re: Transplants, tell your culture shock stories when you first came to South LA

Moved to LSU from the Northeast in the mid 90’s.
As everyone else has said the lax liquor laws are amusing, and it includes buying booze, drinking in public, drinking age, tolerance for dwi. It does rain way way harder in the south.
Parking is another thing. In BRLA it seemed like people would just drive up a curb and park on grass, people just park anywhere.
People also come off a cheap because the idea to pay for things like parking, tolls, cover charge, coat check, etc all seemed so foreign to the people I met from parts of Louisiana. Those people didn’t want to pay for anything now part of that could be most people were college aged at the time and all college kids are somewhat cheap.
Race was funky in many ways. People in Louisiana came off as the most racially tolerant and most racially prejudiced people I ever met, and often both at the same time. As other people have said from other places we don’t have a lot of black people. I never went to school with any, never had any in my town, (and as LA people laughed about when they came to visit where I’m from) not even fast food restaurants had black employees. I had one friend in undergrad who was black but he was from another country and both his parents were doctors working for the world health organization and were based in DC.
There’s a lot more interaction between races in Louisiana and I learned quite a bit about race while living there. I have to say it was just funky and I didn’t agree with somethings I saw but in general I defend people from Louisiana as being way more racially open minded than most people from the outside give them credit for. And yes racism is much worse in places that don’t have any diversity.
That also being said I really thought that you can break just about any law in Louisiana and under decent conditions get away with it (especially if you are white). But part of that “getting away with it” required getting the police to like you or know you, and saying all the right things at the right time. I have never lived anywhere where you can do some really messed up stuff and walk away like LA.

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It was country come to town so we didn’t venture out after dark. We were so dumb.

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I had a friend who moved here from L.A. Lived in BR for many years and went back to visit L.A. She tries to walk out of a bar with her drink, bouncer is like "WTF are you doing?" She's like "Oh shite, this isn't NOLA." Puts drink down, goes outside and lights up a cigarette (trashy, yes) and he says "WTF are you doing, you can't smoke outside!" She was ready to come back to LA

I’m from a small town and this will sound crazy but people there are racist and not accepting of people from outside of that town. Just a really close knit town and we look out for each other, black and white alike.

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drive up a curb and park on grass

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Yep, relatives from Louisiana just drive right up on my lawn when they visit. Two wheels on the lawn and two wheels on the street. I don't appreciate it.

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It never would have crossed my mind to do this.

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Meaning, it would not cross your mind to avoid putting your tires in my grass?

I can't explain it but it's only guests from La.

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You could try raising your kids right where they aren’t demon spawns? Might work.

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It's not my kids I'd be worried about.

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Meaning, it would not cross your mind to avoid putting your tires in my grass?

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No, meaning it would never cross my mind to put my tires on someone's lawn.

1. There’s a wide range of accents. It shocked me how diverse the accents could be from the same city (see New Orleans).

2. Catholics....almost every one is Catholic and actually follows the rules during lent.

3. Mardi Gras- I knew it was a big deal down there, but underestimated the scope and how much of the state shuts down for it.

4. Drinking..., it’s perfctly acceptable to drink for pretty much any occasion and getting drunk in public is ok. This applies for everyone, no matter your age or how well off or educated you are.

5. People down there aren’t shy and have no problem talking to a complete stranger about anything under the sun.

6. How big of a deal crawfish season is.

That story was the funniest and most accurate shite I’ve read on this thread.

North LA is legit a completely different world than South LA. It’s pretty crazy if you think about it.

I’m not from LA and never lived there but I was born and raised Catholic so this is kinda relevant. I took a college GF of mine to a Mardi Gras party (in FL) at my old grade school/church to meet my parents. She wasn’t a Bible thumper so I didn’t think much of it but after we left she couldn’t believe people were “drinking and gambling at church”. I didn’t really know how to explain it because it wasn’t anything weird to me.