Art on Fire, page 5
3.
Some of the restaurants the Robert Foundation had partnered with were within walking distance of the hotel. I asked the concierge at the front desk to make a reservation at one of them. Determined to enjoy myself as much as possible in spite of the circumstances, I went around Hollywood and Beverly Hills like an eager tourist. I waited in lines, I bought a hot dog, I took pictures of the murals in Beverly Hills, and I bought an Oscar trophy at a souvenir shop for ten dollars and change. I chose the Oscar for ‘Best Artist’. I’d considered ‘Best Tourist’, too, but when I pulled the trophy out of my bag, I realised that I had taken ‘Best Person’. Mistakes continued to follow me.
When I got to the restaurant … well, I realised I hadn’t needed a reservation. That’s how shabby the place was. There were only three tables, one of which was covered with piles of napkins and straws. A few customers were collecting food to take away, but no one sat down to eat. It didn’t seem like the kind of restaurant that would even take reservations, and the food was just alright. Still, when I gave them the name of the Robert Foundation, they said the meal was covered.
I had filled my stomach, but felt the urge to eat somewhere else anyway. Another restaurant on the list was only two blocks away. It was an impulsive visit, but when I got there it looked big enough to require a reservation. When I said that I was alone and hadn’t made a reservation, that I was an artist with the Robert Foundation, the waiter asked if I’d like a seat at the outdoor terrace. There was one remaining seat with a view of the HOLLYWOOD sign and today, he said, it was particularly worth seeing. I followed the waiter to my table and was surprised by what I saw. Instead of reading HOLLYWOOD, the sign read HQLLYWQQD, with all the Os replaced with Qs. The waiter told me that the change had happened overnight. Then he asked me if I knew what it meant.
‘I’ve never seen anything like it before,’ I said. ‘Do you know what it means?’
‘No, that’s why I’m asking. Every customer today has given me a different answer.’
‘It’s illegal, right?’ I asked.
‘It’s illegal, but people usually do it to mark an event of some kind.’
The waiter pointed to the wall of the restaurant, which was covered with Hollywood signs, but if you looked closely, you could see they were all slightly off. HOLLYWEED, HOLYWOOD, BOLLYWOOD: some of them took advantage of the sign’s existing letters, while other arrangements used different letters entirely.
The waiter handed me a menu and took a photo of me in front of a HQLLYWQQD sign painted on the wall. I repeated that I was an artist with the Robert Foundation.
‘Oooh, the Robert Foundation,’ the waiter said. ‘That’s a great place.’
‘Do people from there come to this restaurant a lot?’ I asked.
‘Yes, and they often eat this dish.’
The waiter turned to a page at the back of the menu, displaying various options for three-course meals, and with his help I chose the restaurant’s signature ‘Seafood Crunch’. He confirmed that drinks were not included, but at his recommendation, I ordered a glass of white wine.
I liked the restaurant’s music. There were only a few plants placed between me and passersby on the street, and sitting here gave me a sense of comfortable belonging. I watched the stores bustling with evening business, the people on their way somewhere, then suddenly it hit me: I was in Los Angeles — in Hollywood. Even though this wasn’t my destination — just a longer-than-expected stopover — I wouldn’t have been able to see the HQLLYWQQD sign at any other time.
The presence of the Qs seemed significant. My residency was part of a program the Robert Foundation had started to revitalise boring urban areas, and the city I’d been assigned to enjoy, physically and spiritually — to depict in my art — was called Q. I wasn’t sure if the sign was referring to that Q, but the image intrigued me. I thought about how I was always one step behind — I should have come up with an idea like this. Anyway, now I could send a photo of the sign to Director Choi.
Unlike the previous restaurant, this one had a number of customers, all of whom looked great. The food was tasty, too. The bill, brought over by the waiter, came to $210. The wine I’d chosen only cost twenty dollars — how could the bill, even with tax, be $210?
‘Everything is included,’ the waiter said. ‘A three-course meal and a glass of wine.’
