High-fiving at a birthday party in Burbank, 26 year old Los Angeles native Natalie Morales and her friends were delighted to announce that they had exposed another LA newcomer, Michelle Greene, for mispronouncing the word “Cahuenga” and then trying to continue the conversation as if it didn’t happen.
“All of our heads turned when she asked for a ‘can of pop’ from the waiter,” said Morales who exposed Greene at 9:15 p.m. “Like what? What is that? So we decided to talk to her and within 30 seconds, she told us that she had a hard time finding ‘Ka-WHO-in-ja Boulevard’ on her way here and we immediately started berating her.”
Morales, who makes a habit of starting the stopwatch on her phone once she suspects someone of being an outsider, claims that 30 seconds to uncover an LA transplant isn’t even her best time. She proudly recalls when it took her 3.45 seconds to out a man who “pronounced Wilshire wrong, like ‘Frodo of the Shire’” while he was inputting an address into Google Maps.
According to Greene, who has been asked, “You’re not from here, are you?” 97 times since relocating to the Greater Los Angeles area last month, this certainly wasn’t her first time being outed by an Angeleno in public. “Someone told me they knew because of my general air of optimism,” she adds. “I smile and make eye contact with people when I pass them on the street. That usually gives me away.”
“This is important work,” Morales insists after hearing Greene’s statement. “We were born and raised here and they were not. And everyone needs to know.”
Morales is currently in talks to star in an upcoming TLC’s reality series about her life called, “The Newcomer Whisperer”, detailing the ins and outs of Morales’ day as she gleefully exposes non-Angelenos, stopwatch in hand.
