 3: IT’S JUST WATER
Sleep will not come to this tired body now…
Sarea: "[awakens to find Adelagia reading, again] Have you been doing that all night?"
Adelagia: "No, thankfully. I think I got about four hours."
Sarea: "Oh good. That’s more than I thought you would."
Adelagia: "Well, it was good enough for Margaret Thatcher."
Sarea: "Is that the nerdiest thing you’ve ever said?"
Adelagia: "It might be."
Breakfast was at Le Pain Quotidien, as recommended by Sarea’s cousin. Sarea had forewarned me that all waiters in the LA area were going to be hot ("Don’t just go with the first one you see. You have options"); lo and behold, our waiter was indeed.
We both got the toasted Paris ham and gruyere croissant. Sarea wanted their watermelon cooler, but they hadn’t started making it yet, and I had coffee, which was awful. Sarea also, on our waiter’s rec, had their five-grain bread and the Petit Dejeuner to go, for her aunt and uncle. It came with juice and coffee (that neither of us wanted), and the waiter dropped in an extra brioche for her.
Next, shopping! Sarea wanted to get a tank top for our day at the beach the following day, so we stopped at Goodwill first. She found a couple of cute tops, but not what she actually went in for. I found nothing except a sneezing fit, because I am apparently allergic to thrift. We tried our luck at Ross after that; Sarea got three more tops and I continued sneezing at the low, low prices.
We went back to the house, fished out a few leaves and bugs from the pool, and had another relaxing swim until we got hungry and headed out to Spicy Home, a Sichuanese place. We got the dry hot pot with pork intestines and vegetables, an appetizer mix of pig’s ears, wood ear fungus, and cucumbers, and non-spicy dan dan noodles.
[Despite the fact that it was all unnecessarily spicy, this was probably one of my favorite meals of the trip. It was delicious! I just wish my mouth wasn't numb halfway through.]
The hot pot was SO SPICY our mouths went numb. We had to give in and ask for ice water, bringing shame upon our houses and ancestors.
To further remedy our burned, tingling mouths, we went for Taiwanese shaved ice next, but not before calling a nail salon to see if they could take us afterward. The woman who answered the phone agreed that they could, but at precisely five o’clock and not a minute later.
We waffled a bit on whether we had time for shaved ice, given how salty the nail salon lady was, but decided to go for it anyway. At Class 302, we created our own shaved ice wonder: milk snow, mango, strawberry, and passionfruit jelly.
Doesn’t that look scrumptious? Believe me, it was. Oh, how it was. How do they do it? It’s ice! How do they shave it into ribbons? How is it so creamy? I have so many questions! It was also quite large, so we struggled a bit towards the end.
Sarea: "I can’t eat anymore."
Adelagia: "It’s just water. Have some water."
We did manage to finish it all, and got back on the road to Princess Nails. Traffic was heinous – everything they say about traffic in LA is true; it’s terrible all the time everywhere – so our ETA was about 10 minutes outside of what we’d initially aimed for. Sarea called the salon to say that we’d be late. This time it was a guy who picked up; he seemed unconcerned and told us to take our time.
Sarea picked a deep red for both her fingers and toes; I went with a pinky lavender for my fingers and sparkly periwinkle for my toes. They all turned out fine, though we both kind of regretted our color choices a little afterwards. While we were sitting and waiting for our nails to dry (and lamenting the fact that no nail salons seem to use Seche Vite even though it is the quickest drying top coat in the known universe), we examined the different types of nail styles they had on display.
We agreed that the ones that come to a point were too sharp (stiletto), the next grade down still too sharp (ballerina coffin – who names these things??), and their opposite, the flare duck, was incomprehensible except in the case of needing to engage in some light digging.
At this point in the write-up, I have discovered that the style of the tapered nail with a flat top is called either ballerina or coffin, not a ballerina coffin, which makes much more sense now.
Dinner was at The Congee. It specializes, as you may have guessed, in congee. We got a preserved egg/shredded pork one (which was recommended by Sarea’s mom) and an abalone/chicken one. The former was fine – it’s a classic and hard to really improve on; good ones are good – and the latter was surprisingly good; we weren’t expecting actual slices of abalone for the price that it was. Well done, The Congee.
[I have no idea why my family -- not just my mom -- recommended the preserved egg one. I don't know if they just didn't season it when we got it, or what, but it was practically flavorless! Esp in comparison to the abalone one. When I told everyone that we liked that better, they were like, oh we didn't even try that one, because we figured there wouldn't be any actual abalone in it! THIS IS WHY YOU SHOULD TRY NEW THINGS, FAMILY.]
