eating out

Eating in Japan means eating pork or fish. Despite what we all might imagine about vegetable sushi or soy based foods, these are only available in the extreme periphery of this culture. Noodle bowls, which are excellent, are without exception pork based, and delicious. We haven’t been pointed and laughed at since our first night here, when I tried in vain to avoid pork by ordering Vegetable Gyoza (minced pork and garlic), but ordering has not become any easier. A waiter will often greet us with a big wave and “Hi, how you doing?” but can go no further. One restaurant even had prices written in Japanese, undecipherably to us. Asking for two of something almost never works, even when using what I imagine is one of the words for a pair, futatsu. This must not be the right thing to say. Perhaps we are asking for a duet, or ensemble, or team of drinks.

Near the train station across the street is a line of noodle-mostly restaurants that are sort of down a few steps from street level and on some sort of boardwalk. We’ve found a favorite one of these that has Miso Ramen noodles (pork included), semi-spicy or super-spicy noodles. There are about 30 other variations of these that I’m not at all interested in. These cost 800, 900 or 1000 yen, which is deposited in a machine outside the door in exchange for a ticket that you hand to a counter attendant.

The retail experience in general remains a mystery. There are a familiar group of syllables I hear when approaching a counter, which must amount to hello. These seldom vary based on time of day, gender or size of party. I think they address everyone individually as sir, and I haven’t heard what people say in response.

Japan?

Sorry to my loyal consumers that my only post in two weeks is about US news:

to be chasing a scene in your helicopter, capitalizing on a public fear of crime
and love of justice and video games, encouraged by your producer (who is paying for the gas you are burning by the second) to stay the course; then in your last act to miss the scoop on exactly the fiery crash that guarantees you the top spot on the news that night; what a clear look at yourself you must have had.

Japan

The service on JAL is great. Being in Terminal 1 during the afternoon is to step into the jet age of Indiana Jones. The array of huge airplanes outside and uniformed employees from all walks of life is stunning. The Korean Airlines flight attendants were particularly interesting, dressed in slate blue and tan uniforms and pale makeup. Lining up to board the plane with matching luggage you could see that their scarves were tied just perfectly and were stiff enough that they extended over their left shoulders, as if the whole queue were in a stiff wind. Some of us were asked to fill in a survey on the JAL group service; all of the questions about greetings and appearance of the staff praised humility and modesty as the ideal for their employees.

At the airport baggage claim there is a stadium-ready monitor showing a video of kittens napping and curtains blowing in the breeze to calm the masses of international travelers waiting for their bags. This went over well with me.

Bikes are everywhere in the city and out of the hundreds I’ve seen, only 1 has been locked two anything and only 2 others had locks in their wheels to prevent them being ridden away without a key. Vending machines are also everywhere, offering a dozen varieties of tea, soda and coffee.

At a noodle restaurant last night, we were surrounded by the staff, who pointed and laughed as we tried to figure out the menu and navigate the 10 or so condiments available on the table. Among them were fresh garlic cloves and a press. When I used a couple of those on my dumplings, one of them managed to warn “don’t kiss him” to the girl across from me, which I guess goes with saying. When we left the money (about 30 dollars) and split, the guy chased us down on the street to return a single coin as change.

Airport

I'm at the airport again.

lay fromag may play been

Continuing on a rout of hip valley restaurants, we went to a place called Shovelunt. If The Manufacturers were state senators, as the owner of this Shovelunt is reported to be, two episodes of bartender as asshole would warrant immediate, and politically guaranteed, bulldozing of the property to build a Vietnam memorial.

I will provide a rough synopsis of what was hilarious, understated and blood-boiling all at once. It occurred before we attended the monthly art opening, where unwashed people from Phoenix paint or draw or something. The name has been changed in case I really insult the guy, who would be easy to pick out if anyone actually goes there.