He pointed to minuscule letters at the bottom of the menu that read ‘Market Price’ and said that the cost today reflected the presence of the HQLLYWQQD sign.
‘I think there’s been a mistake,’ I said. ‘I’m with the Robert Foundation. Can you bring me a bill with the Foundation discount?’
The waiter didn’t seem to understand.
‘Your restaurant has a partnership with the Robert Foundation,’ I added.
‘What’s the Robert Foundation?’
‘Didn’t you say you knew it?’
He smiled lightly and pointed to his T-shirt.
‘I know Under Armor, I know Nike, I know Samsung. And I know the Robert Foundation.’
When I showed him the email I’d received with the list of partner businesses, he gave me a puzzled look and said, ‘I’ll check to see if there’s some sort of relationship between our restaurant and the Robert Foundation that I wasn’t aware of.’
He came back shortly after and said that there was no such partnership.
‘Are you sure it’s our restaurant?’ he asked. ‘Not one in Hollywood? As you can see, we’re not in Hollywood.’
He pointed to the HQLLYWQQD sign out the window, but I wasn’t in the mood to humour his joke. I could feel glances from the people at the table next to me. Finally, I pulled out my wallet and was, as expected, short on cash. When I added the twenty-five per cent tip the waiter urged, I didn’t have enough money to cover everything. I changed the tip percentage. The waiter coolly brought me a revised bill, but I still didn’t have enough money. Half my cash was in the safe in my hotel room, and I hadn’t expected to spend nearly $250 today.
‘Ma’am, you’re thirteen dollars short.’ The waiter said this twice. When I said, with an embarrassed look on my face, that I would have to go back to my hotel to get the money, he completely gave up the perfunctory kindness he’d shown me previously. In a slightly more domineering tone, he told me to pay right now. Another employee approached me. The people at the table next to me no longer hid the fact that they were staring … then I noticed someone walking down the street. It was the man staying in the room next to me — the person who shared my bathroom. He had looked so different this morning, when we greeted each other, that I didn’t recognise him at first.
‘Hello!’
‘Oh, hello.’
‘Where are you going?’
‘A launch party.’
‘Sorry, but could I borrow thirteen dollars from you?’
He entered the restaurant and helped me pay the bill, mumbling, ‘Market price? This is a scam,’ while smiling at the waiter as he brought us the receipt. The man kept adjusting his glasses and looking around at the surroundings. He was trying to avoid the paparazzi — an occupational hazard, he said. The man was an actor, on his way to the launch party for a TV series, and he’d dressed up for the event.
‘If you don’t have any other plans, would you like to come with me?’ he asked. ‘It’s just over there.’
He gestured to a crowd of people. Camera flashes burst onto a street darkening to dusk.
An actor? Back at the hotel, I zoomed in on a photo I’d taken from a distance, of him posing in front of a red-carpet backdrop and saw written in tiny letters ‘Hunting or Gathering’. When I went to the show’s website to find out more about it, I didn’t see his face.
There was a photo by Willy Ronis hanging next to the elevator in the hotel lobby, and seeing it made me think about what I’d left behind. A child was running, holding a baguette as long as he was tall, looking like a delivery person. I turned Bballi notifications back on. My location was still set to Gyeonggi-do, Korea, and requests for deliveries there started to come in immediately. When I changed my location to the US, I got a call. I assumed it was the Robert Foundation, but it was Bballi, which I had left behind in Korea.
‘Are you a rider?’ the caller asked.
‘Huh?’
‘There’s food near you now — could you pick it up?’
‘Oh, but … I’m in the US right now.’
‘Yes, I can see that. 1765 North Orange Drive, Los Angeles.’
They could track me? I didn’t remember agreeing to that, but it must have been one of the countless terms and conditions I’d agreed to. Puzzled, I continued to listen to the voice coming from my phone.
‘There’s a pick-up forty metres from you. Can you do that?’
‘Forty metres? Alright.’
