Month: January 2013

Is Nixon Underrated?

image558769x.jpg
Today is Nixon’s 100th birthday. I wrote this piece about him about 5 years ago and think you might dig it.

Much has been made of Nixon’s gross errors, paranoid delusions, and chicanerous deceptions. But it is unfair to judge his entire presidency by his mistakes. There were numerous successes and some visionary policies. In fact, in some ways, he was one of the most succesful presidents in American history. He is the only man to ever be elected President twice and Vice President twice, and his victory in 1972 was one of the biggest landslides in American history. He was President when man first walked on the moon. Relations with Russia and China were both greatly improved during Nixon’s tenure. He was an impressive compromiser, able to succesfully push numerous bills through a Democratic Congress.

“If liberals were pressed to say something nice about Nixon, they’d probably mention his creation of the Environmental Protection Agency, Occupation Safety and Health Administration, and support for the clean water act, school desegregation, and affirmative action,” says Kevin Arceneaux, a political science professor at Temple. “By current-day standards, Nixon’s domestic policies would be considered centrist, if not left-of-center.” In fact, renowned left wing activist Noam Chomsky once called Nixon, “Our last liberal President.” And Hunter S. Thompson, who despised Nixon all his life and who worked feverishly to assist George McGovern in 1972, offered him faint praise a few years ago. “Richard Nixon looks like a flaming liberal today, compared to a golem like George Bush. Indeed. Where is Richard Nixon now that we finally need him?”

As for conservatives? “Conservatives, on the other hand, would probably point to Nixon’s foreign policy as his positive side,” continues Arceneaux. “Neo-conservatives are especially pleased with his willingness to expand the powers of the presidency to pursue aggressively U.S. foreign policy goals, even if it meant keeping Congress in the dark or treating concerns for civil liberties as secondary.”

Hunter Thompson said this about him in an otherwise scathing obituary in 1994. “He had the fighting instincts of a badger trapped by hounds. The badger will roll over on its back and emit a smell of death…It is a beast that fights best on its back: rolling under the throat of the enemy and seizing it by the head with all four claws.”

He was a fighter, a compromiser, the son of an impoverished grocer who rose to be the most powerful man on Earth. He was also a crook. But to paint his entire Presidency with the broad brush of the Watergate fiasco is simply not fair.

An Interview With 105-Year Old Restaurant Owner Mama Teshima

When I first moved to Hawaii in 1998, I was staying with a friend of mine (Bo) at his grandmother’s garage apartment. She was friends with the owner of a nearby Japanese restaurant, Shizuko “Mama” Teshima (The restaurant’s name, appropriately enough, was Teshima‘s). So whenever we would go eat there, a 91-year old lady would come to our table and greet us and “talk story” with Tutu, my friend’s grandmom.

Now, as some of you know, I worked in a dolphin facility at the time. So did my friend, Bo. One day, he arranged for his grandmom and Mama Teshima to get into the water with the dolphins. Remarkably, despite living in Hawaii her entire life, it was the first time the 91-year old Teshima had ever put on a bathing suit or gotten into the water. What a remarkable woman, having the courage to go into the water for the first time at age 91, and to then interact with a 500-pound animal while in the water! Just incredible.

When I decided to return to visit Hawaii this past August, I discovered that she was still alive at age 105, and still running the restaurant, though not on a daily basis. She lived in a small apartment right behind the restaurant with several members of her family. When I told her that I had been one of the guys who had helped bring her into the water with the dolphins many years before, she excitedly got her son to go find the photograph of her kissing the dolphin, then said to me, “You still look young but you grew.”

Mama Teshima held my arm during much of the interview. She is simply one of the sweetest, kindest people I have ever met, and I hope a few more people learn about this remarkable woman from this short interview I did. She is 105 years old, and she did not have the energy for a long winded piece nor does she like to talk about herself, so I kept it fairly short. I then went into the restaurant and interviewed her daughter, Irene, who told me more about the restaurant. While I was interviewing Irene, Mama called down from her house and demanded that my wife and I have lunch there, on the house. The food was, as always, delicious.

JGT: I want to start by asking you about the restaurant. When did you first open?

MAMA: I got married, 1927. I stayed with my in-laws until 1930, and there was a store.

