Fun Things to
Do in L.A. !
Fun? What's that?
You just pulled an all-nighter to finish reading about how to experimentally distinguish endoplasmic reticulum from endoplasmic reticular vesicles in cow brain, and you feel like your own brain has been spun down into an ER supernatant. (True story.)
It's time to relax. You ask yourself, "What can I do for fun?"
Well, you don't have to be a nerd to enjoy yourself in the second largest city in America. According the year 2000 SCAG census, that means you have access to 16.5 million people in Los Angeles County and the immediate surrounding counties (Ventura, San Bernadino, Orange, Riverside, & Imperial counties). With this many people, anything could happen.
Downtown Los Angeles, looking south on the 110 freeway during sunset.
One of my favorite things about L.A. is the ethnic diversity-- L.A. has a gigantic Koreatown near Wilshire/Western, about 2 miles west of downtown, and a gargantuan "Chinatown" in Alhambra (about 5 miles east of downtown) where it's common to hear announcements in Mandarin over the loudspeaker. And, of course there is a major Mexican-American presence all throughout the Southern California region. If you want to practice your Spanish, there are plenty of opportunities here! A direct corollary of this is the great culinary diversity of L.A.! Here are some of my favorite restaurants:
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My favorite: the beach!
| You can always go to the beach in Santa Monica or
neighboring Venice to roller-blade, jog, walk along the sand, or just
chill.
Here is the current temperature at the beach, kindly provided by The Weather Channel. Don't you wish you were here now? It's like this all the time. |
The Santa Monica Pier is nice to just go and people-watch there. You get all sorts of people there...tourists, gangsters, fishermen, professional bubble blowers, and everybody in between.
If you like to bicycle or roller-blade, which I enjoyed very much until I dislocated my elbow(!), there is a path that continuously runs along the beach all the way from the Santa Monica / Malibu border to south of Venice. Hopefully, you'll have better luck than me.
Snow Skiing
Just because we have the awesome southern California t-shirt weather, doesn't mean we have to compromise when it comes to Winter sports. After a mere two-hour drive you can find yourself in snow up to your neck at Big Bear Lake.
Driving directions from Los Angeles (2 Hours - 100 miles): 10 E. -- 215 N. -- 30 N. -- 330 N. -- 18 E. -- Big Bear Lake |
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Big Bear Mountain resort is the main place to go skiing or snowboarding. You'd be surprised how easy it is to get there. You just hop in your car, and after a couple hours you're in a completely different world.
The Movies
| No matter how much you like to
study or do research, it is nearly impossible to be oblivious to the fact
that you're going to school in the movie-making capitol of the
world. Frequently on or near campus during the night or weekends,
you'll see big trucks and trailers full of clothes, cameras and
lights. UCLA and the Westwood area are popular places to film movies
and videos.
On campus, about twice or thrice per week, on Monday, Wednesday or Friday night at 7:30 pm., the graduate student association shows a weekly movie for everybody on campus. It's called "MELNITZ MOVIES," named after the hall where the movies are shown. This week they showed "The Little Mermaid," "Sprits, four graduate short films," and "Dreams." |
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Jewel live. |
Another way you might be jolted out of your mathematical reverie back into reality is that somebody may accost you on Westwood Avenue offering you free movie tickets to a movie that you never even heard of before. These showings are the "pre-screening" where the directors and critics go to gauge the audiences' reactions and decide whether or not they should screw up the ending of the movie just to make the audience happy. Often, famous singers or actors will frequent the Westwood area, and the streets will be flooded with people trying to catch a glimpse of a superstar. I've seen Tom Cruise and Jewel in Westwood so far, and I don't even get out that much. |
Museums
At the Getty: Nicolas Poussin, Crossing the Red Sea, 1634.
Maybe about a mile west of the UCLA campus perched up on top of a big hill is the Getty museum which features an array of classical and modern works of art. Just to experience the beautiful architecture of the museum itself is worth the trip.
Also, you can't miss the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), where they have 100,000 works of art from ancient to modern times including this one:
Charles Porter Brown at the LACMA |
Los Angeles also has a lot of small galleries displaying works by local and international artists like Gerd Ludwig at the Stephen Cohen Gallery, West Hollywood: |
Here is a great link that will get you started in the southern California local art scene: http://artscenecal.com.
Clubbing
| If you're into the
sleazy club scene, as I am, there is no shortage of sleaze in L.A..
