ARTHUR

Today I talked to Arthur.

I'm sitting on a cement wall at the intersection of Melrose and Cahuenga Boulevard. I took a picture of a yellow building and now I'm waiting for it to develop. The day is sunny with a fresh breeze. Over the traffic noise I hear a faint singing. I look around and see the back of a man on the other side of the cement wall. He is crouching behind a pole in the parking lot. I try not to stare at him. A spicy smell of incense floats in the air. All of a sudden the man turns around and smiles at me awkwardly. He is a handsome Asian man but he seems uncomfortable. He stands up and leaves. That is intriguing. I hesitate to follow him and finally decide to do so. I walk across the small parking lot and enter the Angel spa.

The delicate music creates a contrast with the traffic outside. A middle-aged Thai woman welcomes me and asks me which massage I want. I ask her if I could speak to the man who works here. She leaves and comes back with him. His name is Arthur and he recognizes me right away. We sit down on black leather armchairs. I ask him about the chanting he did. Arthur starts to explain in a minimal English. “I put food and incense on a plate every day before work. I’m a Buddhist”, he says. He is forty-three years old and arrived from Thailand one month ago. He is originally from Chiang-Mai, a city in the North. His birth name is Arnont but in America he goes by Arthur. The middle-aged woman – Nana – listens to our conversation. She approves with a fixed smile. I ask Arthur if he is the owner of the place. “No, I work here as a masseur. Before that I spent twelve years in Japan working in a Thai restaurant and in a video rentals shop”, he says.

The door suddenly opens. A young woman in strict clothes and high heels bursts into the shop. “I’m sorry, could I use your restrooms?” she asks. Arthur goes with her to show her the way. Nana gives me a bigger smile. I point at her multicolored nails and ask her where she gets them done. “By myself”, she giggles, and she shows me her feet – multicolored too. At the wall I notice an aquarium. The sand is royal blue and the plastic plants are flashy pink. I spontaneously feel so grateful that I am not a fish.

Arthur is back and we resume our conversation. “The ritual is an offering to thank the land – America. You give food to the land and the land gives food back to you”, he explains. “I put Jasmine rice, fried chicken, incense, rice noodles and sweet water on a plate. The water is sweetened so that everything that will enter my life will be sweet too. It makes the problems disappear. The rice and the chicken symbolize wealth and success. The noodles symbolize a long life because they are very long”.

Arthur’s dream is to earn enough money in America to buy a house in Chiang-Mai. Then he will open his own import-export business. “When you’ll come to my country, I will be your guide”, he adds. I utter a clumsy “Kop Khun kha” – for thank you. It is the only word I remember from my vacation in Thailand three years ago. Arthur and Nana smile. She bows slightly. Then Arthur grabs my hand and shakes it vigorously. “You’ll be back for a massage soon, ok?”

AMBER

Today I talked to Amber.

I enter the Paparazzi Hair Studio that stands between a shoe repair shop and a restaurant in Sherman Oaks. It is Sunday and Amber, my hair stylist and the manager of place, opened the studio especially for me and another client.

The first time I came here was a month ago and I was thrilled with my hair cut. I immediately called my mother and friends to tell them that I had found my new hair stylist. I love how Amber works. She literally sculpts hair. She is focused and extra precise. What I also appreciate is that she doesn’t make small talk. Hair stylists who bombard me with millions of questions bore me to death. On the contrary Amber is mellow. She seems grounded yet energetic. Her clothes are simple but her hair style stands out. She has a curly red Mohawk, and both sides of her head are shaved with drawings in them.

Rap music fills the empty studio. Solomon, Amber’s eleven-year-old son, is sprawled on a soft couch next to the entrance door. Amber starts to cut my bangs. “Where are you from?” I ask. “I’m from L.A. But I've got family in Denmark and Sweden,” she answers. “My grandfather was a jazz musician. He was traveling a lot and had children all over the world. Thanks to him I got to travel too and I saw a lot of places!” she says. Her grandfather is Don Cherry. He was a cornet and trumpet player, and played with John Coltrane, Sonny Rollins, and Archie Shepp to name only a few. Tiny bits of hair fall on my eyes and mouth. I try to blow them away. Amber continues. “The good thing about my grandfather is that he kept us connected. We’re a big family now.”

Solomon looks bored. From the other side of the room, he shoots questions at his mom about some kind of contract. It makes me curious. “What does your son do?” I ask. “He does music. And I’m his manager,” she answers. She tells me she has invested in music equipment so he can create beats. “I was into the music gang myself,” she says.

In the 90’s, Amber was a rapper and her artist name was Cobra Red. Her band was the 5 Footaz. “We chose this name because we were all short,” she adds, and then laughs. Amber started cutting hair because she needed a day job. “Music is a dirty gang, you know. I was dying down.” She hands me a mirror to let me check my bangs. “You need everyday money. So I started doing hair and I found a new passion,” she smiles widely. “People come from all around,” she adds. Recently a new client of hers flew all the way from Japan to have her hair done. It doesn’t surprise me. Her style is fresh, a little crazy, and perfectly executed.

Amber hands me a brush to remove the sticky hair from my face. My bangs look great. Then Salomon comes closer and sits down into a chair. His feet can hardly reach the floor. I ask him what music he loves. He giggles and rocks from side to side. “Rap,” he says. “And what else?” I ask –“Hip hop,” he hesitates shyly. Amber tells him to answer seriously, as if it was a real interview. Salomon is intimidated. But after a long silence he finally enumerates: “Naughty By Nature. Eminem. MC Lyte” and then he falls silent again. “He likes old school type of hip hop,” Amber shouts out on her way to her desk.

It is picture time. We all go out of the studio. Solomon strikes a cool pose and Amber laughs. In front of the camera she is totally in charge. She tries out groovy poses, squeezes her Mohawk between her hands and suddenly freezes. Ventura Boulevard freezes with her. This girl is amazing. Whatever she does, she’s all about rhythm.

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