‘Please pick up the food from the listed location and deal with it yourself.’
‘What do you mean, deal with it myself?’
‘Deal with it at your convenience.’
‘Oh … Do you mean I should throw it away?’
‘Many riders eat the food.’
‘So you want me to eat it?’
‘You can do that. After picking up the food, deal with it in whatever way you see fit.’
I got a text message explaining that the pick-up address was ‘secret’. Not ‘special’, but ‘secret’. I’d already left the hotel. I had heard about Bballi expanding to the US, but who would have thought that I’d experience it firsthand? My destination was a small shop in the building next to my hotel. On the counter was a shopping bag marked ‘35’. I faltered, unsure if I should just pick it up; when I did, someone came up to me and asked, ‘Bballi?’
‘Bballi,’ I said in response. That was it. I didn’t need to send a photo of the delivery to the Bballi app. I’d already got a message.
‘Thank you for picking up the order. A secret amount will be deposited shortly into your rider account.’
Then I got nineteen dollars. The currency was displayed in dollars now that I was in the US. It was a pretty good rate for just going to the building next door. There was a familiar hot dog in the ‘35’ bag.
I received a text message from Director Choi.
‘That’s so cool!’ he wrote. ‘The Hollywood sign covered with Qs is amazing. It bodes well for your creative success.’
The message concluded with an excited dancing emoji. I sighed. I wasn’t just experiencing a time difference between Korea and the US; it was like being on a different planet. I placed the hot dog in the fridge, put thirteen dollars in a ziplock bag and placed it on the shelf above the toilet, and pulled a thin hoodie out of my suitcase. That was when I found my credit card — in the hoodie’s side pocket. As soon as I told my bank and they unfroze my card, all strength left my body and I couldn’t do a thing. I took a shower, feeling like I’d been possessed by something, and only after a while did I realise that I’d used the old body wash.
My sleep kept getting interrupted that night, as if I needed intermissions between dreams. The air conditioner wasn’t cool enough, its noise incessant. The sounds of dripping water and switches going on and off next door were amplified by the hotel’s thin walls and shared bathroom. When I started to hear thumping and the sound of someone vomiting up their guts, I crushed my ears under my pillow. Only after my neighbour had thrown up a few more times did I get absorbed back into sleep.
I met Robert in my dream. He looked like what I’d seen in pictures. A white and dark brown papillon, with an expression so arrogant it looked cute. Robert told me he would give me his personal phone number, so I had my phone open, ready to save the information. Zero one zero, three seven four four, ha ha ha ha.
‘Zero one zero, three seven four four — hahahaha? Can you, um, repeat those last four digits?’
‘Zero one zero, three seven four four, ha, ha, ha, ha.’
It was a strange number, but I wrote it down in a hurry. After several more dreams, the one in which Robert had appeared became hazy, but when I got up in the morning, I found a scrawled note by my head.
010-3744-hahahaha.
It was written in sloppy handwriting on a memo pad embossed with the hotel’s name in small letters. The memo felt like a metaphor for the past few days. This was the situation I found myself in. I had a number, but I couldn’t call anyone with it. Was this a test? A test of patience? Was it Robert — mischievous Robert — who’d put me in this situation? I’d already searched ‘Robert Foundation, artist, cancellation’ the night before. Thinking too far into the future was an old habit of mine. As soon as I start something, I worry about how it might end, and even when I succeed, all I can think about is my failures. But no matter how many unsavoury words I typed into the search bar, no comparable situations came up. I wanted to believe that this adventure wasn’t a misfired bullet. There was no reason that a mistake, a cancellation of an artist’s application, or an endless delay would have made it into the news, but I couldn’t stop searching, and because I couldn’t find the results I feared, I alternated between short-lived relief and anxiety. I tried to remind myself that there were uncontrollable variables everywhere — that waiting a few days was no big deal. But hadn’t I woken up from a dream and written down ‘010-3744-hahahaha’? That was a rift between the two worlds I was fighting to squeeze together.
