and now, boston: fana in california, part 2

Thanks to the scheduling possibilities of a junior dance company, Fana unexpectedly had a few days in L.A. at the end of the tour. So to complete the California experience, I met up with her down there for some sightseeing as well. This was a little more tricky since I've never actually lived in L.A., but I think we pulled it off. I'd selected four or five possible stops for our day, since I was meeting her in the afternoon after her demonstration performance and wasn't sure which of the various landmarks Fana would want to see. A real trooper, she decided we could do them all! So that's what we did. Our first stop was for food (Trini priorities), at the Los Angeles Farmer's Market, which has a number of permanent shops. One we particularly enjoyed is called 'light my fire', and it has every major pepper sauce you can think of. We saw lots of West Indian brands, including Matouk's, Grace, and others. Didn't buy any, though. For lunch we had delicious Mexican food from a stand that's apparently won lots of city-wide awards. It was fantastic. Here are some pictures of that stop:

The next two stops were Hollywood, where we walked down the Avenue of the Stars, saw famous hand and footprints and the Hollywood sign; and Rodeo Drive, where all the fancy shops are. In Hollywood we also walked through the front of the Kodak Theatre, where the Academy Awards show is held every year. By the time we were leaving Rodeo it was rush hour, and we found ourselves stuck in some of L.A.'s legendary traffic... Eww... Cars in every direction on the road as far as the eye can see - Churchill Roosevelt style. Through some miracle of impatience and dumb luck I eventually got us out of the mire that our planned route had become, and onto a much less crowded street that took us to the coast. Here's Fana investigating the cement signatures at Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood.

We ended at Santa Monica, at sunset. We contemplated going to the beach so Fana could wet her feet in the (cold) Pacific for the first time, but the beach as you can see is quite large, and we were - well - tired. We settled for pictures. In this picture you can see the Santa Monica Pier in the background, with Highway 1 (which runs along the coast for the entire length of California) in the foreground.