Wednesday, June 29
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The Big Apple
[journal]
 Bye Po(e) people. Bye Chicken Noodle Soup people. Bye Crazy Cat people.
I'm going to New York! I'm going to New York! I'm going to New York! I'm going to New York! I'm going to New York! I'm going to New York! I'm going to New York! I'm going to New York!
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Monday, June 27
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Crazy Cat Ladies
[journal] Okay, so I've complained about the Poe people and the Chicken Noodle Soup people. But I'd sooner marry the whole lot than become chummy with a Crazy Cat person. These types come in, always alone, and look disoriented -- even the Crazy Cat regulars. Their hair is always frizzy and bed-sprayed and though there is no evidence that links them indefinitely to cats, they have this pungent cat aura that screams ownership of 15-20 strays, purring, rubbing, meowing, stretching.
There's little variance between Crazy Cat people. The new ones however always ask this and that, this and that, this and that and after five minutes of me explaining/defending the type of tofu we use and why we put lettuce in the vermicelli they won't order any of the items they inquired about. They'll say something like, "I'll try that another day." The regulars order right away, but ambigiously.
All it took today to darken my otherwise cheerful day was for a Crazy Cat Lady to walk in.
"I'll have, say, that, hmmm.... (pained looks as though she's recalling rocket science) the vegetarian dish."
"The veggie stir-fry," I retitled in order to whittle down the ambiguity of vegetarian dish (we have lots of vegatarian dishes). "Did you want that on rice or vermicelli?"
Crazy Cat Ladies like saying no before they say yes.
"No. I don't want it on those."
"We only serve it on those."
"Vermicelli? Fine, I'll have it on vermicelli and your veggie roll." She said fine like I was twisting her arm or dangling a cat out a window sil.
"Veggie stir-fry on vermicelli and a veggie summer roll, you said?" again I repeated her order because I knew somehow it would be wrong.
"Yes."
I told her there's tofu in it because otherwise she'll exclaim, "There's tofu in the veggie roll?"
She nodded.
I then went over to Brian and tell him that this Crazy Cat Lady is a Crazy Cat Lady (CCL) and not to be surprised if I got her order wrong.
I got the order wrong.
She wanted the deep fried vegetarian spring roll, which never has tofu in it and that's why I asked if she wanted the one with tofu in it.... Luckily for me I didn't bring out the order to her. Unfortunately for Brian, he did.
"What's this? I don't want this."
"It's your veggie summer rolls."
She shooed the dish away from her.
"I didn't order it. I'm not eating it. I wanted the deep fried ones."
"Those don't come in Tofu."
"That's the one I wanted. It's not my fault."
"He asked you if you wanted the one with tofu."
"He doesn't speak English good. He doesn't know how to talk." (Okay I don't really know if she said "well" or "good" but my money 's on good)
"He has a Masters in Literature." (Haha Brian is awesome! I have a Masters in Education, but damn, that was a wickedly timed lie)
"He doesn't know how to talk. I'm not eating it. He doesn't speak English good."
Brian got her a new replacement, free of charge and she didn't say thank-you or anything. All she did was stuff it in her CCL mouth and left a CCL mess and walked out in a CCL huff.
Damn CCLs.
