East Los Angeles

Max Vasquez - February 8th

I am given the opportunity to visit my father’s side of the family maybe 2-3 times a year, and each time is really something to remember. Being raised in Natomas and Woodland, you get used to the small (ish) town life where if you go to the store, you’re most likely going to run into someone you went to school with. However, Los Angeles makes Woodland look like a lego set in comparison. Even when I was a little kid, I remember after sleeping for most of the time  there, getting to see the towering building surrounding my field of vision only mixed in with hills and traffic. I’m pretty sure that the biggest thing anyone will remember the most about Los Angeles is the traffic. 

Besides the bumper to bumper traffic, the best part is staying with my grandma. She is now 90, so it’s a treat to see her, but I have to say the area she has lived in for nearly 50+ years is something else with the smell of something cooking constantly and the crappy motel a couple blocks away. It's these sentiments that cause me to view Los Angeles with this nostalgic lens. That's what I really want to dive deep into with this article: how two different people who live in two different areas in Los Angeles can view and tell completely different stories. You can have someone that grew up in Hollywood or Anaheim or even Long Beach. This person grew up with Towers  all around them, trying actors with day jobs as waiters, beaches where you can find every type of person, or  how with a little more money growing up means more opportunities with businesses or getting the sense of a dense urban feel. The views are like you’re looking down on the city. This person has more positives about Los Angeles rather than the person who lived in commerce. 

  The part of Los Angeles that my father’s family lives in is in East Los, so the stories I hear aren’t always the best like how my dad was used to the sounds of gunshots, how during holidays if you heard shots they weren’t fireworks and to stay as far away from windows. But, not all stories are so bleak, mostly I hear about the food of east Los. From my most recent visit food was definitely a staple of the trip. I think they just do food so differently that it just hits in a way that you want to go to the stop at 2 am. See that’s a big difference from Woodland to east Los the food. Let’s be honest if you want food past 8 you are kinda screwed. The options are slim to none, but in Los Angeles  if it was 4 am you could find a place in a couple of minutes. The biggest staples of food for me have to be Bob's Big Boys, Philippe, and The Hat.  

It’s not just the food, however, that makes East Los special, it is also just the energy you feel when being there. I mean as a kid I would feel bored if we weren't at disneyland, but now I am able to really recognize the beauty of it all. The families come together in a small house that was built in the 5os with gates, or the regulars coming into their favorite burrito place, or how wherever you are when you look up at the sky you are meeted with just beautiful colors blending into each other. The views never change in Los Angeles as no matter your class in the city you can find a view to just be in awe of. That’s why I love driving in the city to see how different the environment is yet so common to us.   Even though I visit a couple times a year I still get to understand the sense of how my dad grew up, the drives where if you want to go to Target or the market get ready for a 30 minute trip on the freeway or backroads. I may be a small town kid but I still see East Los as a part of my family's history.