JGT: And where was that located.

MAMA: Right here.

IRENE: It was a bar, a grocery store, and a barber shop, when they first opened. It was hard when they opened the grocery store, because people didn’t have money. She ran things on credit, and people wouldn’t be able to pay her until the coffee harvest came in, and then they would come in and pay.

JGT: Have you always lived in this building (right behind the restaurant)?

MAMA: This came in 1947.

JGT: So you started with a store in 1929?

MAMA: Yes, a store. Rations. General merchandise. Small, but we carried fishing tools, groceries. Old fashioned. And then when the war came, I took care of the soldiers (American soldiers were stationed next door). I fed them. They would come to the bar, and they were hungry, I used to treat them. When I was 30-something. I was young. I didn’t worry about money. Nobody had money. (laughs)

JGT: Was there any difficulty for you, when the war started, since your family is Japanese?

MAMA: There were three local people who came to check on us, and make sure everything is alright. Policemen and…FBI. There were blackouts, and we had to cover the windows, but we didn’t feel like there was war. When Pearl Harbor was bombed, they took my husband to the mainland. To the concentration camp. But it didn’t take long, and he came back. Oshima, the man with the store (His family still runs the general store called Oshima’s a couple of miles down the road from Teshima’s), wanted to come back, he had little children. He was climbing up the barbed wire. They shot him, so he died. (ed. note- I did a little research on this. Kisaburo Oshima was shot and killed at an internment camp in Fort Sill, Oklahoma.)

IRENE: I don’t think my mom had any problem with the soldiers next door. In fact, they all came to her and she would write to their parents and tell them that the boys were OK. She always felt that, what if it was her children being far away, (the parent) not knowing what’s going on?

JGT: So did the restaurant stay open during the war?

MAMA: I had the bar. The soldiers came. I said, “The soldiers are not going to live long. They are going to die.” So I gave them a lot of liquor. Other bars gave little liquor or mixture. But I felt they’re not coming back. Why not give them what they want?

IRENE: During the war, you know the church next door, the Buddhist church, was used for soldiers. And a lot of them wanted to go out to eat and drink, so my mother would cook for them. So she decided to open a little saimin and sandwich place. She started small. And then she got rid of the grocery store, and just did the restaurant and the bar.

JGT: So when did you open as a restaurant?

MAMA: I forgot the date. (Laughs) I cannot figure. (ed. note: According to several other sources, it was sometime in the 1940s).

JGT: So you’ve been in charge of the restaurant ever since it opened?

MAMA: Yes.

JGT: When you opened the restaurant, did you used to cook the food?

MAMA: Yeah. And my friend, but she’s all gone. I’m 105, so she was one year younger. She and I. She did the waitress, helped me cook, and I cooked, washed the dishes.

JGT: Where was your husband?

MAMA: Working at Captain Cook.

IRENE: He worked at the Captain Cook Coffee Company. He was a mechanic over there.

JGT: When you first opened, was it named Teshima’s?

MAMA: Yes, Teshima. The same.

JGT: What advice would you give to a person who wants to own a restaurant?

MAMA: No greed. Always try to help.

JGT (To Irene): Do you think your mother is proud of what she’s accomplished?

IRENE: Oh I’m sure. She’s not the kind of person to take credit for things. But she’s done a lot, and because of her, we’re still here. She never had an education, but through hard work, she accomplished a lot. She should be really proud of herself, even if she won’t brag about it.

True to her mantra of always trying to help, on her 105th birthday, this past June, Mama Teshima asked people to not bring her gifts…instead she asked them to donate to a scholarship fund set up for local high school seniors so that they could attend college.


Cool Job: City Tap House GM Andy Farrell

One of the coolest people I’ve had the fortune of getting to know the past few years has been Andy Farrell (above, left). Fun-loving Farrell is a GM/Partner at City Tap House, and an advocate, endorser, and fan of craft beers, particularly local ones. I’ve always known that Andy is the guy who handed me my check at City Tap after quizzo, but I wasn’t sure exactly what his background was, why he got into the beer business, or what he digs about his line of work. I figured I would find out.

JGT: How did you get into the beer business?

ANDY: I was a working chef for 10 years. Smith & Wollensky, Fleming’s Prime, a couple of small spots in South Jersey in AC and Somers Point.

