Reading Response 2

               In this section he wrote about actually there are many unsavory secrets in restaurants industry. There were sometimes awful ones which I should not have read, maybe. Still, his detailed descriptions were based on his own carrier as a chef in New York so they were very persuasive and worth to read. Actually, his descriptions about “secrets” are very interesting for me. One reason is that I just liked to eat out in ethnic restaurants, and the other reason is that I have worked in the kitchen.

“In America, the Professional kitchen is the last refuge of the misfit.” Anthony Bourdain says. Then he continued, restaurants are one of the best working place like heaven and in New York chefs use mainly Spanish when they talk each other while they cook. It was very easy to imagine these chaotic but smooth scenes. In fact, there are many foreigners in restaurants’ kitchen and it is very interesting to see how they cook, talk, and serve. The reason why I know this is because I really liked to explore Tokyo for unique and ethnic restaurants. Actually, in Tokyo it seems that quite a few people are working at restaurants. There are many kinds of ethnic restaurants; they are Italians, Frenches, Turkish ones, Spanish, Chinese, Korean, Thais, and in my town there were several types of Myanmar restaurants, according to the differences between each tribe. The interesting point is that we can enjoy cultural differences not only from dishes, but also from the way how cooks behave. In Italian restaurants, all waiters gleet me with loud voices, “Buonasera!!” , at the moment I get into. On the other hand, in Spanish restaurants, basically chefs and waiters are quiet. However, when the number of customers are getting increased, we get the opportunity to talk with chefs. In that restaurant, a chef told me about his life as an activist, the reason why he drifted to Japan, as a cook.

Last year, I have been working in a convenience store. It was not a restaurant, but because I dealt with food, Bordain’s story sounded like very real. The most interesting part was about quality. He stated that there is difference about quality on each day of the week. In fact, this exists. In my case, the coffee machine were washed only on Monday and Friday, so Monday’s and Friday’s coffee were much better than the day before. Also, we recycled rice for our packed lunch products. These “secrets” may seems very fearful for customers, but they do exist. Bordain succeeds in making his work be characteristic, through describing the other side of food industry. However, his story does not sound only unpleasant, but also funny and interesting. That is because he leads us to inside of kitchens, where cooks are working proudly. Of course, sometimes there may be dirty secrets, but even that beautiful cuisines which we love are from there. We are curious about magical places where chefs are displaying their awesome skills. Bordain satisfied that our curiosities, anyway.