Taking the Subway to Get a Visa

The first three rows of the vast convention center stage is devoted to bloggers and media. They sit with their laptops pecking out messages on Twitter, commenting on the innovators who one after another got their ten minutes to pitch the crowd on the worthiness of their travel website.

I kicked myself for leaving my laptop at the hotel and not being able to join them; so far the only thing I can do with my little itouch is check email and write truncated replies.

I had to leave the proceedings yesterday to take a subway to downtown LA and send the Iranian government a check for $124 and my passport to get my visa. I never knew that they had a subway in LA, but it was sparkling clean and full of riders. I got out at the stop at Hollywood and Vine and the ceiling of the station was covered with film reels with mellow lighting.

On the way back I decided to take a bus, and inside, they had a television playing 'transit TV' with an anchor woman and commercials. Outside on Hollywood Boulevard we passed by porn shops and tour operators who take people to see the houses of the stars and sell a large inventory of fake Oscars and Hollywood tee-shirts.