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12 sure signs you were born and raised in Los
Angeles

By Colin Heinrich On
April 7,
2014 · 9
Comments

Photo: Ian
Broyles

1. You’re not from “Los Angeles.”

We’ve got a lot of pride in our city, but it’s second to a more localized
loyalty. A team prefixed by Los Angeles wins a championship, sure, the whole
town riots as one. But if somebody sits down in a bar next to a guy born and
raised in LA and asks where he’s from, that guy isn’t going to say he’s from Los
Angeles. That guy is from Santa Monica. Or Culver City, or West Hollywood, or
any other individual city that makes up the megalopolis that is LA.

It’s not that we hate each other (although there’s a fair amount of snobbery
that goes on). It’s just that Los Angeles as a city is so diverse that each
neighborhood/city has turned into a niche, sheltering the inhabitants from the
horrors of having to adapt to other people. It’s like the nation-states of
Ancient Greece, with better hot dogs and worse drivers. America may be a melting
pot, but Los Angeles is a box of chocolates, and the caramel doesn’t like being
called the coconut.

Ignore this fact and you risk — shudder — being called a tourist. Or
worse — a transplant.

2. Most conversations involve directions.

Everybody laughed when Saturday Night Live did “The Californians,”
but people in Los Angeles sat confused for a moment, running the listed
directions through their head and seeing if they made sense. It’s like an
unconscious disease that’s wormed its way into our minds, where we constantly
need to know the fastest way from point A to point B at any given time, because
hey, you never know when Olympic will back up for a few miles when you’re trying
to get home.

It gets worse in the car, where it’s nearly impossible to have a conversation
about anything else. Picture this: a passenger consulting Waze, and two more
debating with the driver whether going all the way to the 405 will save time.
And that’s just on the way to the grocery store.

3. Traffic doesn’t really even bother you anymore.

On the other hand, sometimes you really can’t be bothered to take 40 turns
just to get home after a long day of work. The 405 is packed, but there’s
something Zen, something stereotypically Californian, about sitting in traffic
with the window down listening to music without a care in the world.

Most people would get frustrated. Tourists gape at the prospect of taking two
hours to drive 10 miles. Those tourists usually have a reliable public
transportation system back home. Probably one that even takes them all the way
to the airport, the spoiled bastards. Angelenos have had to deal their whole
lives. Like a blind man whose other senses have had to work harder to
compensate, Angelenos have learned to cope with the facts of life. Our sense of
patience is working overtime.

Photo: noisemedia

4. But you’re still holding out hope for a subway to the sea.

We act like we’re not jealous of all those Londoners with Oyster cards and
the Chube. We’ve adapted. But secretly, every time whispers go around about a
subway extension (at least once a year), we turn into giddy little kids on
career day dreaming about the day they become a fireman.

Oh, could you just imagine! Cheap and reliable service to LAX and Venice
Beach! People have made dozens of imaginary maps of what it could look like,
with so many lines and stops that construction wouldn’t be finished until the
sun exploded. They’re the kind of drawings teenage girls do in their notebooks,
only replace her future wedding dress with a way to get home from the bars that
doesn’t include an angry taxi driver.

There are steps being taken nowadays. Legislation being passed, new stops
being put in. But Los Angeles’ economy looks like Adam Smith and John Maynard
Keynes straight up took a dump on it. There’s a 70-year backlog on potholes that
need filling. Right now, that subway to the sea may be a fairy tale, something
people born 10 years from now might one day enjoy. But there’s no shame in
holding out hope.

5. You’ve accused somebody of being a transplant as an insult.

When somebody from Los Angeles gets mad, the first reaction is to call the
offender a transplant — somebody who just moved to the city. To be fair, there
are a shit ton of transplants here. Naïve blonde chicks from Ohio who skipped
college to try and make it as an actress, and hey, they’ve got a casting session
in the valley with some dude they met in a bar!

More
like this: How to piss off an Angeleno

But it’s not exactly something to be ashamed of, and locals still use it as
their go-to method to be as offensive as possible. The driver that cuts them
off? Transplant. The guy who doesn’t know how to merge? Transplant. The idiots
crossing the road when you have a green light? Better believe that’s a fucking
transplant.

Half the transplants come out when you’re behind the wheel. The other half
come out when you believe somebody is misrepresenting Los Angeles, forgetting
the fact that in a city of 3 million people, there’s bound to be some differing
opinions. There will probably be a transplant comment in the comments of this
very article. To hear an average Angeleno tell the tale, there would be only
five “real” Angelenos in the entire goddamn city.

6. You avoid Hollywood like the plague.

The Hollywood sign is an international icon. So are the Chinese Theatre and
the Walk of Fame. With such a rich culture, steeped in the tradition of film and
glamor, surely Hollywood must be the place to be for spotting the hippest
celebrities and getting just a glimpse of the movie star treatment. Right?

Here’s the flaw in that logic: Why the hell would anybody, celebrities
included, go someplace filled with people specifically trying to ogle their
every move? There are two types of people actually in Hollywood. Transplants and
tourists who didn’t think things through, and homeless people dressed as
Spider-Man ready to stab them for taking a picture without paying.

