Flagstaff, AZ

flagstaff is a proper little frontier town bisected by the rail road and route 66. i love the railroad, the freight trains thunder past every 1/2 hour or so and you can hear them all over town as the train drivers hoot their horns really loud. i met a girl that rides the railroads and now i keep on looking out for the freight carriages that are comfortable to stow away on. to be honest there aint much to do here except watch the trains go by but its nice to be in a small town after just being in cities. the highest mountains in arizona overlook the town and the centre is somewhat wild west in character. yesterday i went hking in the grand canyon. its so beautiful. i have been told its awesome, huge, mindblowing etc. but no one told me how beautiful it is. you look out and its like looking at the sea with islands rising out of it, it just seems such an infinate expanse. there is such a variety of rocks of different colours, black and tan and red and white, and they seem to change colour as the light changes throughout the day. also the view changes so much as you move around which is surprising as its so vast you would think that a few hundred feet difference in position wouldnt alter anything. its an amazing thing to see because you couldnt really draw it or describe it, you just have to see it to really experience it. so im going to shut up about it now.

What Happens In Vegas Stays In Vegas

this phrase actually refers to all the money spent in vegas, it stays in vegas and that is why there is so much opulence. anyway there are basically two ways of doing anything - the sensible, clever way, and the vegas way. (fun game to play whilst drinking - whenever you say vegas you have to say baby afterwards. if you were american you would probably turn this into a drinking game. i wouldnt though) so i set out to walk the strip in the evening in order to take in some neon with absolutely no intention of going out, when whilst walking along i here shouts of how much?! its people from my hostel with a car. now i am easily won over by the opportunity of travelling in a car, they have novelty as i am so infrequently in one. also in american where car is king it has an added allure, so i join them. sightseeing becomes punctuated by stopping for drinks etc. you can guess the rest. in vegas, baby, the standard drink seems to be an ice margarita, which is a huge cup of slush puppy flavoured with margarita. they have a certain novelty even if they are a bit sickly. its also quite popular to drink them out of giant plastic cups with straws that are shaped like your casino ie in paris you get an effiel tower shaped cup. why you would want to drink alcohol like this i dont think i will ever understand. naturally i ended up in a club. now the one good thing about clubs in vegas is they usually have an outdoor dancefloor. there is nothing quite like dancing under a night sky especially when towers of neon surround you. the nevada climate is very suited to outdoor night dancing as well. meanwhile in the street a load of b-boys were having a dance off - this was very cool as they were intergrating lots of different styles like capoiera and clowning. back in the club i was dancing in my usual cringeworthy style to commercial hiphop. i was with a german guy who was a really good dancer so we were just encouraging each other. i dont think vegas knew what had hit it. (aside to anna - there is a cheesy hip hop song getting big in the states that samples better off alone. needless to say it was pretty bad but i was trying to explain to some americans who alice dj was. i didnt get very far) then i got back to the hostel at 5 and instead of going to catch my 6.20 greyhound bus with plenty of time to spare, i had a jacuzzi instead (yes, my $16 a night hostelhad a jacuzzi, it didnt bubble but at least it was warm). after a night on the tiles, if you cant have 8 hours sleep, a jacuzzi is the next best thing as it sooths all those aches and pains. then i nearly missed my bus and the next day i pretty much died a death.

Las Vegas, Baby

i arrived in vegas before dawn yesterday, i had been sleeping fitfully, aware that we were driving through a pretty much empty desert landscape and i awoke to all this neon ahead of us. the freeway travels alongside the strip which is all stupidly huge so you get an amazing view. (ah i'm writing this sat by the pool - yes hostels in las vegas have pools, i think everywhere in nevada has a pool - and theyve just whacked some reggae on the hi fi, ah thats better). i tried to walk the strip yesterday, its quite far since all the hotels are so huge theyre quite spread out. the first hotel i went to was called stratosphere and is the tallest building west of mississippi unbelieveably. its actually quite scruffy inside and it costs a bomb to go up the tower so i couldnt afford to do it. theres also a mini theme park at the top with the worlds highest rollarcoaster. most hotels in vegas have rollarcoasters inside them, they come as standard. my favourite hotel was the venetian, which is modelled on venice, sort of. venice itself is not very big so the half-size scale of everything is sort of near enough to be oddly familiar and its not quite as tacky as it sounds as its sort of done quite well. tacky is not quite the word for vegas anyway as its tacky on such a grand, impressive scale that even though its lacking in taste, you couldnt quite call it tacky. so yes, there is an indoor grand canal with gondoliers and a fake sky and even during the day is lit so its permanently twilight. there is a st marks square with opera singers and a bridge of sighs with barneys' branding on it. outside there is a ducal palace and 'rialto bridge moving sidewalk' four words that should never go together. the casinos are basically just shopping malls. in vegas they think everything is imporved with the suffix -shop. so there is grand canal shops, caesars palace has forum shoppe including a schwarz branded trojan horse.