Sitting down at the bar on a couple super lightweight aluminum chairs we were greeted by a good-looking surfer type bartender who was about my age and nice enough, if a little light in the loafers. I thought, cool, this guy will make for nice conversation and potentially can offer directions to a place that is neither 110 degrees inside with lip-pierced dropouts inside nor icy cold and varnished with a thin layer of Food Network chicken dishes and weight-management salads with $26 price tags. (yes, people actually, without embarrassment or wilting with defeat, order from a “weight management” menu at a chain we visited last week). Shovelunt is an attempt at the latter. The surfer was replaced by a slightly older and gayer gentleman who got off on the wrong foot.

The restaurant serves “flights” of wine paired with cheeses, a version of which we enjoyed in the rouged fairy-tale of Tamponi last week. I wanted beer and my colleague wanted wine, and so we opted to purchase a beer, a wine, and the three cheeses from the “chardonnay flight” list to satisfy our unique cravings and avoid the monumental price and millilitral servings associated with a flight.

Us: We’d like to order a glass of wine and the three cheese plate

Man: great, tell me what you’d like and I can help you select.

Us: we’d like the chardonnay and the three cheeses it’s paired with, but full servings of each.

Man: Yes but….[us waiting for him to say “we’re out of #3”]…you wouldn’t like them, they are really funky French cheeses and unless you’ve been to france or blah blah blah

Us: well, these three are featured on your menu, apart from the gross of other varieties you offer. We’ll just get the camembert and can you recommend two others?

Man: I really don’t think you’ll like it, it’s not like the camembert you get in the store.

Us: Well, do you have anything yellow, or canned that you think we’d like to pay $15 for a slice of, or anything wrapped in singles, can we get a sleeve of Ritz crackers or something that comes in a tub? Do you have Asti? What store do you think we shop at that we show up in this accent-lighted Ikea-spasm and order $30 worth of drinks?

Man: [suggests two cheeses]

Us: [I try for the camembert again, he denies it]

Man: you could have XX cheddar or the piave.

Us: Piave.

Man: that’s a really strong one

Us: Shut up and get out of this vicinity.

Man: [walks away without our drink order]

Obviously at this point I say something quite loudly to the effect of “maybe you should’ve come out to your mother while you still had time.” Which sort of ends our interaction with that guy for the evening, he sent the young guy back over.

The funny thing is that the owner was sitting right next to us the whole time and didn’t notice that (1) his employee began a sale by negatively speaking about something featured on the menu (2) denied a specific request for all menu items (3) continued to deny an order when the request was properly pronounced (“camenbert” ‘piave”) (4) didn’t offer a taste of an item to ensure it wouldn’t be sent back (5) didn’t take drink orders with the cheese, the pairing of which is the purpose of the menu page to which we referred during this sequence.

The man then let us taste the cheeses that he did not let us order and sort of apologized for assuming we wouldn’t like them. I debated gagging on them and playing it up like the camenbert really was lethally funky (JB rip) and, oh sir, you’re so good for having warned us off this freakish paste! I have to say, though, the three he denied were better than the three he forced upon us. One cheese I’d recommend is Piave, which was one he offered in contrast to some kind of Cabot sludge, and which after two firm “we’ve had that before, fuckface[s]" he allowed us to purchase.

What he should have done, for those of you wondering how I can be so rude to someone I didn’t even order a full meal from and whom I actually thought I would like, is say any (or all of them, he could have even back pedaled for a while if he didn’t start of poorly)

(1) I think I can do better than the pairings on the menu, have you ever had XX?
(2) Let me bring you a taste of XX so I know we’re on the same page with this…[which he did after all! (why wait?)]
(3) Many people send back the camenbert, have you had it before?
(4) The flights are so popular, can I suggest some cheeses a lot of people don’t notice because we have so many?
(5) We’re out of everything you ordered, because of the holiday, I’m bringing you colby-jack and craisins and charging you $30. Do you like drag queens?

