January 7 Wash my funk away

We leave Melbourne and it’s brutal heat behind , for now . As I’ve said before , long haul flights are gruelling. As our new Dreamliner banks to the right and circles over LA for our descent, the beast that is LA is totally revealed . It’s cliche , but LA is a concrete jungle , in Amazon proportion . Welcome home . A grey mist has enveloped the city , it adds weight to the gravity you feel in the pit of your stomach . It’s not fair as LA looks a lot better than this on a sunny day , but for now it really is depressing . LAX is confronting , especially when you are picked up by bus and taken to the terminal . Its a warning sign that this joint must be humming .It’s unbelievably busy , a cluster of international flights ( Asian countries)have arrived at once . The queues through immigration stretch in to the hundreds of meters ,my toilet stop has cost us a couple of hundred spots in the queue .After 45 minutes we are mercifully taken to the front of the queue as we are a family . Emma is short a document , ( work visa)something she hasn’t needed to show in the past . A grilling proceeds ,then an extended wait for a special interview follows , we wait in baggage for another 90 minutes . It’s hard , Black , whites and greys . Shit don’t smile in here , and boys don’t skylark about . Your behaviour is watched .Customer service is king in the US , with exception of arriving in the country .Finally , we taxi out of there and the things that you’d long become immune to resurface .The traffic , the rat race ,the smell of exhaust fumes , the palm trees , fast food ,Black , Hispanic and the Pacific Ocean . Oh , it’s good to be back old girl , i’l be back in you soon . You’l wash me clean and raise my spirits . It’s weird , but it’s still good to be back ….. for now .