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Tuesday, June 21
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There's a New Name in Town
[journal]
There's the Po(e) people I wrote about and now a new breed. The first member I met was a lady, smartly dressed, looking educated. She came in on a rainy cold day and as she walked to the counter she wiggled the rain from herself. "I'll have your chicken noodle soup please." "We don't have chicken noodle soup." Brian, the all knowing master, brushed by me and gently whispered "She means the Pho." OhhhhhhhhThe next time it happened I felt proud of myself. "You mean the Pho?" "Yes, the Vietnamese soup." Today's member was also a lady, not so different than the first. "I'll have your chicken noodle soup." "You mean the Pho right?" It was quasi-rhetorical. I practically punched the order in. "No. Your chicken noodle soup," she repeated. "Ummm." I quickly looked left and right for Brian, but the master wasn't around. Fuck. "I'm sorry, we don't have that." "Yes you do. I've had it before." I grabbed the menu with a picture of Pho on it. "You mean this?" She looked at me as though I was crazy. "Yes!" She fingered the same picture. "The chicken noodle soup." I totally want the Po(e) people to meet the Chicken Noodle Soup people. The room would be all white like a hospital. I would seat them across from each other and in the middle of the table place a picture of Pho and a gun loaded with only one bullet. All I would say is "discuss," and then I would solemnly leave the room. Maybe I would let a single tear roll down my face, but that's only if someone was watching me. On another note, Sprout was mentioned again in Toronto Life as part of their bargain of Toronto issue. They called Sprout, "The Star of Saigon." |
Monday, June 20
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26 is after 25
[journal] I always write about my birthday. Here's 2004 and 2003. It was so odd reading "I turned 24 this past Sunday." I remember being 24, writing that and now I'm 26. I'm not afraid or unhappy about growing older anymore. I'm finding as I age, I'm changing: the things I like, the way I think, the feelings I have. Growing older for me is refreshing in that sense. I hate the deep annual analyzing, so I'll leave it at that.
It was a cash year, everyone and I mean everyone gave me cash or some form of it: straight hard cash, gift certificate, or paying for lunch/dinner. I don't think I'm that hard to shop for, but I have everything I want. I would have been happy with anything, but I'm not in need of anything.
ps. I stole someone's cake picture (it's my birthday, I'll do what I want to), deleted their name and photoshopped my name in. Just in case you're wondering how awful that cake tasted or why my name is like 3000 meters away from the rest of the lettering.
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Friday, June 17
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I'm a film whore
[journal] 
There is a mom-and-pops video store near where I work. The video store, in order to compete with Blockbuster, provides a lot of foreign films, indie films and has special promotions. Since I prefer foreign and indie films over Hollywood blockbusters, I inquired about their special promotion. The deal is, for 45 dollars a month (or 30 dollars a month if you commit to a three-month contract) you can rent as many movies in the month as you want with only two movies out at any given time.
When I signed up and paid 50 something after taxes, Chris, the owner, seemed quite pleased, stacking the bills in a tidy, blooming tower and smiling while his eyes flared a greedy green. However, now that he has seen me almost every day for two weeks, you'd think, from the expression he shows, I'm sticking jumbo pickles in his mouth and not renting movies.
HOLY SHIT this kid is really abusing my generous deal. He comes in here everyday and robs me of two movies that paying customers could be renting.
Every weekday after work, without fail, I make the five minute trek over to his store. I think he began to notice how steady my appearances were, so one day he made sure NOT to be in the store at that time. The store lights were on, but the door was locked without a "Be back in 10 minutes" sign. I pictured him crawling on fours, hiding behind the register, giggling and clutching his heaving belly. He probably bought one of those folding, protracting mirrors just so he could peep my expression.
Now I randomly go either before or after work. It totally screws with his anticipation.
He also has two employees. One time I came in and Mike, the employee, wouldn't let me rent the movies unless I gave him my credit card information, which I wasn't carrying. Mike is a hybrid of two guys from The Simpsons. He has the attitude of the comic book store guy and the appearance of the scientist guy.
"I need your credit card information."
"I gave it to Chris already."
"Look. All I know is the monitor is flashing for it."
"I've been renting everyday. You can look that up. I've had no problems with Chris or Lisa. Why would it be asking?"
" I need it or you can't rent."
Chris, before signing out the night before probably entered that in as a note. "Ask for credit card." He's like my video renting nemesis, but like in those Hollywood cat'n'mouse capers I disapprove of his motives, but totally respect his cunning. He's got some insane skillz. Like, if brought to a court of law, I couldn't prove any of this stuff. Maybe my ex-lawyer friend Ying could, but not me!
