After I'm in Los Angeles, it's time to start looking for accommodation. A cursory analysis of offers for motels, apartments and rooms showed that the "City of Angels", like all of California, is a very expensive place to live. For example, a bed in
Of course, I turned to Airbnb, where the options for less than $40 per night were only a tent in the backyard or a place in a half-rotted camper. I’m not talking about motels at all - from $ 70 per day.
As a result, the best option turned out to be a service for placing students at educational institutions - homestay. In my case, such a service was provided by GEOS School, where I attended a class. But one shouldn't think that Americans are all so kind and they house students just like that. In fact, this is renting a room in the house, but food is also included in the accommodation.
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Functions for the selection of housing are assigned to a special unit at the school, and for the client this service costs $ 100. In fact, this is such a department with a couple of realtors who do not go anywhere, do not sell anything, but simply send requests to people from their database. As a result of their complex mental activity, you receive an offer in the mail for American families where they plan to settle you.
At first I was offered to share one room with another student, but then they found an option with a room just for me, in the perception of the host side of a young student who hardly speaks English. What was the surprise of the family when a bearded man in his early thirties showed up to them, who tried to talk to them in broken English with a funny Russian accent.
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My home for 3 weeks 
Yes, I didn't mention the price. The result is $ 285 per week, including meals. And this is the most affordable and high-quality housing option in Los Angeles. Of course, with such a course as it is now, all this is not so cool, but when I lived there, the ruble was noticeably stronger.
I got to the city of Carson to the wonderful woman Judy (72 years old). She lives in her one-story house with her grandson Brandon (the guy is stationed in the backyard in the guest house). It turned out that Judy had been working as a graphic editor in an automotive publication for more than 15 years: she made covers, typeset articles, photographed, so we quickly found common ground.
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Judy's house is small but cozy: a spacious hall, kitchen, work room and two bedrooms. Furniture, interior - country style. This is because Judy came from Arizona, where her father had a farm. She said that when she came to Arizona with her friend Denis (Japanese), her father always looked at him very unkindly. It's amazing, but there are still "white states" in the US, such as Arizona. "Tolerance" is not recognized there.
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Judy and Denis 
Judy is passionate about drawing, decorating, glass work. Her whole house is hung with her own paintings, and she always draws up Christmas presents herself. In this sense, Judy is a rare type of American who cooks well, knows how to do a lot of things with her hands, confidently drives a car, takes care of her grandchildren and her only daughter.
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The youngest granddaughter is McKayla. I've never seen real snow, although the snow in California is heaps. Here she is helping to decorate Judy's spruce branch, generously applying white foam to it. Snow from a can.
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By the way, it turned out to be easier to speak English with children: they do not use complex verbal constructions, and, as a rule, speak slowly, and generally understand you better than adults.
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McKayla (center) at a school concert 
With the eldest grandson Brandon, we talked a little more. At 23, he is not involved in PR, photography, design and growing a beard. Brandon doesn't drink or smoke - he works at the port and goes to church. By the way, he recently proposed to his young girlfriend. However, his mother, as I understand it, is not enthusiastic about her daughter-in-law on a national basis.
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Once Brandon invited me to visit a house church - this is, in fact, a room in a private house where Sunday church comrades gather: they read prayers, talk about the problems and successes of mankind through the prism of the Bible and the teachings of Jesus Christ. All this takes place in a relaxed, friendly atmosphere. I was warmly received, for a long time they were surprised that a person from cold Russia had been brought to their light.
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They wrote to me on Instagram under this photo, they say, why don’t they drink beer in the bar in the evening, but do it incomprehensibly what?
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Subjectively, Americans are much more religious than Russians. I'm not talking about the depth of religion, I'm talking about the popularity of the church among the population. It is difficult to meet unbelieving people in California. The number of all kinds of churches in Los Angeles just rolls over. Well, what to say, even in private homes they are organized.
Of course, the churches here are more modest than ours. It may be a small and unattractive building with bare walls, a small stage and school chairs - like an assembly hall in a provincial music school.
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One Sunday, I visited Freedom Church in Torrance with Judy and McKayla. The whole action is divided, so to speak, into three acts: several musical compositions, when the audience sings along with the VIA (vocal-instrumental ensemble), then it is the turn of the priest's sermon and again a song block. After the musical part, children are taken to a special room, where animators take care of them.
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Interestingly, the church has a full-time priest (pictured), but priests from other organizations are also invited there quite regularly. When I was at Freedom Church, I came across a guest speaker, and a young man in a blue shirt and three children took the place of an ordinary parishioner, stepping out to the microphone from time to time.
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On this day, the leading priest was a former fireman. He told a heartbreaking story about how, along with his colleague, he fell under the rubble in a fire. Both were badly damaged, and his colleague did not survive. The story raised the topic of responsibility for what happened, because it was he who led the subordinate into the burning building. As a result, everyone cried, hugged, and then sang optimistic songs together with the musical group.
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As I understand it, the church is also important for Americans in terms of communication with each other. There it is not particularly customary to make friends with families, in our understanding of the word - they came to church once a week, talked, cried, hugged and parted. Yes, they also visit guests, but less often than we do, and, as a rule, they do not stay late.
After about two hours of service, everyone goes out for lunch, which is "derived" from what each brings. Since the Americans are extremely “motley” in terms of ethnic composition, the table is also full of variety. True, not everyone cooks themselves, like Judy, and often they just buy ready-made.
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But Americans go to visit not with ready-made meals from the nearest cafe, but with what they themselves have prepared. In Russia, for example, according to tradition, the hosts treat you, and the guests bring alcohol. It turned out that everything is exactly the opposite.
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Together with Judy, I went to visit her friends, whom she meets about once every 2-3 months. The contingent is extremely diverse: Mexicans, Japanese, Europeans, Africans, gays, but at the same time, all of them are friendly, cheerful and open to communication.
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In the photo - the owners of the house. A gray-haired man with a large bottle of wine and his Japanese wife, who speaks better Spanish than English. The fact is that many Japanese fled the war to the countries of South and Latin America, then moving to the United States.
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Well, what about the attitude of Americans towards Russians? In short, they treat you to beer in a bar and confess your love for Putin. Not all of course, but there are many. Obama, they say, is a weakling with us, here Putin is a real man. Of course, they know better from the sunny coast of the Pacific Ocean.
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Met the guys at the bar on the pier. The girl already jumped when she found out that I was from Russia. Everyone was interested in how to take the place of the first lady. I advised to do it through sports or journalism. Although her competition is too strong in the face of it is clear who.
But not everything is so clear. In the United States, just like in our country, the central television system of brainwashing works great, but, unlike in our country, here they do not make Russia extreme, but convince citizens that America is doing everything right in foreign policy. Feel the difference?
But little is said about this at the household level, more about the weather, although in California the weather is stable like nowhere else. For a month of life in Los Angeles, it rained once and then at night. All other days it was sunny.
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Continuation about life in the USA follows! In the near future I will write about the Mazda6 car, which I was kindly given for a test drive in Los Angeles with the assistance of the Russian office of a Japanese company, about the peculiarities of traffic in the USA, the picturesque road along the Pacific Ocean (Pacific Cost Highway); I will tell you about interesting cars such as Dodge RAM, Dodge Challenger, Chevrolet Camaro, Fiat 500.
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Photos
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