Part 2
It was 23:55 on the eve of our birthdays; I was in the youth hostel, and surging with adrenaline. I decided to wait until just after midnight to call Lisa and wish her a happy birthday. When I tried to call, I got voicemail / answering machines on both numbers. There was no recorded message, just the standard greeting for when there's no recorded message. I thought that either she had gone to bed early or she was celebrating her birthday the night before and was too busy celebrating to answer her phone.

I didn't feel like going to bed just yet, so I decided to go outside and look for something to eat and get some money from an ATM and just generally get a feel for the place. I chose to stay in Hollywood - a suburb of Los Angeles because it is where most of the sights of LA are concentrated (according to my guidebook), and just in case I couldn't find Lisa, I'd be able to see the sights. The hostel was just off Hollywood Boulevard where I decided to explore. Hollywood Boulevard is lined with tall palm-trees. The sidewalk (pavement) is paved with grey marble slabs with a pink-marble star depicting a celebrity's name and an icon showing what they were famous for (record, film, book, etc). This is supposed to be decoration, but in practice, it just makes the ground very slippery when wet (it had just been raining and I was wearing my colourful - yet un-grippy shoes). The boulevard was lively but I didn't feel like I was part of it - I felt like I was in my own little world but was too overcome with relief to care. On the way I met a few characters that ended up talking to me. For some reason, at least half of them were named after characters from the Bible. While looking for an ATM in some chicken-related fast-food place (the Americans have the nice habit of placing ATMs in stores), one of the dudes there saw me and accused me of being on "Crystal Meth" (this was the first time I had ever heard that term used, and I was later to find out that it was similar to what the Americans call the drug called 'speed'). I was looking overly excited and not because of any drug but because I really was overly excited. The experience was getting quite intense. I was tempted to just explain the "I'm the sort of person who gives off misleading-vibes" thing and that usually, it's a "laid-back" kinda vibe I mislead people with, but instead I just told the story with Lisa so far.... that we had been e-mailing each other since a year and a half, it was both our birthdays tomorrow, the e-mails were getting lost, and I had only just gotten her phone-number just minutes before her birthday. He and his girlfriend felt really happy for me and congratulated me. Of course, I still hadn't gotten through to Lisa on the phone. Just before I went to bed, I decided to hang round the hostel bar for a bit and wind down, but I felt too excited to be aware of my surroundings so I just went to bed.

The following morning, it was both of our birthdays. I phoned both numbers again. Just got answering machines.

The sky was clear and the weather was very bright and sunny. It must have been the warmest I had experienced on the trip so far - warm enough to go outside wearing a t-shirt and shorts (if I had wanted to wear my shorts).

I tried calling Lisa a few more times but it was just the voice-mail. They didn't even have a recorded message; they just repeated the number...

Bah!

I tried calling the numbers from a payphone instead of my mobile just in case the Americans had a certain cell phone (mobile-phone) dialling convention I wasn't aware of. No joy. I even tried calling my own mobile number (a US "cell phone" with a US sim-card) from a payphone. At least that worked, and meant I had given her the right number. But if she gave me hers, then why hadn't she called mine when I gave her mine?

By now, my mobile started to warn me that it was rapidly running out of credits. Each failed call cost +- 50c. I had to recharge credits, so I looked for a place that sold pre-paid phone cards for my mobile.

I must have by then been the furthest away I had ever been from home and the wonderful feeling I had gotten from discovering Lisa's phone-numbers was turning into that feeling of despair and anxiousness which was coming back. Why would she give me two numbers that I couldn't reach her on? How come the e-mails weren't getting through? Had someone forged an e-mail from her and deliberately tried to mislead me? Was she being targeted by a prankster and why? Was it me, and not her that was the victim? I had a gut instinct that Lisa would not do such a thing, but who would?

It was then that I looked over my shoulder and for the first time ever, saw the famous "Hollywood" sign. At this time, I was not in the mood for seeing famous landmarks, but the sign did register in my mind. I had seen it loads of times on TV etc, and now for the first time, it was here in reality.

I soon found a pre-paid card and tried Lisa again. Still the voicemail, but this time, I noticed that one of the phones immediately transferred me to voicemail instead of waiting for a few rings first. Any change of pattern must have meant something ... but what ... I couldn't figure out.

