Santacon 2018, Los Angeles

Out New Age Shopping with the LA Tarot Fanatics today, I didn’t realize that today is also Santacon Saturday!

As our shopping group walked through Chinatown we gazed off toward the Platform at the Metro Chinatown Station and saw this group of about a dozen Santaconners waiting for the train.

Santacon is the alt holiday celebration where consuming alcohol replaces consuming commodities. Today in Los Angeles and other cities Santacon has people in bright red costumes shuttling from bar to bar. LA Santacon used Metro adjacent bars for convenience and safety.

Through our travels, we encountered them a couple more times in the day.

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a dozen Santacon 2018, Los Angeles participants in vivid reds, greens, and striped costumes pose with bottles, flasks, and friends on the LA Metro Gold Line Platform at Chinatown Station. — **4:12:29 pm** – Chinatown Station, Metro Gold Line

a Santacon couple resting on the Metro platform at Chinatown. She sits on a bench and yawns. He stands relaxed. They hold hands. — **4:12:53 pm** – Chinatown Station, Metro Gold Line

dappled by the afternoon sun, a couple waits for the LA Metro Gold Line train and looks at a Metro System Map posted at the station. — **4:13 pm** – Chinatown Station, Metro Gold Line

the Metro Gold Line train toward Union Station arrives at Chinatown Station and Santaconners enthusiastically board the train. — **4:16:54 pm** – Chinatown Station, Metro Gold Line

as Santacon participants file onto the Metro Gold Line train, one pauses mid-stride to turn and wave to my camera. She wears a velvet-red dress and a bright stocking cap. — **4:16:57 pm** – Chinatown Station, Metro Gold Line

A festively dressed group of Santacon participants walk through Chinatown, Los Angeles — **4:49 pm** – Walking through Chinatown, Los Angeles

a Metro Gold Line train car is filled with Santacon participants. — **7:12 pm** – riding the Metro Gold Line near Little Tokyo station

a woman who's probably had a few Santacon drinks already implores a young guy on the Metro Gold Line train to "call your mother!" — **7:13 pm** – teaching the youth

He didn’t reply with more than a word or two, but she gave him a several Metro stops long lecture anyway. The core theme which she repeated many times, which she implored him with over and over was,

You have to call your mother!

She went on to explain – with the enthusiasm that perhaps only a Santaconner can – that,

Even me, I’m an adult, but I still have to call my mom and tell her that I’m riding around Los Angeles in a red bra and drinking in different bars. She may not understand, but I still have to talk to my mother!