Today was Australia Day from 1915 til 1935 (when it was moved to 26 January) and Los Angeles is home to far more Australians than any other American city. According to the Australian Consulate-General, there are about 44,000 Australians living in Metro Los Angeles — more than twice as many as live in second-place New … Continue reading No Enclave — Australian Los Angeles
The Flag of Australia, the Australian Aboriginal Flag, and the Flag of Torres Strait Islanders Australia was discovered about 45,000 years ago when they either walked or made short sea-crossings from Papua to the north in what is now the Torres Strait. In Australia they grew into diverse cultures with around 250 languages spoken by … Continue reading Happy Australia Day
INTRODUCTION Today, on 13 December (St. Lucy’s Day), Argentina and Croatia will face off in the World Cup semi-finals. It’s safe to say, most Angelenos who care at all about association football (aka “soccer”) will be rooting for Argentina. Los Angeles is also home to the nation’s second-largest Argentine community — although it is smaller … Continue reading No Enclave — Croatian Los Angeles
Today is the birthday of John Chapman, better known as Johnny Appleseed. It is celebrated, in some places, as Johnny Appleseed Day. Other locales celebrated it on 11 March. I’m not sure how the March date was chosen. It’s exactly one week before Johnny Appleseed died — which seems like an odd thing the celebrate … Continue reading Swinging Doors — Los Angeles’s Cider Scene on Johnny Appleseed Day
From the 1900s through the 1970s, large numbers of migrants to Los Angeles gathered in themed picnics organized around their states of origin known as State Society Picnics or just State Picnics (although that sounds confusingly to me like an outdoor state banquet). They were known as “State Society Picnics.” The phenomenon was huge. One … Continue reading Southland Parks — Los Angeles’s State Society Picnics
Last year, on 18 August, I published a piece celebrating San Fernando Valley Day. You see, in the US (and nowhere else, really), people write dates month/day/year. I know, it makes no sense. Chalk another one up for American Exceptionalism. 818 is the area code that closely responds to the San Fernando Valley (although it … Continue reading Happy 626, or, San Gabriel Valley Day!
The Grand Tour, for the unfamiliar, was a custom that arose in Britain in the mid-1600s, which involved upper class young British men touring around Europe as part of their cultural education. By the 1800s, the custom had spread from the British upper classes to the nouveau riche of Europe, the Americas, and the Philippines. … Continue reading Nobody Drives in LA — The Los Angeles Grand Tour
It’s Asian Pacific American Heritage Month and so I thought it might be nice to shine a spotlight on some of Metro Los Angeles‘s many Asian American artists, the subject of this week’s post. It was a bit of an undertaking for many reasons. There are and have been many Asian American artists who’ve at … Continue reading Pan-Asian Metropolis — 200 Asian Angeleno Artists
If you’ve ever walked anywhere in Los Angeles other than to and from a car, you’ve no doubt noticed that there are dirt squares along many sidewalks into which the city occasionally plants trees. I don’t know what the technical name of these squares is or even if they have one. I think that I’ve … Continue reading Those Useless Trees — Guerilla Gardening with Agave
INTRODUCTION I love incense. I’ve been fascinated with it since I was a young child and discovered that my parents had two boxes of cone incense. One was sandalwood and had an image of the Taj Mahal on it. I don’t remember the scent of the other, but it had an abstract image of a … Continue reading The Brightwell Guide to Incense
Eric Brightwell 