I usually manage to find something to do whenever I'm somewhere on my travels, but if I'm expecting to meet someone, I try and synchronise myself with them and expect them to show me around or something. When I can't find the person, I'm not as good as finding things to do than I would be had I known I was to be by myself for that part of the journey. Whenever I'm stuck somewhere and I'm not really sure what I should do, I like to be as flexible as possible and to make up my own tour of the area and gain my bearings. The best way for me to do that and combine flexibility with mobility is to rent a bike. This would help me take advantage of the nice weather too. I found a bike-rental place and rented a bike. Lisa said she likes to hang out with a bunch of weirdoes on Sunset Strip, so I decided to cycle down there on the remote-chance I might bump into her. It's a long shot, but at least I would have got some exploring and sightseeing out the way. Thank goodness for my loud tie-died psychedelic t-shirt that was meant to attract attention - especially from someone who had been told to look out for someone in a tie-dyed t-shirt. Before I did any serious cycling, I stopped off at a cyber cafe that had better facilities than the Internet access at hostel and it was cheaper. When I finally got moving, I cycled along Sunset Strip - another famous landmark, and from there, into Beverly Hills - yet another famous landmark type thing. At that point, I decided to head back to the Hostel. When I got there, I tried Lisa again. Still no luck. So I decided to put plan B into action - to get drunk and go out with some assorted people from the hostel.

They were serving food at the hostel. I hadn't been thinking much about food so just decided to eat what I was given without concentrating on it, which was just as well as it had mushrooms in it (which I don't like) ... this on my birthday too! I was still hoping I might somehow catch Lisa on her birthday, but was by now very doubtful. I did have some momentary distraction when I observed an Australian and a New-Zealander ask each other where they were from and imagine the awkwardness they must have felt (Australians and New-Zealanders are supposed to have a thing against each other - I've never been able to understand it).

Just when I thought it couldn't get any worse than eating mushrooms on my birthday (a bad sign if ever there was one), it did. The evening was spent in the hostel bar with people from the hostel. I was hoping we'd end up going to Sunset Strip by night, but we just stayed in the hostel. This was one of those hostels where the guests stayed so long they no longer had the urge to go out. There was a small group of people who did go out but didn't bother to bring me along. One thing I leaned from the trip is to avoid hostels where people have been staying for ages as a cliquey atmosphere develops. The evening wasn't going well. I had mentally drifted away from the surroundings and wasn't giving off a "come talk to me" vibe. I also didn't sense the sort of vibe where I could talk freely about not being able to get hold of Lisa. Another attempt was made to contact her before the end of our birthdays without success. The night was just spent floating in and out of the conversation without making much of a contribution. I had come all this way and was hoping to meet one person - why wasn't I interested in the other people in the bar? Overall, it was not an enjoyable night. What a way to spend my birthday!!! AAAAARGHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The next day it was a Sunday. I wondered if she had forgotten to switch on her phones. I wasn't sure if any of the numbers were cell phones or not (unlike UK phones, US phones do not have a characteristic mobile-number). An extra day would surely have given her more time to check the voicemail for messages, or at least give herself more time to answer the phone, but no ... just the standard voice-mail messages again.

She had mentioned that her car had broken down. I just could but not help wonder what would have happened if it hadn't broken down. Would she have come to Union Station on Friday evening to meet me? I was so close to actually meeting her, but then something got in the way and we couldn't get through to each other.

Why would she give me two numbers I couldn't get through to for 2 days? How come the e-mails kept getting lost? I was suspicious. Despair was setting in. I had rushed the West-Coast portion of my journey just so I could be with Lisa on the day of our birthdays, but the birthday had gone and I still hadn't found her. I was now worrying that if she found out that I had been to LA without seeing her, she would feel awful too, and that made me feel worse. I was even starting to panic in my mind. This was a serious bummer. Cool-ness in my mind went flying out the window, and whatsmore, Multiple AAAAARGHHH's times infinity!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The adventure which up until then had been running smoothly had ground to a compete halt. I was getting nowhere and was getting restless. I should have been out enjoying the California sunshine and Hollywood and cycling on my rented bike and not stopping at the Hostel's Internet kiosk and Cyber cafes all the time (even if I did get to indulge in my newly acquired taste for bagels). As I had seen a famous landmark or two while I was there, I was worried that my mind was developing an association so I was going to be reminded of this episode every single time I saw the Hollywood sign. For the first time on the trip, I was starting to feel homesick. I really wanted to be back in Europe. Now I was DETERMINED to meet Lisa - even more so with each setback. I was thankful I had taken a detour to New Orleans two weeks earler as otherwise, there would have been no highlight to prevent this from overshadowing the trip so far, and it gave me somewhere to look forward to that was a lot closer to Europe and directly further down the line on my journey.

