I am an LA girl born and raised. Sure, I’ve lived in other cities (went to college on the east coast, studied abroad in Madrid, etc.) but no place held my heart like LA. Technically, my family is from Pasadena. Home of the Rose Bowl and Rose Parade? Yeah, you’ve heard of it. And they are mortified every time I claim I am from LA. Pasadena has fought long and hard to maintain its own identity and not be swallowed by the LA sprawl, but let’s face it. Everyone knows LA and secretly wants to live in LA or at least visit on a whirlwind movie star-filled fairytale trip. Case and point – the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. I mean, Anaheim isn’t even in LA county. Talk about carpet bagging.
But, to get back to my original point. I love LA and I never thought that I was going to leave it until my husband up and got a job in Santa Barbara. Only a few hours up the coast, Santa Barbara is a picturesque town known for its beaches and being the home of UCSB – named consistently as one of the top 5 party schools in the country. My husband is an east coast guy and I could tell LA was starting to wear him down, so we agreed to take a reprieve and made the move to good old SB, or as the local tourism bureaus call it, the American Riviera.
We knew that Santa Barbara was a small town, but we did not realize just how small it was until we got here. First, everybody knows everybody. I have to admit I was a little freaked out when we got to town and people I’d never met before already knew about my husband and me. Our new employers had shared the news of our hiring and word had spread. Definitely not the typical reaction we would have gotten in LA. So much trying to stay anonymous as we eased our way into this new community. Apparently, people could smell the fresh meat in town– for better or for worse.
Second, we starved for the first month that we got here. With UCSB’s reputation and wine country nearby, we figured that Santa Barbara would have a lively nightlife, hot restaurant scene, and kickass bars. We came to learn quickly, however, that all the college kids stay in a small surfer-bro bubble called Isla Vista and don’t actually make it to downtown Santa Barbara very often. This means that restaurants close at 8 or 9, the time that we usually started thinking about dinner, and bars are deadsville unless it is a holiday or a cruise ship is in town. To make matters worse, the wine tasting rooms close and stop their tasting flights by 6pm. Definitely not conducive hours for working professionals. Let’s just say we starved and went thirsty for the first few weeks before we figured things out.
Third, Santa Barbara has a really strange age demographic. There are a tone of startups in town but the brain drain is a huge problem. That’s because the town is really expensive. Rents are sky high and buying in SB is crazy expensive, even more than LA. The rental prices are driven up by college kids that will pay ridiculous amounts to live in squalor and retirees that pay ridiculous amounts to buy 2 bedroom, 1 bath cottages with a peekaboo ocean view. Anything in the middle? Forget about it. (This captures the general sentiment http://youtu.be/reb4GXg1W2k). We have come to learn that Santa Barbara is home to the Newly Wed or the Nearly Dead. Basically, people get their first job out of college stay here for a year or two and then scram to more budget and job friendly cities and their vacancies are filled by rich retirees. Unless you have family money or a great job, making it in SB for the thirty and forty somethings with families is a tough go.
Four, Santa Barbara is surprisingly lacking in diversity. After living in LA, this is especially noticeable. Everything from the people on the street to the restaurants just seems monotone. For self declared foodies, the lack of diversity is especially rough. And when there is an ethnic restaurant in town, it just doesn’t live up to expectations — people in Santa Barbara like food bland and without spice (may have to do something with the demographic mentioned above). But, that doesn’t mean they won’t charge you an arm and a leg for it.
So, this is turning into a rant about Santa Barbara, but really it’s not all that bad. The place is beautiful, we can actually drive places without sitting in traffic and the weather is amazing all year round. It always takes a little while to get adjusted to living some place new and this blog follows our growing pains and adventures as we make a new life on the American Riviera and Eat Drink our way through SB!