‘Robert Art Foundation Advances Urban Cultural Revitalization’, ‘New Changes to Traditional Artist Residency’, ‘Number One City Q’, ‘Q: A Short Distance Between Artistic Inspiration and the Marketplace’ … When my persistent searches led me to these articles, I felt further relief, and I wondered if I was making too big a deal of a simple delay. Well, you couldn’t call it a simple delay — everything had a margin of error, but if that was the only problem with my airport pick-up, things should have been fixed within a couple of days, tops. Of course, I was aware of the unprecedented emergency. Yesterday a neighbourhood in Los Angeles had recorded a temperature of 119 degrees Fahrenheit. In Celsius, that was over forty-eight degrees.
I turned the air conditioner off and on again, but it still wasn’t working properly. The refrigerator wasn’t staying cold either. When I opened its door, I saw that the hot dog inside had aged ten years overnight. Its wrapping paper was soggy, the inside of the fridge lukewarm. I felt the urge to throw the hot dog outside, but as soon as I opened the window, stale air flowed into the room. It wasn’t even 8.00 am. Everything was stagnant, inside and out. Moored at sea for three days before reaching my destination. The sky was yellower than it had been upon my arrival, and it smelled increasingly acrid.
The hotel lobby was chaotic that morning. More than a few guests said their air conditioners hadn’t been working, and each time someone complained, the employee at the front desk pointed to the same words on an iPad screen: ‘Lightning has hit the area over ten thousand times in the past few days.’
A mobile map indicated current wildfire hotspots but, in contrast to the severity of the situation, the fire icons on the map looked almost dainty. The fire’s origin was above a national freeway, but it had been migrating west and would soon reach San Bernardino National Forest. People were concerned about the blaze running into small, regional fires. That had already happened in some places, and the new conflagrations had veered onto entirely unexpected routes. One town on the map was so surrounded by fire icons, it looked like it was under siege. Humans and nature, playing a deadly board game.
The disaster was unfolding on a huge TV in the lobby, but I couldn’t hear the anchor’s voice. I wasn’t sure if the volume was off or if the music in the lobby was drowning it out. The reason the lobby was so crowded was that, unlike in the forests depicted on screen, engulfed in flames, underlined with correspondingly serious text, it was fairly cool here. Strangers conversed; one would say that the situation was more severe last week, that the fires were under control, and someone else would refute that statement.
One woman, who said that if it was like this in the summer, she couldn’t imagine how bad things would be by autumn, when fire season would be at its worst, turned to me and said, ‘My mom always fantasised about coming to California — especially because of the weather — but now it’s on fire!’
A silver-haired woman sitting next to us said, ‘Let’s go home. Let’s pack our bags.’
‘But Mom,’ her daughter responded, ‘we just got here.’
Then, to me, she said, ‘The airport is on the verge of being shut down. We only just managed to get out of it.’
‘The airport is closed? In Los Angeles?’
‘Yeah, we left and then they shut the doors.’
I had tried to call the Robert Foundation so many times, to no avail, that by the time my call was finally answered, I had almost resigned myself to another day of waiting, and forgot why I’d called them. When I heard the woman on the other side say, ‘Robert Foundation,’ I came to my senses. It was a familiar voice. Maybe we’d spoken before. Regardless, she wasn’t the person meant to pick me up. She asked if I was calling about personal business, and when I said no, she replied with a list of mysterious words and asked which of the aforementioned projects I was calling about.
When I asked the woman to run through the projects again, she did so at extreme speed. I quickly realised these projects had nothing to do with me, but the woman continued speaking. In the end, I had no choice but to cut her off. Maybe I’d be misunderstood as impatient and rude, but there was a problem with speaking so fast and for so long that people had to cut you off.
‘Sorry, I don’t know what those are,’ I said. ‘My name is An Yiji. I came from Korea to participate in the residency program. I landed four days ago, but I’m still waiting to be picked up.’
