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February 08, 2004Glass and chopsticks...
Los Angeles can be such a delightfully random place. I was at the Broadway Deli late last night with my girlfriend, her roommate, and the roommate’s boyfriend. Suddenly, quite out of the blue, some guy walking along the sidewalk slams his hands through one of the large windows that run all along two of the restaurant’s four sides and takes off.
What’s worse, there was a woman sitting in a booth directly adjacent to the window in question. She was showered with broken glass, and got a bad scare, but miraculously enough, there wasn’t a scratch on her. You can imagine the look on her friend’s face when he returned from the bathroom to find their table and booth looking like something out of an action film.
We were sitting more to the center of the dining area—the Broadway Deli is one big room, basically—but I still just about jumped out of my skin when I heard that window go.
What makes it all the weirder is that I’d spent about half an hour earlier in the day grappling with a scene in my screenplay in which a homeless veteran goes crazy and punches through a plate-glass window. It’s life imitating art, assuming my screenplay counts as the latter and moments in Los Angeles count as the former.
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I frequent a sushi restaurant a few blocks away from my apartment. I’m no great fan of fish (cooked or raw), but their avocado rolls are very good. An order of those rolls and a bowl of miso soup make a great, inexpensive lunch on a winter afternoon—with strawberry mochi to top it off, if I’m in the mood and it’s not too chilly. If I’m really hungry, though, I’ll order a teriyaki chicken bowl: the obvious choice of meat, plus vegetables and rice. I still have my awkward moments with chopsticks, especially when I get to the bottom of the teriyaki chicken bowl and I’m dealing with stray grains of rice. On the whole, though, I’m no slouch. A few of the waitresses know me by sight. However, sometimes I’ll go in at an odd time and get a waitress who doesn’t know I’m something of a regular. When that happens, she’ll invariably bring me a fork with my meal. I don’t know why, but it bugs me. It’s like they’ve brought me a booster seat, or had the cook whip me up some star-shaped chicken nuggets, or any of the other patiently condescending concessions restaurants make for the very young. I could walk in there as the most westernized of Japanese-Americans, not knowing a shite from a Shiite, and not be given a fork. Why? Because I’d look like I knew how to use chopsticks. It’s a reasonable enough thing to assume—as is, I guess, the converse. All the same, I'm bothered by the assumption of ignorance based on looks. Posted by patrick at February 8, 2004 03:56 PM I wouldn't worry about it, dude. Caucasians will always be given forks and Asians will always be considered from the same country. Imagine what I have to go through ever time I visit my girlfriend's parents. (She's Thai, for those who don't know.) :) James Posted by: James at February 9, 2004 05:58 PM Pat, I feel your pain. This has been a source of personal consternation for well over a decade now. I love the booster seat analogy - spot on. Then again, people might just say we're acting elitist...not that I'll listen to the dreary opinions of the little people anyway... One advantage of of knowing how to use chopsticks will arise should you ever visit Japan. It will immediately impress and astound your friends, who will - despite other positive opinions of you - expect you to weild chopsticks as if they were, well, foreign objects. Furthermore, should you ever use round chopsticks to complete an entire bowl of round-noodle Ramen, your companions will certainly buy you some kind of prize. Posted by: Mad Monarch Voards at February 10, 2004 06:50 PM Yeah, can't tell you how many times I have to ask for the chopsticks. But... Now you're writing stories that suddenly come true, eh? How freaky is it that some guy punches in a window? How often do people even punch in windows, anyway? So, you will be writing the story about a certain friend of yours winning big in the lottery soon, won't you? Posted by: Jon Bastian at February 12, 2004 12:59 AM Thank you! Chinese Apes. Posted by: Yellow Monkey at February 25, 2005 09:52 AM Thank you! Chinese Apes. Posted by: Yellow Monkey at February 25, 2005 09:54 AM