To top it all off, the bread was of the super-market French style (it’s not the camenbert you get in the store, but it is the bread!) and completely unacceptable for the price of the plate, or raise the price a buck and get some decent bread, senator.

north

In a fantastic rented Dodge Caliber we headed out in the late morning for northern Arizona to maybe see The Grand Canyon. As you drive north from Phoenix on Rte 17 there is an amazing array of planned communities. These are called planned communities by their developers and people holding the bag for thousands of particle board buildings that they are hoping to sell to families getting squeezed out the sides of other cities who need a place to live. Most people would not think of them as planned communities, because the only thing you can plan on is that your house will be colored brown, will be covered by desert dust storms frequently and you will need an oil change in your Honda CR-V once a month because you are driving almost 70 miles round trip to your job in Phoenix. These nests for future humans have their Polo outlets pre-installed across the highway (no you can’t walk or bike to the outlets). It is a tragedy that these towns are being “planned” around services (like buying madras shorts and wainscoting paneling for your shed) that are exclusively offered by national and international corporations. I could be wrong, because you can’t see into the towns from the highway of course, so maybe I’ll go check it out in the next couple days.

Further up the road there’s a different type of plan going on at a place called Arcosanti. It’s a cultish scientific community again off the highway, but I think the overall plan is to have a city of 5000 people in one space that’s entirely mixed use and low-impact. They have done an impressive amount of building in an unimpressive 37 year time-span. Everything that’s there looks cool. We’ll have to take the tour at some point.

There’s an old time town called Jerome that’s home to 450 people and serves as a very cool tourist site by day as it sits about a thousand feet above the Valley Verde below on some very steep mountainsides. There are just a couple of restaurants and art galleries up there now, but I guess it used to be a miner’s town.

Don't do that

There is a place near phoenix called Scottsdale which features bars and restaurants in a place that’s a little nicer than most of the “chrome and glass” slickness of Phoenix. Phoenix is not slick with chrome and glass other than those materials used to create automobiles and the few centers of community among the millions of acres of concrete and particle board, but a book said it was. There is a place in Scottsdale called Tamponi or something that serves wine and food in a striking red environment. This is located behind some white linen curtains next to a Bed and Bath and Beyond (convenient!) in one of the gorgeous strip malls that make up Arizona from Tuscon to the South Rim.

When the staff gets off there (not what it sounds like) they sit on the porch and smoke cigarettes and talk about waiting tables and how much you can make working doubles. In other words, they are conspicuous and annoying when you spot them past the upturned stem of your rapidly emptying $16 glass of Cabernet Franc.

This allowed me to think in a new way (and very quickly) of all the times a business has shackled me in the past and restricted my freedom on the premises. I am thinking of waiting tables, selling bicycles and working on the cruise ship. All of these jobs I had were uncommonly rigid in their rules for our behavior, and all were companies that are smaller than the norm. Back in Scottsdale, I understand fully that it was a slow night at the place and that this may not happen all the time, but these people should not have been there. Alternatively, we should not have been able to identify these people as employees of that establishment. The problem comes from the fact that when you are a customer in the place you work, you are not existing in either the same social sphere as either the staff or the customers. With no restrictions on your whereabouts or dress, you drag the staff into a more casual and potentially slower way as they want so much to be seated with you instead of serving you, their co-worker. Even though you’ve rolled up your apron so tight and stuck it next to your seat and unbuttoned your black shirt a couple buttons since you collected your last tip, you are not in public mode. You lack the poise and subtle reserve of the CK Ones and Egoistes around you. You might as well be at home unwrapping your weed for a night in front of the xbox.

Thus I have understanding of the requirement to wear name tags in public areas on cruise ships and similar employee fraternization rules. I support all these rules now, with the one exception that the more intelligent and discreet employees should be allowed to do as they please incognito, that is, under the radar of critical customers like me. The simple theater of selling glasses of wine for $16 can’t be interrupted by off-duty employees. Someone who moments ago filled my water glass or described the delightful truffles the chef has created shouldn’t be blowing cigarette smoke in my face, or infringing on the cozy quietude that a slow night happens to afford. These few made the slow night seem like a bad thing, because we could dream of a busy night with doting service from them all and their couch occupied by better looking and rich people. I don’t know where you should go, but you can’t stay here.

Also, waiters shouldn’t be too free with questions like “is everything excellent?” and “are your expectations exceeded?” and “how did our chefs prepare your meal?”. I can understand someone saying these things once, but I’ve NEVER heard someone pull these off. On the other hand a quick and quiet “excellent” or “very good” makes me feel good about ordering the Surf and Turf, and not fat.