JGT: So straight out of college did you go into the kitchen?

ANDY: Yeah, straight out of college. Every job I’ve ever had was in a restaurant, beach grill, bar.

JGT: After a while did you think to yourself, “The beer side of this is appealing more to me than the food side”?

ANDY: When I took over Bridgid’s in 2009 (as GM/Chef), I was going to be operating a business that had a 20 year history of great craft beer. In order to do the best for the business, I immersed myself in everything craft beer: American regional stuff, European brands. I learned all I could, from the process to the history of it, to the players local and nationally. I sponged it up as much as I could, first for the business, then it became a real passion. I kinda fell in love with the idea that this very artisanal product, literally “craft” product, was a hell of a lot more worthwhile and enjoyable than…what everyone else was offering.

At Bridgid’s, I did the menu and prepped much of the food, but I helped order the beers, set up events, ran the front of house. When I decided to leave there I wasn’t feeling it as a long term fit anymore. I was up in the air. I thought about trying to open something on my own, apply for brewery jobs. Wasn’t sure. But I knew I was done for the time being in the kitchen.  I wanted to be more involved with beer and the emerging Philly scene.  City Tap was something the Public House guys were just starting to work on and thru casual conversations I got involved.

I was only going to set up training, and it turned out to be something I wanted to be more heavily involved in: helping shape a new kind of bar in Philly. Most bars in Philly with good craft are small intimate neighborhood style. CTH was a chance to make craft more accessible, especially in UCity. Young audience. The people who are buying beer for the next 40 years are here.

JGT: What is your job description?

ANDY: Job description- operate the business profitably is the bottom line. Oversee the staff- hiring and training. Oversee the kitchen along with chef- quality/consistency. Oversee beer program- keep it dynamic, local, American regional, European benchmarks. But keep it accessible to folks who aren’t craft savvy, but might like to be. Drive business with good events, a strong weekly calendar, and most importantly, develop good relationships with our guests.

JGT: What’s the best part about working in the beer and hospitality business? (Click “More” below to keep reading)

Continue reading “Cool Job: City Tap House GM Andy Farrell” →

Cool Job: Interviews with Interesting People

Not too long ago, I read the excellent book “Working” by Studs Turkel. In it, he interviewed people from all different types of jobs, from waitress to fireman to prostitute. I’ve really been wanting to do something similar to that ever since, and feel that I’m fortunate enough to have a ton of friends doing interesting jobs, so it would be cool to learn more about them.

Of course, I’m doing this with a zero budget, so I can’t really follow them at a day on the job or anything, but I can always do a quick interview with them online. So that’s what I’ve started doing, interviewing people with interesting jobs, ask them a bit about what they do, what their day is like, the best and the worst parts of it. So if you have an interesting job and I don’t know about it, just shoot me a line and I’ll try to set something up. First interview is coming soon!

Big Money Tuesday Returns!

We kick it off tonight at O’Neals. There is no better place on the circuit to get a win, quite frankly. If you’re looking to move up a bit in the rankings, and don’t want to have to knock off Steak Em  Up or Duane’s World, I would highly suggest a trip to O’Neals. $3.50 Mexican beers. Interesting quiz tonight. Music buffs are gonna love one of the rounds, though it is not a music round.

On to the City Tap House at 10:15 p.m. Biggest draft selection in the city and great beer specials every week for quizzo. Great chance for you to try something new, and the first place prize is a $100 gift cert. Not bad. Hope to see ya tonight!

Fastball Pitcher Bob Gutierrez and Other Sports Stuff

The above video was one Steve K, Fastball Bob, and I put together recently and was featured exclusively on Zoo With Roy yesterday. If you’re a Phillies fan, I think you’ll dig it. And if you dig it, spread the word. If we get enough views, we’ll make it a recurring thing.

Here’s the latest podcast from Lee and I. We make our playoff predictions, and discuss whether or not the Chiefs made a good move by hiring Reid.

Make sure to make your playoff picks on our facebook page.

How is Andy going to do in KC? Well, if previous Eagle coaches that went to coach elsewhere are any indication, not very well. Other than Vermeil, previous Eagles coaches went 78-138 when they went to a new town. Of course, most of them were not as good as Big Red.