my highlight of the day was going to bellagio (one of the poshest hotels on the strip) and having the all you can eat buffet. i ate about 2 days worth of food in one go. i had a plate of sushi and dim sum, then a plate of cold sea food, then all the fish and then a steak. it was the best steak i have ever eaten, it was from one huge steak about 1 1/2 " thick and then they give you a slice widthways so its all pinky goodness. how did i manage to eat so much you may well ask? well i stuck to protein and had no carbs but even so, haldway through the steak i started to have problems. i foolishly was wearing a skirt with a stiff wasteband which i had to undo and then i couldnt do it up again and i was basically a beached whale. oh and i had pudding because you cant not have pudding. i then had a bit of a fear and loathing moment where i staggered around the hotel having halluncinatory palpitations brought on by too many mussels. seriously i was drunk on too much food. in vegas music plays everywhere, even in the street, seemingly from nowhere. i was drawn towards some opera and there was this huge lake doing schycronized fountain shows to music every 15minutes with a half size effiel tower in the background. it was actually awesome. then i had to go back to the hostel and lie down..

I Leave The US (albeit briefly)

so yes, i met some people in the hostel and they managed to persuade me to go to mexico. when i initially mentioned the possibility of going to tijuana to my mother (its perhaps a 45 minute trip fom san diego in a rusty minibus) she sent me an article from the sunday supplements detailing all the gang crime and unsolved murders over the past year. however after reassurances that we would be fully escorted, i'd thoiught i'd give it a go, after all, the mexican people i meet in the states seem very nica and polite and i wanted to try some food. now we weren't going for a tour so much as a bar crawl. i couldve just gone on a taco shop crawl and been happy enough (i know the difference between tacos, fajitas and burritoes now by the way). i actually think the corona tastes worse in mexico, i think they make a more refined product for export to the uk. i know a bar crawl sounds pretty tacky but even if i didnt see anything of real mexico, at least i got an authentic experience of being an american tourist in mexico. ive already mentioned the bizarre and rowdy american attitute to drinking so don't think to harshly of me for what im about to detail.

yes, so, you drink slightly ropey corona. thats ok. then you come to drink tequila and seems to be the way its done everywhere. the bar man puts a towel under your chin while you tip back your head and he pours tequila down your neck. then he bowls a whistle incessantly whilst putting his hand over your mouth and shaking your head. now i dont have a problem with drinking tequila (although this stuff was a bit rough), i have a problem with some mexican guy shaking my head. all the other girls in our group got firemanlifted and spun around. i said to our escort - its a good thing he didnt try that with me because i wouldve got violent, and he said - yeah i told him not to because i could see by the look of your face it was a no go. too right. mexico is a catholic country, they would never treat a mexican woman like that. we finished off by going to a strip club. now i dont mind nudity or sexy dancing, i just dont like seeing sleazy men leer over woman, and our escort was like - your not going to like this then ho ho but really i dont like it much either its just everyone gets drunk and is like yeah lets go to a strip club and then they get there and actually all feel a bit digusted and want to go home. i wont go into the sordid details here as i want to keep this blog family friendly (a mexican prostitute did say i was beautiful though). those of you of an inquizitive nature can ask me when i get back. also when i get back there will be a lot of mexican food action going down at my house