All archenemy stuff aside, the movies have been great. I've particularly enjoyed "Talk to her," and "Ichi the killer." "Talk to her," explores the border between love, devotion and creepiness, insanity. "Ichi the killer," makes Kill Bill a children's movie. They handed out barf bags at the Toronto Film Festival screening of it.
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Tuesday, June 14
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Sprout Part One: Creatures of Habit
[journal]
The regulars are a calculable bunch. If they were spontaneous, they wouldn't come to eat at the same restaurant every other day. I've been working at Sprout for over half a month now, which is just long enough to awaken my mastery of predicting the regulars. Brian, my brother and owner of Sprout, is already a master.
Everyday regulars will rush in (they comprise about 80% of the daily sales) and Brian will correctly tell me what they'll do.
"This guy is going to get curry and grab a lot of napkins."
The guy will walk up to the counter, look at the menu (ie, lie to himself that he has any free will) and order curry and then grab a lot of napkins.
"She'll order Wonton to go."
"He's coming to buy only a green Tea, grab the newspaper and spread the sections out all over the table."
They will all do what he says.
For the regulars already seated, Brian will save me a lot of time.
"You may as well bring them out water now, unless you want to wait and get to the table then have to return after they ask for it."
Back when I was a neophyte waiter, I didn't believe. I ignored him. I wanted to scientifically test him by not listening to him. I ended up making several trips to bring water, hot sauces, plum sauces and hoison sauces.
Brian even knows the "Po" people. The Po people are the ones that pronounce pho incorrectly. I'm not anally focusing on perfecting an accent either. I mean they call it Po --- as in Edgar Allen Poe. I don't understand why they say it this way. It's not like English speakers can't make the P-H sound or they've never encountered the P-H phoneme before. I guess some jokester Vietnamese guy told them the H is silent and then said "Trust me," reassuringly.
Sometimes when someone says, "Can I have some Po(e) please?" I want to stop what I'm doing, look diagnally above into an imaginary spot light and recite:
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore....
NEVERMORE! NEVERMORE!
Then they would say, "Dude, what the fuck was that?"
Then I would say, "I just gave you your Poe. You owe me 6.95 plus tax." |
Thursday, June 2
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Name Dropping
[journal]
 My dad knows the owner of a restaurant chain in Toronto called Spring Rolls. He phoned the owner to ask for a waiter position for me and then phoned me and said there was one available. He told me to go immediately to the Eaton Centre location and ask for Virginia and then say I'm Dr. Vu's son and give her my resume. If you've ever seen the Seinfeld episode when Kramer told George to name drop "Kramer" to the optician, then you'll know where this story is leading.... I arrived at Spring Rolls and asked the restaurant greeter if I could meet with Virginia. She said Virginia was busy and asked if it was important. I replied that it was for a job position and Virginia may, in fact, be expecting me. She told me to have a seat and wait, which incidently I obliged, except I did so in their dining room area. The greeter smiled at me and politely asked if I could sit in one of the chairs off on the side. Five minutes later, a small Asian lady walked up to me. "Hi." She mirrored me. "Hi." We both sort of waited expecting the other person to speak. I thought she would make mention of expecting me and she thought I would explain what my business was with her. I shifted uncomfortably in my seat "My name is Joe V." She nodded. I tried to continue the sentence as seamlessly as possible after her nod because I saw then that my name meant nothing and I had to act as though I knew that. "I'm looking for a position at Spring Rolls and my father talked to the owner who told me to come see you." "Who is your father?" I cleared my throat. "Dr. V." "Dr. W?" "V." "B?" Not an inkling of recognition or interest in the name so I didn't bother with another correction. "Yah. I think he's the owner's doctor (at this point I wasn't sure of anything anymore. I wasn't even sure if Dr. V was my father. I was also afraid of her asking me what the owner's name was because I didn't know and that didn't bode well with my story). "I'm sorry. Until the new location opens we don't have any positions open until September, but if you'll leave your resume with me we can call you then." I left her with my resume.
PS I ended up getting the job after the owner talked to her, but I had to turn it down in order to help my brother at his restaurant. |
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