The World, The Standard, Mickey's, Sugar, The Room, The W. -- these are some
of my favorite places to experience L.A. nightlife first-hand. There are
literally hundreds of bars and dance clubs in L.A.. It's expensive,
you feel terrible the next day, but for some reason you just pick yourself
up and do it again the following Friday night.
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The Room ( 1325 Santa Monica Blvd., (310) 458-0707) actually brings a little feeling of being in Hollywood to the westside. Previously, the only other bar to do this successfully was Liquid Kitty. The interior of The Room is nice and dark. A serpentine bar weaves its way along one wall, while booths line the opposite wall. The bartenders make some mean drinks, while a blend of mostly acidy-jazz plays on the house system. The weekends usually find guest DJ's spinning to a crowd that will get up and dance in the middle of this small to medium size bar. One great thing about The Room is that not only is it open 7 days a week, it opens it's doors on the rather early side. |
This makes it a good choice as a location to meet your friends at the beginning of the night. The crowd is the only tip-off that you're not in Hollywood anymore, Dorothy. The crowd is definitely more straight-laced milk and cookies compared to the happy rehabs of its Hollywood cousins. It can be quite crowded to get in on weekends, but once inside the atmosphere is very relaxed and enjoyable. Of course, a stiff drink always ensures that!
Mickey's: If you've never been to a gay bar, you should definitely try it. The whole time I was there there was this ripped, muscular 20 year-old guy dancing on a table wearing nothing but a speedo. One night, at a different place, they had a drag-queen lip-sync contest. One of the songs they lip-sync'ed to was "I'm Just a Girl." That was pretty entertaining.
Farmer's Market
UCLA Farmer's Market.
Every Thursday starting around noon, there is a local Farmer's market about one block south of campus in the Westwood Village. Actually there is a farmer's market everyday of the week at different locations in the L.A. area. Here is their schedule.
Venice Beach
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Not too far south-west of campus is a small community of ex-hippies and body builders. It's called Venice. There's nothing really special about Venice except that the flavor of the community is a bit different; it's something of a mixture between Berkeley, San Diego and Santa Monica. It's kind of beachy, kind of yuppy, and kind of hippy. They have their own little culture down there. I don't know how to describe it really. On the weekends you can see artists, body builders, entertainers, and roller-bladers along that beach path that I was telling you about -- the one that starts in Santa Monica. It's neat. You should check it out for yourself. Oh yeah, if you're in Venice, stop by the Rose Cafe (at 220 Rose Ave., Venice.(310) 399-0711.) where they have rotating art exhibits by local artists and really excellent pastries. |
3rd St. Promenade
A view of third street looking north from the 4th level of the parking structure.
Third St. Promenade is one of my favorite places in L.A.. Whenever you want to do some people watching, this is definitely the place to go. There are tons of street performers, bums, vendors, restaurants, and people. It's a really nice place where L.A. people go -- not just tourists.
The silver statue-man. He doesn't move at all.
It's only a 10-15 minute drive from campus. The best times to go are Friday and Saturday nights. That's when it's most lively.
Recreational Activities
Recreational Learning: Not only do you have complete access to the hundreds of UCLA courses, but you can also take courses offered by the local community college SMC or UCLA extension for an affordable price. There you can find less academic courses, such as one on movie production in which real Hollywood directors come to talk about making movies. As another example, I took a course at SMC to learn how to make windows GUI applications.
Recreational Sports: Our students have been in involved in windsurfing classes at the UCLA recreation center, the great outdoors, kayaking, and so much more.
UCLA also has strong intramural
sports teams.
Theme Parks
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And don't forget, L.A.
is the home of Disney Land, Universal
Studios, Knotts Berry farm, Jurassic
Park and Six Flags Magic Mountain.
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Ideal Location
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When choosing a graduate school remember the three most important criteria: Location, location, and location. Unlike some of our rival institutions, UCLA is in a really nice neighborhood situated next to Bel Air between Beverly Hills and Pacific Palisades, some of the richest neighborhoods in L.A. county, and only 15 minutes away from the Santa Monica beach by car. Also, UCLA is a mere two hour drive from two other major southern Californian cities: San Diego and Santa Barbara. When I first came to L.A., I thought that I'd be dodging bullets half of the time here, but in West L.A., that's really not the case. The worse thing that might happen to you is getting the magical finger from an SUV-driving Starbucks sipper on his cell-phone. |
Last updated: Feb 9, 2002 by David Beckwith