I Visit A Bar

i'm staying in a beach hostel in San Diego. my hostel in LA had sea views too (it was a 'cotel' or collumnaded hotel) but this is a proper beach hostel with decking onto the beach and sand everywhere. even my bed seems to have a sand in it. i was lying on the beach when i wrote this and it was misty morning which was kind of nice as the sea seemed to appear from nowhere. there are lots of wading birds on the beach with me too, poking about for food in the sand. one has an extra long thin beak and extra long thin legs and when it runs it runs a bit like an ostrich which tickled me pink really. anyway this place has a proper friendly party party atmosphere which led me into having my first american bar experience (ok ive been in a bar in the us before with my uncle but it was in new york city and a fairly sedate affair). firstly, i have never seen so many flatscreen tvs in my life, not even in a curries, and they were all playing a different sport; american football, ice hockey, rodeo etc. and there was turtle racing (im not sure if this counts as animal creulty but it was quite entertaining) hosted by a girl dressed up as a ninja turtle. we had a sweepstake amongst our group and my turtle won, woop! i won $10 so actually managed to make a profit on a night out for the first time. but the whole place was really rowdy, not in a nasty way just in a very un-british was. if you broke a turtle racing rule you had to down tequila and milk (ewwh) and everyone chants and yells at you. and this was on a monday night. (the place was called murray's field. any comments natalie? i was probably in some equivalent of a wetherspoons) anyway later im goiing south of the border to tijuana (or TJ as the americans call it). so pray for me.

Only in LA...

1) doggy strollers. this is so when you go power walking along the beachfront you can push with you your tiny lapdog that cant walk more than 100 yards.
2) doggy day care. not just in beverly hills, in venice too.
3) the worst cab drivers in the world. they have no idea where they are going despite that fact the whole city is built on a grid and they have GPS. beggers belief.
4) skateboards are a legitimate form of transport
5) surfboard attachments for bikes
6) road numbers that run to the 10,000s
7) the most hyperbolic contemporary curators. saw an interview with one discribing an artists work as having the integrity of a rock and the infinaty of the sky.
8) all the clubs shut early at 2 apparently to stop the actors getting loaded and missing their morning calls
9) the bendy buses have 'transit tv - moving entertainment' where you can track the progress of the bus live on google maps
10) there was a spontaneous hippy gathering on the beach that lasted 24hrs with about 30 people playing bongos

Los Angeles

mmm LA is a strange place. its not helped that there are a lot of weird people knocking about. not interesting weird so much as scary weird. and its a nightmare trying to get anywhere which is starting to hack me off a little. i was writing this waiting from a bus from getty villa. it only comes about once an hour and does not seen to stick to the timetable so i was stuck waiting indefinately. thankfully although there was a motorway on one side of me, there was a beach on the other. the getty villa is a recreated roman villa (that sounds tacky, its actually not) with a large and notable collection of ancient artefacts. they have a $billions budget to spend every year so as you can imagine its pretty impressive. all the museums in the states seem to have endless budgets and no visitors.

hollywood on the other hand is a bit of a dump. all down the main boulevard where there is the walk of fame there are about a dozen shops that just sell slutty clothing for strippers. i'm kind of disturbed there is enough demand for this although i do like the wig shops. i think my favourite aspect was the cemetery. it called 'hollywood forever'. what a name. it has some good trees as well as some pretty fancy graves. rudolph valentino and johnny ramone are meant to be buried there but i couldn't find them.

My Appearance

i looked in the mirror today. this was a mistake. ive only been on the road about a week and my complexion has become what can best be described as ruddy, not exactly tanned although i now have lots of freckles and not exactly burnt although the tip of my nose and the ridge of my cheekbones twinge a little. my neck has definately burnt and has started to peel and go scalely. my skin is super dry for the wind and i am dependant on the chocolate chip cookie chap stick niamh gave me as a leaving present. my back aches from sleeping on the bus and my feet ache from walking miles and miles everyday. i went for a medicinal paddle today down by santa monica pier, which despite the unseasonally cool wind was quite busy. Angelians are a pretty cool laid back bunch altough they do like to say 'fucking' every other word.

also just to clear up a few myths here, greyhound buses are fine. the man at the ticket booth gave me a $350 discount on my pass because he liked me. you get to watch CNN in the departure lounge (im starting to love american news channels by the way, particularly fox) and there is security so no bums hang around at the termini. you also get a kind of tour of obsure branch locations of burger king.

my favourite thing so far in LA is grand central market. it is amazing, like burough market but a fraction of the price and is all mexican/japanese. there is a stall that just sells chilli spice and beans. for $2 i bought 2 small courgettes, 2 small peppers, 4 tasty looking plum tomatoes, some mushrooms and a massive bunch of asparagas. $2! and quality too. the asparagas is literally a tenth of the price at home. so far ive only been shopping at corner shops which are really expensive and rubbish. i also bought some hawiian fish stew for $3. you get a cup and the girl didnt fill it too the top so i thought far enough the cup is about the size of a bucket and then she put in some broccoli, a load of chicken and some king prawns for good measure. what does hawiian food taste like? answer im not sure since fish stew just tastes kind of fishy wherever its from but it was pretty tasty.