The Internet kiosk at the youth hostel had a built-in video camera. I decided to take a picture of myself and e-mail Lisa just so she could see a recent picture of me. Alas, the camera was facing a window where the sun was shining through which was buggering up the contrast of the image. I tried to remedy this by trying to fix my bed sheet to the window. A risky activity to do in a hostel where you don't get your deposit back for losing or damaging your linen. I could not attach the bed sheet by any means and in the process, lost the pin of my Swiss Army Knife. In the end, I just used the kiosk next to the one I had tried to use, and by then, the sun wasn't at such an awkward angle. The picture was taken and e-mailed. This at least gave me a slight feeling of re-assurance, but still no sign of Lisa.

I soon decided to enjoy the California sunshine and Hollywood and cycle on my rented bike. I left a message on Lisa's answering machine saying I'd be back at the hostel at 6:30 pm. This time, I cycled from Hollywood along the Santa Monica Boulevard all the way to the beach at Santa Monica. The bike ride was about two hours where I occasionally stopped off to look at stuff (I passed through Beverly Hills again). When I finally got to the beach, I figured I only had 15 minutes or so to wander around the beach area and then explore the open-air market. I had said I would be back at the hostel at 6:30 and so far still hadn't received any sort of confirmation from Lisa (nor could I get through to her), so after exploring for a bit, set off back to the Hostel. I knew it was unlikely she'd be there when I got back but even so, decided to head off, but decided it was OK to be a bit late. On the way back, I stopped off to investigate a few things. Of course when I got back at 7pm, there was still no sign of Lisa in the hostel or her phone numbers. At least I had made it back in time for me to pick up my sheet I had left in the common room before it was taken away (I would have lost my deposit if it had been), and had had an enjoyable bike ride, but that did not prevent my mind from collapsing.

After spending some time by myself, I decided to pull myself together and go upstairs to the bar. It was comedy night, so I thought that would cheer me up. Before the comedy acts came on, I ended up playing a card game with a few people from the bar. We were playing with Monopoly money, and I quickly lost all of it. I still felt like I had drifted away from the surroundings. It was time for the acts to come along. The guy doing the introductions asked us where we were from and how many of us there were in our groups. I just said I was by myself. He responded by saying that the guy in the tie-died t-shirt was always by himself. I had been wearing tie-died t-shirts for the past 3 days to stand out, but wasn't giving off a very stand-out-ish vibe. I was not in a mood for any heckling, but the comedians did cheer me up a lot.

I decided to stay in LA another day simply because the bike rental shop was closed on Monday, and it would give me some more time to reach Lisa before I left LA (but of course, I could still come back). I was thinking that because it was Monday, then she'd be at her office and that one of the phone-numbers might have been her office number. I assumed her new job was a Monday to Friday affair as her previous job had been a product manager at some company (she never even told me what her new job was). I was flying blind. I had too little information and was running on what I knew which was like using a jigsaw of a map where most of the pieces are missing. I was navigating by hope but that was wearing down. I tried both numbers again but no - still the voicemail. The day - like the past two days - was spent getting through to the answering machine, but I decided to do some more sightseeing to keep my mind off things. I went on a walking tour of Beverly Hills. I was told that there might be a small chance I'd see a celebrity. But I didn't want to see some stupid celebrity; I wanted to see Lisa.

Before the day was out, I decided to try to cycle to the "Hollywood" sign to see how close I could get. My plan was thwarted by the road leading up to it becoming steep and winding me far away from it. As I cycled along Hollywood Boulevard, I saw a bit of a crowd gather and a security operation outside Mann's Chinese Theatre (the famous cinema where they have the footprints of the celebrities in the paving stones). I discovered that it was the premiere of the latest Star Trek film (Nemesis) and that the cast were going to be there. A thought occurred to me.... This was an event that attracted attention. Maybe it had attracted Lisa (she had given no hints that she was in any way interested in Star Trek). Or maybe she thought I might be there so she'd come to find me there (she had no idea herself whether or not I was interested in Star Trek). I do like the sorts of meetings where you have to work out a puzzle to find the other person, but in the event it's a long lot of miles from home, there HAS to be a backup plan so I am re-assured against not meeting. I had always suspected this, and now I knew for sure. I was starting to think that if I could somehow communicate my predicament to the cast of the Star Trek film who were going to be there, then they could make an announcement and ask if Lisa was somewhere in the crowd. Even if she weren’t, it would generate some publicity, which she might pick up. At least if I didn't find Lisa, they might have let me see the premiere for free. On the other hand, I really did not want this to go public, for it was just something between the two of us and definitely not a spectacle for the masses of residents of LA. This trail of thoughts didn't last long. My stomach gave in, and the Hostel was having it's unfeasibly short dinnertime. I had not been taking care of my stomach lately. For the past few days, I had been missing the free pancake breakfast at the hostel because I was getting up too late, and what with the mushroom incident on Saturday, I was at the mercy of my stomach so I had to retreat to the hostel as the limousines were arriving (I was too far away to actually make out anyone who could have stepped out of them).