Hollywood, especially Hollywood and Sunset Boulevards, is a bona fide
shithole. Mr. Rogers’ star on the Walk of Fame is in front of a sex shop. All
the glamor of the Academy Awards is an annual marketing machine. People from Los
Angeles are at least aware of that.

7. You get unnaturally attached to mediocre local food joints.

A little over a year ago, Henry’s Tacos closed its doors. La-di-da, right?
Except Aaron Paul of Breaking Bad tweeted out an attempt to save the
restaurant, and people piled out in droves. There were petitions and sit-ins.
More celebrities gave their support to the little taco stand in North Hollywood.
Of course, it ended up being for naught — the shop still closed down — but the
support and outrage was huge.

Here’s the thing: Henry’s Tacos was pretty standard fare. In a town like Los
Angeles, you could throw a burrito in the air and hit a better Mexican joint.
What made it special was the fact that it had existed in the same spot for 50
years. Remember that neighborhood loyalty we talked about way back up in #1?
People are fiercely protective of neighborhood institutions, and when you grow
up getting the same taco every Wednesday, you get attached. Nostalgia is a tasty
seasoning.

Every Angeleno has a local joint they go to, and while it may not be their
favorite — they might not even go very often — they would be devastated to find
out it was shutting its doors. Let’s see a McDonald’s pull that off.

Photo: Courtney
“Coco” Mault

8. But you still take friends from out of town straight to the In-N-Out near
the airport.

…But that’s not to say we hate chains. In-N-Out isn’t some small local fare
by any means — they’re in Texas now for God’s sake — but there’s something about
the mystique of the secret menu and its refusal to franchise that makes it feel
distinctly Californian. And it started just outside of Los Angeles, so we can at
least pretend it’s ours.

By now, everybody’s heard of In-N-Out and the secret menu’s out, so when
friends come to visit, they always want to try out the Animal Style they’ve
heard so much about. One of the most convenient locations is on Sepulveda, just
near the exit to LAX, so the line is always packed with foreigners wondering why
the menu is so sparse and locals trying to get one last Double Double before
they go away for a while.

You’d think there would be some kind of hipster effect, where Angelenos start
to hate it as it proliferates outwards, but the food is just too good. I can’t
stay mad at you, 3×3 Animal Style with Animal Fries.

9. You cringe at the word “hella.”

Los Angeles and San Francisco have a bit of a one-sided rivalry. San
Francisco hates LA. They hate our better weather, they hate our “vapid culture,”
and most of all they hate the Dodgers. Meanwhile, Los Angeles doesn’t mind San
Francisco. The rain and fog is a nice break from the 364 days of sunshine we get
a year. The Giants may win their share of baseball games, but Dodger Dogs are a
damn good consolation prize. Nobody from LA will talk shit on San Francisco in
any serious manner.

Read
it: Why San Francisco hates Los Angeles

But there’s one thing we can’t forgive: the word “hella.” It’s nails on a
chalkboard. If you’ve never heard it before, think of it like a synonym for
“very.” So, “Dude, I’m pretty hungry,” becomes, “Yo, I’m hella hungry.” It’s
just…why? The worst part is that nobody can explain why we hate it so much. We
Angelenos say words that probably sound just as stupid to other people. But
hella, man. It’s so, really, very annoying.

10. You get anxious at the prospect of jaywalking or parking.

When I first started going abroad, people would cross the street wherever the
hell they wanted. I didn’t get it. They would run into the street right in front
of cars, even police cars, as if they were playing a real life game of Frogger,
and nobody batted an eye. I had to fight to swallow my anxiety before I could
follow.

It’s not that I was afraid of being hit by a car. It’s conditioning. In Los
Angeles, the police won’t hesitate to pass out jaywalking tickets to anybody
brave enough to step off a curb before the little green man beckons from across
the road. You laugh at that scene in Harold & Kumar. We nod in
humble sympathy. Of course, we have a ton of unsolved crimes, but somehow
passing out jaywalking tickets takes precedence. Gotta get that city budget back
up to snuff, I guess.

It’s the same with parking. Whenever you park, you feel a biological
compulsion to read through every detail of the ticketing times. When you’re
abroad, these roughly amount to “don’t park here at night.” In LA, you can park
on one side of the street every other day for two hours in the morning except
Tuesdays which is one hour and every other day you can park for six hours but
only if you have a permit. At a certain point, you just say “fuck it” and park
elsewhere. And you’ll still come back to find a ticket left a minute after the
time expired.

11. You’re fanatical about at least one of Los Angeles’ sports teams.

Maybe you’ve heard: Los Angeles has sports teams. And they’re pretty damn
good. So good, in fact, that some of their best rivalries don’t even leave the
city. Bryant #24 jerseys are so popular that half the people wearing them
couldn’t name another player, and the Clippers handed the Lakers their worst
loss in team history this year. The Kings won the Stanley Cup recently and
single-handedly turned a city into hockey fanatics (bandwagon or not, the city
loves its hockey). Without a professional football team, we’ve turned USC and
UCLA into one of the greatest rivalries in sports, where people who attended
neither pick sides.