Area by Area (or thing by thing if you will, just some general bits and pieces)

NORTH BEACH is san fran's little italy. an italian lady shopkeeper was rude to me. first person to be rude to me since i got to america. i hate italiens. i also finally went to city lights bookstore. i think the main reason i wanted to go to san fransisco was just to visit this place. i went to a free poetry reading there featuring david meltzer. i think he's quite famous (american lit afficiandoes can i have some confirmation of this? i know i could just wiki him, but thats not really my style ) anyway everyone in the room laughed twice as loud at his jokes in a referential manner. the other poets were very good as well. i spoke to the one that was the best looking and got him to sign my book and told him to come to london to do a reading.

CASTRO is the gay district, but its a bit dull in a smart moneyed sort of a way. there is a beautiful cinema there though that was screening 'milk'. i love it when things are that predictable. i walked down fulsom which is the s&m street. on the subject there is also this amazing shop in the haight which i think operates just to provide clothing for gay club hosts and hostesses. they sell spandex hot pants in every colour of the rainbow amongst other things.

THE ART MUSEUMS are all predictably gorgeous. the MOMA is small but beautifully formed and i saw a good william kentridge show. i visited the fine art institute of the art school. the architecture is styed like a moorish church and it is right on top a hill with a roof terrance that has stunning views across the city. unbelievably it was open on easter sunday with studio access. sickening really. there is also a fairly impressive diego rivera mural in one of the galleries. i can't really think of anything camberwell has on a par with that.

MISSION is the east london/mitte part of town. i found a shop that sold nothing but 'zines and other bits fashioned by graphic design students. i also did some thrift shopping and bought a shell suit top with a sequinned parrot on it. the vintage shops are really good but friscan twats seem to generally dress like BRMC extras so all the good stuff is ripe for the picking.

OTHER THINGS TO NOTE are that the main shopping centre has the same name and logo as westfield in london. i'm not sure what that means. also i ate a big mac meal yesterday. it was pretty good but i'm not enough of a macdonalds regular to tell you if it was any better than ones at home but i swear the 'regular' size is bigger here. katie has dared me to get a supersize at one point. i'll let you know hat happens when i do.

Some Comments About Food

earlier i ate a 'super burrito'. it was pretty tasty but it was also about the same width has my upper arm although this was not really a problem as it was going to be my only meal for 16hrs. i had some spicy beef in it which tasted strangely like my dad's casserole, but in a good way. i was lounging and digesting this in golden gate park which is beautiful. it has good trees in it like english country estates do. i was at the haight-ashbury end of the park though so lounging around with me were lots of crusty casulties trying to sell cannabis to 13 year old kids and looking like they had been there since 1968.

back to the food. for breakfast i've been having two bagels with cream cheese, two glasses of orange juice and about 6 cups of coffee. this is my main meal of the day as for dinner i've been eating super noodles that i bought in the chinese supermarket. something i have discovered though is that americans will queue if its for good food. i was at a japanese festival yesterday (there was a japanese funk band playing - not as good as it sounds) and there was this enormous queue down the road for tyriaki burgers. english people wouldnt do this i don't think. they would settle for the non-meat based product that no one else wanted. similarly the farmers market in 'frisco is packed with a certain type and yummy middle class family that goes crazy for lavender salt and is willing to pay $20 a pound for smoked salmon.

Some Actual Details Relating To San Francisco

ok, i would have posted last night except i fell asleep at 8 in the evening partially due to jet lag but also due to having walked for 10 hours all day, but at least i saw a good deal of 'the city'. first i'm going to tell you some vaguely sensible and informative things about san francisco. the weather here is permanently set to perfect - i have to wear sunglasses all the time and every photograph i take seems to be overexposed. its not as hilly as some make out (people have bikes even) but certain hills are somewhat vertigo inducing and make your knees hurt if you walk down them. it reminds me of wales. san franciscans are pretty friendly. one helped me find my bus from the airport and gave me the 50 cents i was short a fare (because i'm stingy i didn't take the train or even the express bus but the local bus that stops everywhere, costs $1.75 and no visitors take.) however our attempt at conversation went as follows,
(him) where you from? (me) london
- whats the name of that other place in london? - err
- liverpool thats it, my friends from liverpool - thats up north. i like liverpool. its a good city
- my friend says its not so good to be from there - ah we call them scousers, i guess theyre considered a bit dodgy
- dodgy? like how? - well they like to pitch things (i would have said nick but i didn't think he would understand me not that he did anyway)
- pitch? - steal, but not really. its just a stereotype we take the piss out of
- i don't understand anything you say - i mean er make fun of
etc.

