Before deciding to move out to Los Angles, I had only visited it once over a decade ago. I had a fabulous experience being a tourist eating Pink’s hot dogs, eating at the delicatessen that Larry King used to frequent, and eating from the many “A” rated restaurants. You see a pattern here, right I like to eat. I like to eat out. I also like to shop. I even shop Amazon with great pleasure. I love that I can get many items delivered same day.  That is total instant gratification without the hassle of having to deal with people. That is a true definition of win/win to me. When I visited Los Angeles over a decade ago, I didn’t go to any of its malls. However, based on popular culture I knew that Los Angeles is the land of malls and the valley girl. Many moons ago, I did watch the movie Valley Girl with Nicholas Cage.  I have also seen, multiple times, the movie Clueless which is where I learned that all Californians say “as if” continuously.

I also learned about the mall culture of Los Angeles in where people, especially young ones, hang out there. That was not my experience growing up in the South Bronx.

During the past few weeks, I finally made my way to a couple of malls in the Los Angeles area. I will admit it here, I liked them. Both malls had some kind of filming going on that added to the chaos of shopping but it was part of the LA experience to be had.

First, I checked out the Citadel. It is a shopping outlet that I can’t seem to make my way through. I’ve been there twice and I get hungry and tired mid-way. I’m not a teenager and thus opted to eat an actual sit-down meal and get some rest. I even took in a glimpse of the filming of Anericas Next Top Model. I didnt catch Tyra there. Perhaps she has moved on? The stores are wide and varied. If you have a child there are a lot of children’s clothing stores. What impressed me the most, however, were the restrooms. 

The restrooms were super clean, spacious and comfortable. Who ever says that about a mall restroom? In Anthony Bourdain’s Kitchen Confidential he notes you should check out a restaurant’s restroom first as that will give you an indication of their overall cleanliness. Indeed. I might apply this advice to malls going forward.

Then I made my way several times now to the Glendale Mall. It’s so large that it has an indoor mall that would take hours to wall as well as an outdoor mall with lawn concierge service. Yes, that is true. They provide you with blankets, they play music and kids run carefree through the grass. 

 There was some singer, perhaps actress, signing autographs at the mall. Somehow it was related to Cotton but I didn’t really get it. I might have been the wrong demographic. As I walked through the mall I saw all the high school cliques one could think of. There was one group that I labeled Pretty Little Liars. I watched and wondered if I had ever walked around like that. Expecting to be stopped and asked if I had ever considered modeling, acting or just being in a reality show. It’s that latter option that many seemed to be going for. Seemed to me that there were those that wanted to be the next Kardashian. Not that there is anything wrong with that. Ha!

As I sat resting my weary knees, I caught a glimpse of an image of the past or so what I imagined. In my film classes (yes, even I have taken film classes and loved them all) I learned about art installations and I was thus happy to sit and watch a window display that reminded me of the days when I wondered whether I would go onto film school, law or psychology. What a trippy moment that was. Thank you LA.