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It is a story about serendipity — of an surprising encounter that jogged my memory once more of the ability Hollywood has on the planet.
I went outdoors one current Friday afternoon to gather a package deal that had been delivered to my Hollywood Hills dwelling. A stunning younger lady was developing the road. She approached me hesitantly.
“Can I ask you one thing?” she stated. “If I hold strolling up this hill, will I get to the Hollywood signal?”
She was wearing a lacy white duster over slacks and T-shirt and her footwear weren’t meant for mountaineering. I advised her she was taking the fallacious route and requested if she had a automobile. She didn’t.
She spoke with an accent unfamiliar to me and I requested the place she was from. Ukraine. She defined that her title was Maria and she or he was in Los Angeles for at some point to select up some immigration paperwork and would then be flying again to Spokane, Wash., the place she was staying with a pal. With the hours she had left, she had taken a taxi to Hollywood, hoping to search out the well-known signal and see a few of the glamour she knew from motion pictures.
I believed she regarded like a misplaced princess and I knew what I needed to do. I advised her to attend and fetched my automobile keys. Inside minutes we had been off on a mini tour of Hollywood. First cease was the signal. I turned the nook from Franklin heading up Beachwood Drive and it loomed earlier than us. She gasped, “There it’s!” Then she stated one thing I’ll at all times keep in mind. “Individuals right here might imagine these are simply letters on a hill. However to us, that is our dream.”
We stopped so she may take footage. It was supper time so we went into the Beachwood Cafe, the place she may barely eat something as a result of she was so excited. I advised her it was stated that Harry Kinds as soon as dined there, which added to her pleasure.
She then poured out the story of her life, which could make a reasonably good film itself. Maria was born into a really massive household in a village on the border of Ukraine and Russia. When her mom fell in poor health, Maria and a few of her many siblings had been despatched to an orphanage the place she was educated and cared for.
“It’s not unhappy,” she stated. “They had been superb to me.”
At 17, she left the orphanage and went to highschool at a Ukrainian college. She needed to be a health care provider and by the point the battle started final 12 months she had completed virtually all of medical faculty. However bombs had been falling; she knew she needed to go away. A pal in Spokane invited her to stick with them.
That was about six months in the past. She has realized that with a view to end her research and get a medical diploma in the USA she must excellent her English. She started taking courses whereas working to assist herself.
I advised her about my profession on the Related Press and the well-known tales I had lined. Her eyes grew extensive after I talked about my contact with Michael Jackson and different stars. However she was most impressed that I actually reside in Hollywood, a spot that appeared fictional to her from afar.
Then it was time to move out. She would want to get an Uber to the airport quickly. However earlier than she left, I made a decision to offer her another Hollywood expertise. We drove alongside Hollywood Boulevard, previous the Pantages Theatre, memento retailers and vacationer haunts.
“This is sort of a film,” she stated. Quickly, we had been at Grauman’s Chinese language Theatre. I parked on the curb and advised her to go have a look at the well-known handprints and footprints within the cement. After operating for a fast look earlier than I must transfer the automobile, she got here again and exclaimed, “I simply noticed Donald Duck! That’s my childhood.” I advised her to go additional in and see extra. By the point she returned, she had seen the prints of Marilyn Monroe and plenty of others.
I drove her throughout the road to the Hollywood Roosevelt resort and suggested her to go searching the historic web site of the primary Academy Awards. She leaned towards me and stated she needed to inform me one thing in confidence.
“Once I determined to come back to Hollywood right this moment, I prayed for a miracle, that I might see anyone well-known. And I met you.”
She emailed me when she obtained to the airport and once more when she arrived in Spokane. She thanked me and stated she would come again to see me at some point. I advised her our encounter was an instance of an English phrase she didn’t know but: serendipity. Every of us discovered one thing we had not been in search of.
Hollywood nonetheless casts its spell far and extensive. Studio heads take word: Its future is in your palms together with the valuable goals of hundreds of thousands.
Linda Deutsch was a longtime particular correspondent for the Related Press. She has been a resident of Hollywood for greater than 50 years.
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