san franciscans are also what i would describe as militantly peacenik. examples of this - they are trying to ban army cadets, they have banned fois grois on animal welfare grounds (no, i did not read this in the onion, its actually true), someone handed me a leaflet stating that in order to stop climate change it is necessary not to drink, smoke, do drugs or eat meat and diary. i also saw a samll anti government protest made up of christians (banners proclaiming "where would jesus bank") and anarchists ("everything is wrong").

i chose my hostel because its near city lights bookstore. its also on the street where all the strip joints are, ha ha. theres a place next door called 'the beat museum' which purports to have the actual typewriter kaeroac wrote on the road on. i'm also very close to chinatown which is apparently the biggest chinatown in the world. my guidebook describes it as tacky but i love chinese tat. soho doesnt have enough of it. there are the famous cable cars but they are mostly just for show and i can't afford to go on them. you can hear the cables rattle underground as you cross the tracks which is kind of creepy though.

also i ate in subway today. its kinda the same as subway at home only they also offer a catering service where thing make you giant subs for slicing. i guess, say, so you can have your wedding catering done and be, like, thanks to subway for the food because we first bonded as a couple over a shared love of italian meatball and ranch sauce (hold the jelepenos)

San Francisco

first of all to let you know i'm writing this on a pc with linux. its like using a computer ten years ago. i tried a browser called 'konquerer' that was absolutely useless and am now on something called 'ice weasel', awful name but at least it works. so dont expect any fancy stuff right now - i'd love to show you a photo of the carpet in my hostel (its psychadelic) but thats going to take me a while to figre out. also ive been up for 20hrs and counting on only 4 hrs sleep so please excuse my spelling.

and just as more of a preamble, i'll tell you what i wrote on the flight since i'm one of those strange people that love long distance flights. despite having flown to new zealand 3 times, i still find it faintly glamorous. i get all excited by the complimentary eyemask and socks. in fact i think i was the only person in the cabin wearing their socks but i surely cant be the only person needing relief from their swollen feet. i also love airplane food - the fact that its in little containers and eating it is like a ritual. i was a bit disappointed by the lack of english or american theme to the meal. i had alaskan pollock and the salad dressing was definately american but other than that it was all a bit nationality neutral. i also had a glass of wine and watched ferris beuller's day off on the minature screen on the back of the seat in front of me. regarding alcohol at 34000 ft - it goes to your head. hence my surprise at everyone around me maxing out on the free booze (tea, coffee, sir? soft drink? - i'll have a g&t please). I thought only my dad did that. i had tomato juice (soon to become a new obsession of mine i think, what would you call it? a virgin mary?). i mean it was only midday, perhaps not everyone else had been out on the razzle 10 hrs previous, but even so. my second favourite thing about flying after the food is the moving map where you can track the progress of your plane across the globe. after sitting still for 5 hours i start to find the fact i am flying over places such as 'godthub' and 'foxe basin' infinately amusing.

anyway so i land finally and go through immigration where i get the third degree from the officer and it goes a bit like this (remember at all points i am smiling and he is not.)
(him) purpose of viist? (me) leisure
what is your job? - i'm a student
shouldn't you be at college at the moment then? - i'm on a year out
how much money have you got? - what on me? a couple of hundred dollars
how much is that? - er 200 dollars
do you know people here? - yes my uncle lives here
have you been to america before? - yes
where to? - er l.a. and new york
how long are you staying for? - two months
on 200 dollars? - well i have a bank account as well
how much is in it? - couple of thousand
how much is that? - 2000 dollars
and you think thats going to be enough? - er yeah
are travelling on your own? - yeah

etc etc
chrissakes, whats so suspicious about that?

i've got to go and get some dinner now before i faint, but san francisco is actually lovely. will explain more coherently tomorrow

10/4 7pm