After dinner, I had another moment of spending time alone. There was no comedy night, so I'd have to brave the bar without any form of entertainment and hope I might hold out long enough to find some company.

It was a bit later on that evening before I decided to go to the bar that my mobile phone un-expectedly rang. I looked at the colour LCD display - it was Lisa!!! Hallelujah! I answered the phone. For the first time ever, I heard her voice! For some reason, I imagined it to be deep, but it wasn't. She told me that my voice sounded like it's out of breath. I asked her where she had been.

"They just woke me up". She said.

I was like "WTF?!?!?!?!?! – Doubleyou Tee Eff?!?!?!?!?!". I thought to myself "Who does she think she is? Frankenstein's monster?” but did not convey these thoughts over the phone. I just asked "How come?”. It turned out that she was suffering from a bleeding kidney that was triggered off by her friends getting her very drunk the eve before her birthday (Friday) and had to go to the hospital where she'd been unconscious the past few days. This must have been just before I tried to phone her for the first time. I was thinking that perhaps if I had not spent so much time at LA Union station looking for her before heading off to the hostel and going on the Internet there, I may have been able to call before the kidneys went. But to me that didn't matter. We had finally gotten through to each other and that's all that mattered. She said it was sweet that I had tried to meet her on the day of our birthdays. All of a sudden, I no longer felt bad about not having managed to meet her on the birthday.

I asked about what was happening with the e-mails and if she was getting mine. I found out that the e-mail loss was 2 ways (my e-mails to her were getting lost as well). She blamed a broken Internet-router at her workplace, but my knowledge of the way the Internet works gave me a gut feeling that it was a crappy e-mail service she was using. We had both made several attempts to give each other our phone numbers, but it was only on the eve of our birthdays that I finally got hers. She only got mine when she found all those answering-machine messages when she woke up (it may have been some time after she woke up, as she said she couldn't use her mobile in the hospital in case it interfered with the equipment there). I realised that unlike the e-mail, there probably would not have been any answering-machine message loss, and was starting to be worried if I was coming across as a frantic stalker with all those answering-machine messages.

At this point, she kept asking me if there was anything wrong with the reception, as my voice seemed to be echoy. I told her my mobile's reception-o-meter was at only one bar, but I decided not to tell her that I was on the toilet at the time. I told her I'd move to the car park where the reception was better and I'd call back. In the car park, we resumed from where we'd left off. As getting drunk had made her kidney bleed, she told me she did not want to get drunk when I was around. I suggested that when we meet up, we both stay sober and have fun watching everyone else get drunk (this is what's called "People-Watching", best done in UK at 23:30 and in LA at 02:00). The battery on Lisa's phone was running out which put a strain on the conversation.

So we agreed to meet up the following weekend for a spot of People watching in LA. The phone call had completely changed my thoughts and state of mind. I was focused. I was unstuck! I knew for sure I was going to meet her. By now I was fed up of being in LA so decided to explore the rest of California in the meantime. I could leave as soon as the bike rental shop re-opened. At once I started thinking about where I'd be going that week. I at last had something to do so I didn't have to resort to trying to socialise in the bar while hiding how I was really feeling. I launched myself into my travel-guides and timetables and started planning out the week ahead. The result was that I had researched a plan to head off to mid-California for the week and explore some of the places I rushed past on the way down. I decided to visit San Francisco next (a nice city) and Yosemite park (I didn't make it there in the end).

This ongoing cascade of alternating 'Hallelujah' and 'AAAARGH' moments made me feel like a character from Voltaire's book Candide - being on an adventure to find the girl and always having changing fortunes in good luck and bad luck while being philosophical about it as much as possible.

The following day, I at last wore something that wasn't a psychedelic tie-dyed t-shirt (it was a quieter geek-ish t-shirt if you must know). I went out to the nearby cyber cafe to celebrate the joyous occasion with a bagel and a hot chocolate (a newly acquired taste of mine). I then returned my bike just as the shop opened and dashed to Union station. It was all aboard the trip to San Francisco. While on the train, I even established SMS (text-message) contact with Lisa.

The days around my Birthday had been very intense. I was constantly alternating between despair and euphoria. This is what being on an adventure is all about! Or as they say in California - Gnarly!!!


To be continued...
( mistaspakkaman and the inedible shifting caterpillars, Mon 30 Jun 2008, 16:30, Reply)