Travel
California critters
by Sarah Catherall
It takes all kinds, especially in LA.
I shake the chauffeur’s hand, conscious that I stink. On our night flight from Auckland to Los Angeles, Mia, my 10-month-old, vomited. For 11 hours. Over my clothes, the airline seats, tissues and tea towels.
“Welcome to LA,” says the driver, holding up a sign bearing my name at the LAX arrivals gate. “How was your flight?”
His silver Lincoln is so polished that I can see my reflection in the door. It confirms that I look like I feel. I lay my daughter on her blanket to protect the leather upholstery.
We whizz along LA’s wide roads. My driver tells me that he’s been driving limousines since 1980. He used to drive a van for “the studios” but loathed the long hours.
“You know the great thing about LA?” my driver asks, one arm resting out the window. “There are no critters. It may be warmer in New Mexico but they have critters. We got rid of ours. You have them in Australia, right?”
His Lincoln purrs into the entrance of the Beverly Wilshire Hotel, just across the road from glittering Rodeo Drive. Richard Gere and Julia Roberts had a love affair here in Pretty Woman. Elvis Presley lived here while working for Paramount Studios. John Lennon chose it as his base when he was estranged from Yoko.
Porters greet me. One opens my door, one takes my bags, and one chats to the driver. One accompanies me to reception. The hotel entrance boasts six huge vases, bursting with orange paeonies. The elevator has wooden panelling and marble floors shine beneath each chandelier. A woman with pencil-thin legs waits at reception, clutching her Gucci bag and pursing her collagen-injected lips.
Our suite has a marble bath, super king-size bed and a cot for Mia, complete with a teddy bear wearing a jacket in hotel livery. The porter stacks my suitcases in the wardrobe.
“Is that all miss?” he taps his cap. “Is there anything else I can help you with?” Jet lag hits me and I want him to leave. “No, no, thanks very much.” I want to shoo him out the door like a fly. He walks over to the side lamp by the bed. “This is the switch for the light,” he gestures. Of course. I hand him a couple of dollars.
Outside again, I realise I’m underdressed: white trainers, cotton skirt and T-shirt. Just to shop here, you’re supposed to wear heels so high that your feet run perpendicular from your shins. Your lips should be stained bright. Your make-up must be thick enough to stand the heat.
On my way to the Nike superstore I spot my first celebrity. The black man dressed in black Nike gear and trainers is the musician Seal. A fan poses next to him for a photograph.
My husband, Jeremy, arrives and we head to West Holly-wood, which sells clothes I’m likely to wear. We manage to find a park on Robertson Boulevard – if we wanted to, we could zoom into a valet booth and get someone to park it for us. We’re in Paige Premium Denim’s retail store on this hip shopping strip and, like a celebrity, I’m treated to a private fitting. Two assistants begin handing me pairs of jeans. “You look like a size 25,” one correctly guesses. Within minutes, I have 20 pairs of jeans in the dressing room. They won’t let me try on a straight cut, and we settle on bootlegs in every style imaginable. Embroidered pockets, different washes, some with holes, some without, some dark, some light, black, blue. Jeans pile up like a mountain on the floor and start to look the same. An hour later, I walk out with a $US230 pair of jeans, promised they will be “a push-up bra” for my “ass”.
A septuagenarian woman intercepts us back at our hotel, where we retreat to rehydrate in the rooftop pool. Carrying a gold-tipped cane and a Chanel bag, she stops to coo at Mia, turning to Jeremy: “Are you the daddy or the nanny?”
After we dine that evening at the glitzy Koi in West Hollywood, the paparazzi are back at our hotel, standing beneath hundreds of tiny lights strung across the side gate. “Who is here?” I ask the porter. No evidence of a privacy act here: he confides that Tom Cruise is somewhere inside.
I settle for a chat in the foyer with Sandy, a blonde woman in her early thirties, and her mother, from Philadelphia. Sandy’s white toy dog, Cody, sticks a tiny head out of her small black handbag. “He goes everywhere with her in that,” her mother confides. “Cody goes to work with her in that bag.”
The mother and daughter are in LA to find Cody an agent. Sandy hopes that Cody will become a television star. The next day, they’re paying their bill at reception. “Guess what?” Sandy oozes. “They’ve called him back for a second showing. I’m so proud,” she gushes, cuddling her bag as Cody’s head peeks out the top.
LA’s not entirely free of critters.