Sports practically run this town. The very health and stability of the city
hinges on whether or not one of our teams is in the running for the National
Championship, and there’s gonna be a riot no matter the outcome. A city so broke
it gives out jaywalking tickets will foot the bill for a parade if there’s a
win.

Of course, this isn’t localized to Los Angeles. Everybody either loves us, or
loves to hate us. But there’s something about getting free tacos in the Staples
Center after a Lakers win that tastes oh so good.

12. You consider car chases a sport.

Speaking of being the national champions. Los Angeles is so good at car
chases we have dedicated apps to let us know when they’re on TV. That’s when we
crack a beer and cheer on our boys in blue as they zip through the streets in
the ultimate contact sport. The news anchors are the announcers. The times the
perp almost gets away are the touchdown plays. When the chase gets within a few
blocks of your house, that’s a home game, and you better be craning your neck
for a glimpse of the action.

Hell, OJ Simpson is our standing MVP in football and the chase.

It’s a morbid sport, sure. A lot of people aren’t into them. But like I said,
people in LA are desensitized to traffic, and that includes the traffic hurtling
50 miles an hour down the wrong side of the road. In a town so driven by cars,
you gotta insert a little levity into the equation. That’s the real mark of an
Angeleno.

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On summitting Makalu When your boyfriend travels abroad to propose to you

About The Author

Colin Heinrich

Colin spent his childhood being dragged kicking and screaming across America.
As an adult, he realized he's a glutton for punishment, and now he's throwing
himself across the world. He lives for the story and will do anything for the
experience of it, though his friends don't agree that's an excuse to eat that
cricket in Thailand. Colin enjoys guacamole (that cricket could have used some),
music festivals, and that place in Joshua Tree that looks like a Salvador Dalí
painting if you look at it the right way. Follow his adventures at http://www.elsewhereman.com/.

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view all → Colin
Heinrich

Howl

I wasn’t planning on commenting on the entertainingly accurate article, but
Henry’s Tacos re-opened. They’re across the street and 2 or 3 places down from
where they were before

david

In reference to #6-Hollywood wasn’t always that way: As a teenager in the
70′s, Hollywood Blvd and surrounding environs were THE place to party!–but
only at night after the tourist marks got scared off by the local denizens
that only come out after the sun goes down. Glendale, Pasadena, Burbank, etc…
would all go back to snubbing each other when the sun came up: but from 8pm to
4am we were all the children of the glittering dark and Hollywood(+Griffith
Park) was our realm!

Matina

Truth^^^

Loner

Ha, hella. I’m gonna hella use that word whenever I visit
now.

AdrianRR

I barely agree with any of this but it’s better than what I would write
myself. Although, notable changes are no, we don’t go for mediocre. We are
attached to seemingly mediocre places including strip mall food. But the money
goes to the food not the rent & deco. Our Tacos Mexico and Astro Burger
taste way better than the chemical BS that comes from franchises. We are ok
with traffic because we have weed, and perhaps some other reasons too. I am
extremely UN-fanatical about sports, and so is everybody I know. Jaywalking
and parking is an issue I agree. By the way, just in case someone wants to
mention that we are scared of snow they are a recent transplant because up to
about 15 years ago we regularly had over 100″ of snow in the local
mtns.

Claire

As a born and raised Angeleno, I absolutely relate to all of these things
(besides the sports thing. I’m pretty sure every city likes their sports
teams). These are things that I talk about with my friends all the time.
However, I would recommend that the next time the author regurgitates an
article from 7 months ago he makes sure the new piece doesn’t appear with a
link to the old piece smack dab in the middle of it.

enriqueroldan

you forgot el pollo loco, tacos de cabeza, sesos and burritos de azada.
Horchata in hot summer days. Wrestling days at the olympic auditorium. Las
carnitas at el mercadito at east LA. Los raspados. To talk in spanish ! yes si
senior ! That means your from LA

Fun

But the TV show “Californians” is so true. I’m from L.A. and people do talk
about the freeway often. haha

Operator7G

1. Yes, I am.
2. No (and I don’t know what you’re talking about).
3.
Incorrect.
4. Nope. It’d be nice but grew up without it and don’t expect
one anytime soon.
5. Not exactly. Only to clarify that when people are
complaining about Angelenos, they’re pretty much complaining about
transplants. Most people are amazed that I was actually born in Los Angeles
and not even a suburb or city in LA County.
6. I avoid it like a lousy
experience but venture in to go to Amoeba or a show at the Pantages or El
Capitan.
7. It’s unnatural to be nostalgic? Grow a heart.
8. HELL NO.
I’d never take anyone to a fast food joint unless they asked to. There are
plenty of better places for burgers and fries.
9. Heard it plenty on a
“South Park” episode not much much aside form that.
10. When it comes to
losing a limb crossing the street or paying $85 to park, yeah, I might get a
little anxious.
11. We have sports teams?
12. No.

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