DAY 4: WE’RE BOYCOTTING THIS BEACH
We packed up early and left Sarea’s aunt’s house for the breakfast special at The Noodle – a main, side, and a drink. Sarea had the pig hock noodle, zha liang (rice noodle wrapped around a Chinese donut – which another cousin of hers hilariously calls ‘oil stick’; to be fair, that’s how the Chinese literally translates, but I still laughed and laughed), and Hong Kong milk tea. I had dumpling noodles, xian jian bing (Chinese salty donut – though not actually salty), and milk tea.
CostCo next, because we needed to get gas and also Sarea wanted to check if they had gift cards for a restaurant in the area. We had checked another CostCo the previous day without luck, but a guy working there assured her that this CostCo would have what she was looking for. How wrong he was.
We stopped by Dollar Tree again, as we had accidentally left our sunblock at her aunt’s house. We stood in line behind a woman who appeared to have depleted the store’s entire supply of assorted stuffed animals, primarily frogs. Sarea thought she might be trying to recreate Lady Gaga’s Kermit coat.
Laguna Beach was next on our hit list. We walked along the water’s edge for a bit, sidestepping all kinds of seaweed and kelpy things, and picked a place on the sand to sit down for a while.
Sarea: "Oh, we should’ve brought our books."
Adelagia: "I guess we’ll just have to enjoy each other’s company."
Sarea: "Nonsense!"
We’d parked ourselves close by to a large family group, who seemed to have no end of complaints about the beach, such as lifeguards wanting to avoid them and also having no wifi. At the beach. At one point, after speaking to a lifeguard (unfortunately I couldn’t hear their conversation, but it seemed to have had something to do with the length of his rescue tube), one of the women came back to the group to announce unhappily that "we’re boycotting this beach," despite then taking a seat and staying for longer than Sarea and I did.
[What was wrong with those people, seriously. You're at a fucking gorgeous beach, you're not working, and it's a beautiful day. Stop your braying and sit the fuck down.
Also, here's a gif of beautiful Laguna Beach. It might take awhile to load, but I think it's worth it!
]Also overheard at the beach, somewhere behind us: "It burns!"
And: "I ran a half marathon in May, and then my toenail fell off." This, in response to her friend, whose big toenail had just come off.
We both got sunburnt.
A pit stop at Trader Joe’s for cold drinks, and then towards Tavern on 2, a "dive" that Sarea had seen on Guy Fieri’s Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives and featuring a surf and turf of pork belly and octopus that we were very keen on putting in our mouths. Tragically, they did not have this dish anymore. We tempered our misery with sticky pig tails, crispy Brussels sprouts, bone marrow, and a short rib sandwich.
For some reason I felt slightly ill towards the end of the meal – possibly from the long afternoon in the sun – and so we packed up all the leftovers for Jade, apart from the Brussels sprouts, which we took back with us to the hotel, and it made our fridge reek something awful.
[It makes me sad that this meal made you ill, because it was actually quite good, I thought! I wasn't as enamored of the sticky pig tails as I thought I would be from watching the show, but everything else was really good, esp the Brussels sprouts and short rib sandwich, mmm. The bone marrow wasn't very bone marrowy. Also, after this meal I went to Banana Republic and bought a couple pairs of shorts, because the only kind of shorts I'd brought to LA were athletic/workout shorts, and those went with exactly NONE of my outfits. Yet it was so hot that I really wanted to be in shorts!]
Afterward, we met Jade at Salt & Straw. We’d initially encountered Salt & Straw during our travels in Portland a couple years ago; it was and continues to be the best ice-cream place we have ever been to. As such, it was with immense joy that we discovered that there were several LA branches as well. However, to my great disappointment, the Portland and LA menus are slightly different, to account for local ingredients, and the LA branches didn’t have the flavor of my heart, Arbequina olive oil. I went instead for the roasted strawberry/white chocolate, which was good and what Sarea and Jade also got (along with Sarea’s perennial favorite, sea salt/caramel), but still not quite as satisfying as olive oil.
We then drove to our hotel, The Garland, and weren’t quite sure where to park. A helpful valet motioned us over, and after a cheerful barrage of questions and directions, said, "I see that I am confusing you," and told us to park in a valet spot while we checked in and then get back in the car to find a real parking spot afterwards.
The young lady at the check-in counter was similarly confusing as she gave us the daily schedule for the free shuttle to Universal Studios, informing us that the driver follows the schedule, but that there was "no pattern, so don’t try to find one. Just follow the schedule."
We later realized that "no pattern" meant that it didn’t run hourly or half hourly or anything like that, but it would have been less perplexing had she simply given us the shuttle schedule and let us figure out the timetable ourselves.
Part 2 awaits you!
