Thursday, January 23, 1997
VILLAGE:
High prices, lack of interesting places deter student
patronageBy Dorn Yoder
Waste my money in Westwood?
I have to respond to the article about the Westwood merchants
who have petitioned the university to more or less close down the
student union store.
Let’s see  what is there to do in Westwood? Go to a
Jollywood movie for $8 or $8.50 per person? And see a culturally
fulfilling extravaganza? I’m not a fan of Follywood movies. You
might as well watch most network TV or talk to the dog. It’s the
same writers, the same plot and, except for really rare situations,
the same exhibition of talent, or its lack thereof.
And there’s no supermarket in Westwood, but there is a little
market which offers coupons for merchandise they don’t have in
stock. I don’t know how long ago the Safeway closed. It used to be
where the Mann multiplex is now. And what kind of clothing is
there? The Gap? There’s where you’ll find something original and
unique. And how do the kitchens look in most of the
restaurants?
Don’t ask, just go out back of them and you’ll get an idea. And
is anything cheap or even inexpensive? As in, what the students
can, or should, afford? Or are they cheap to the chi-chi neighbors
from Bel Air or wherever, who come on down to feel the grit of
"real-life" every now and then and brush shoulders with
intellectuals for once in their lives?
So, if these merchants want our money, why do they cater to the
rich neighbors? Whose fault is it that most of us can’t afford most
of what’s in "our" village?
Well, let’s see, there’s a Thrifty and there’s a couple of copy
places, and if you go across Wilshire … Oh, that’s probably not
Westwood anymore  that’s got to be West L.A.
I’ll tell you of a few cool places. Telegraph Avenue in
Berkeley, and College Avenue used to be OK but it’s a little too
upscale, unless one is already a bourgeois yuppie, but that doesn’t
happen until after one graduates, if one is really unlucky and has
no life except for the things which surround them. The area around
NYU is pretty varied and interesting, and it has something for
everybody. Of course, that’s in the middle of a real city, New York
City, that is, whether you like it or not. And around Yale there’s
an interesting neighborhood with lots of bookstores.
Real book stores, not these coffee-table selection types like
Clown or Barbers or Whatever Books. The only cool bookstore I can
think of is Sisterhood, but wouldn’t you know it  that’s
across Wilshire.
Isn’t it ironic that a public university should be in such a
private neighborhood and that a private school (USC) should be in a
neighborhood which would benefit more from a public school’s
presence?
It is unfortunate that instead of a neighborhood which might
cater the intellectual tastes of our community, we have people who
seem more into money-grubbing. Go into Westwood and look at the
prices. It’s bad enough that these people creep onto campus with
those posters and frilly things and expensive backpacks and cheap
jewelry and all that stuff, and take up our sidewalks and plazita
spaces, selling us stuff that 40 percent of us on financial aid can
clearly afford and have a deep need for. But now someone, after
feeling threatened by the inadequacy of their own inventory
planning and pricing, got smart, got a lawyer and learned how to
shift the blame. So suddenly it’s the university’s fault that they
in Westwood have no customers. Where do they think they are?
UCLA at Century City? Or UC Beverly Hills? Â I’m getting my
masters at U. of Mastercard, and minoring in power-shopping at U.
of Bloomingdale’s  and you? Daddy will buy it for me; could
you have someone bring it out to the car for me? The merchants are
suffering alright; from delusions, from bad planning on their own
part, from greed  dare I say from good old stupidity?
The only cool place I can think of on this side of Wilshire in
Westwood is Penny Lane.
There’s probably one more. Please tell me when you locate
it.
I don’t like the bars in Westwood, and I don’t like the
restaurants. These people don’t know the difference between decor
and atmosphere. Is that ASUCLA’s fault? Not unless the owners are
alumni. I’m sure I need to go shopping for $85 sunglasses, and
neither my education or my life will be complete without $75 jeans,
or if I was a girl, some lovely, slinky little thing for … only
how much? And I love a nice light lunch for $12 plus tip. Well.
Let’s see, how could I get that money? Maybe I don’t need those
textbooks after all. Actually, I look around and suspect a lot of
stylish people of being better dressed than they are read. Oh,
those are the people from Brentwood.
But wait! I’m beginning to see! To be well educated is a drain
on the economy. That’s it. We need to spend, not study, to save
their sorry donkey.
My suggestion is that the next time any of us go shopping, ask
why there’s no salvation army in Westwood for the really cool
clothes. Look around, isn’t that what you really admire? Cheap
chic, for everyday wear? Going to the opera of course requires
something nicer, perhaps expensive. But how may times did you go
last term?
Why isn’t there a repertoire cinema in Westwood? There are
certainly enough excellent, mostly foreign movies which have stood
the test of time. Of course, if too many people saw these they
would begin to no longer accept such schlock that our high-paid,
movie-making neighbors serve up, as if we had no choice. Go ask why
high-top basketball shoes made in China for the cost of rice are
priced at $125, why a wife-beater T-shirt costs $18, why underwear
is $6.50. (I’m guessing there, I don’t usually wear any.) I suggest
that for a week, at least, every time any of us from this campus go
shopping or hanging out or spending in Westwood, ask  why
aren’t we getting more for our money?
A lot of these people drive Mercedes and Lexus, big new ones.
They’ve gotten more for our money, our financial aid, and the books
we should have bought and read. Ask them. Then tell them what you
want.
And be clear about it. Don’t just go off, like I do. For
example, there’s no place to go dancing in Westwood, there’s no
gay-bar, or girl bar. Sure, there’s the place you can walk into and
catch the whiff of vomit, but there’s just plain no cool bar there.
Sure, you drink a little, and who cares, and that’s just what they
count on.
Westwood should be a college town, and that’s just what it is
not. It’s a place for pretentious rich people to come to and feel
intellectual for a moment, but before it goes to their head, they
leave. The merchants in Westwood are catering to a clientele which
does not exist in our neighborhood, and they are ignoring the needs
of the people who are really here. And now they have the nerve to
wonder why we don’t come to spend.
There is such a thing as value for money, it’s just not in
Westwood. Westwood is a college town, it’s not just Brentwood’s
neighbor, it’s not just Beverly Hills’ poorer cousin. It’s our
college town and it might be time for these greedy and foolish
merchants and real-estate agents to act like it if they want our
patronage. Then they’ll get more business. You won’t sell much ice
cream at the North Pole, and there’s no reason to tempt students on
financial aid with Gucci’s. Our new student union is indeed a
little bit extravagant, but I don’t want to walk that far into
Westwood for the food they offer there, neither Burger-Rama (retch)
or uh, uh, Raskin-Bobbins. Yeah, there’s my vitamin quotient for
the day. Getting the picture yet, Avrech et al?
There’s 30,000 plus of us here. Every time we go into Westwood,
we should take just a few minutes to communicate to the management
of wherever we spend money what we want, not to the waitron, not to
the salesperson, (you may as well tell the wall) but ask for the
manager, or owner, and tell them what you’d like to see. Think
about it first, and don’t lose your temper, (that’s why I’m not
going, but urging you instead.) Think about it good, or like the
three mistaken wishes, you’ll get what you asked for but not what
you meant.
So think about it, and I’ll bet in not too long there will be
some results. What I’m saying is that we’re not getting enough for
our money. You decide what to do.
Think of it this way; on two sides this campus is surrounded by
people who live in big houses, on nice streets paved at tax-payer
expense, and we can’t park there, and get looked at with suspicion
for even walking through, another side is filled with some
expensive, and some sub-standard, student housing, and on the
fourth side the merchants are now complaining because we don’t
spend enough on their lousy merchandise. Makes you feel a little
penned-in, write?