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January 10, 2009

Bento Zanmai on the Hill in Boulder serves up tasty real ramen. We returned to Bento Zanmai today and got some good news: the shop, which operates out of a tiny food court on The Hill in Boulder, just across the University of Colorado campus at 13th and College, has extended its hours. The joint used to close up at 6 on weekdays and 3 on Saturdays. It unfortunately still closes at 3 on Saturdays (we got there just in time after seeing an early -- and cheap -- showing of Clint Eastwood's "Gran Torino" movie, a post to come). But it now stays open until 8 pm on weekdays. Joe Simonet, the affable young hapa who's a corporate officer of the Sushi Zanmai restaurant corporation that owns Bento Zanmai as well as Amu, the izakaya next door to Sushi Zanmai that's currently our favorite Japanese restaurant in the region, chatted with us about Bento Z.
January 6, 2009

Dr. Sanjay Gupta has been asked by Pres-elect Obama to be the country Big news for Asian Americans (and for the South Asian community): Dr. Sanjay Gupta, the affable and seemingly tireless chief medical correspondent for CNN (and a practicing neurosurgeon), is President-elect Barack Obama's choice to serve as Surgeon General of the United States. According to the Washington Post's Howard Kurtz:
Gupta has told administration officials that he wants the job, and the final vetting process is under way. He has asked for a few days to figure out the financial and logistical details of moving his family from Atlanta to Washington but is expected to accept the offer.
It'll be great to have another Asian American high up in the Obama administration, and the pres is smart to hook Gupta, because he's so well-known and well-liked, not to mention trusted, by the general public. But it'll be a loss for journalism, and one less prominent Asian American journalist in the national media.
December 31, 2008

Jero, the first African American Enka singer in Japan, learned the musical style from his Japanese grandmother.Enka music is often referred to as "Japanese blues." The comparison is apt for a couple of reasons: the music is almost always about heartbreak and inconsolable loss. You can hear it in the singing. And, enka singing relies a lot on vocal inflections that are also common to American blues and gospel music: vibrato and melisma (the bending of notes to show emotion). But fans of Enka in Japan probably never expected to see and hear an African American from Pittsburgh, PA make a name for himself as a rising star in the genre. (UPDATED: See bottom of this post for a video of Jero's historic New Year's Eve performance) Jerome Charles White, Jr. (coincidentally a name that would sound cool for a blues musician), who goes by the stage name Jero, is unique among Japanese pop stars, in that he's young (27), gifted, mixed-race black and American. He sings (and speaks) in perfect Japanese, and more important -- and more unusual -- he sings a style of Japanese pop music that many consider to be "old-fashioned." Enka music isn't quite blues -- aside from some of the vocal inflections and the sad subject matter, it's not a rhythmic style. It has roots in folk music like blues, but it's always presented in slick, orchestrated (stagey and theatrical) arrangements. Young Japanese have drfited away from this style and seem to prefer more modern genres like R&B, rock, disco and rap.
December 26, 2008

Don Wakamatsu, a yonsei, is the first Asian American manager in Major League Baseball. A New York Times profile of Don Wakamatsu (thanks to reader Juan Lozano for pointing it out), the Japanese American named by the Seattle Mariners to manage the struggling team, reminded me that I'd been meaning to write about him since Wakamatsu's hiring was announced in November. It's an historic signing because for the hype that Japanese (and other Asian) ball players have received from the media since Hideo Nomo arrived as a pitcher for the Dodgers in 1995, there have been few and mostly unheralded Japanese American players in MLB. (By the way, Nomo wasn't the first Japanese player -- Masanori Murakami pitched in 1964 and '65 for the San Francisco Giants.) And, there has never been an Asian American manager of a Major League team. It's nice to read stories about Wakamatsu, who acknowledges his role as a pioneering Asian American. He grew up with an awareness of his heritage -- his father is Sansei and his mother is Irish American, so he's a Yonsei, or fourth-generation, Hapa. He played in Japanese American sports leagues as a kid, and is a member of the Japanese American Citizens League. His grandparents were interned at Tule Lake during World War II, and his father was born in camp. His grandparents even bought pieces of their former barracks and used them to build their home in Hood River, Oregon after the war, and they still live in the house. Wakamatsu was born in Oregon but raised in the Bay Area suburb of Hayward. He was drafted by the Cincinnati Reds in 1985 as a catcher, and also played for the Chicago White Sox. He's held various coaching positions for the Texas Rangers, Anaheim Angels, Arizona Diamondbacks and others. He was bench coach for the Oakland As last season when he was picked to helm the Mariners.
December 19, 2008

The OC Welch Ford dealership in Hardeeville, SC, resorted to racist ads to sell cars. UPDATE: Dec. 19: Sometimes, good sense wins out. Despite the car dealer's initial refusal to back down from the racist sentiments of radio ads that ran a couple of weekends ago, it appears Detroit may have exerted some influence. The Japanese American Citizens League, which has a national anti-hate crime campaign funded by Ford Motor Company, released a press release that announces a public apology from Ocie Welch, the owner of O.C. Welch Ford Lincoln Mercury in Hardeeville, SC:
Mr. Welch issued a press release and sent the apology for his comments in the recent advertisements to the JACL. He stated: "I would like to apologize for my comments in recent radio advertisements. I am passionate about my love for Ford, and I mistakenly and wrongly conveyed this passion. I do not and will not condone discrimination and am sorry for any hurt I have caused." The JACL acknowledged the apology and noted that car dealers are one of many businesses suffering as a result of the economic downturn. The JACL issued a letter to Mr. Welch in which it stated that the remarks were hurtful and potentially harmful to all Asian Americans because they were reminiscent of racist sentiment during the recession in the 1980's that acutely affected the auto industry in Detroit. During that period, Japanese automakers were often scapegoated as the sole source of the economic hardships. It was in this environment that Vincent Chin, a young Chinese American, was beaten to death on the streets of a Detroit suburb by two autoworkers who blamed Chin for their problems, saying, "It's because of you that we're out of work." Chin was not Japanese, nor was he or Japan responsible for all the unemployment caused by the recession. Instead, Chin was the tragic victim of a climate of economic fear abetted by racism. He was victimized by racism in the same manner as Japanese Americans who were incarcerated in concentration camps in remote areas of the United States during World War II. It is for this reason that the JACL abhorred the remarks of the radio ad for the racism it invoked and for any misplaced anger it may have inflamed. The JACL has worked with American automobile companies on various programs in the past and partners with Ford Motor Company on a youth leadership and empowerment program which includes anti-hate issues.
Read the original post by clicking the "Read More" link, and listen to one of the radio ads:
December 18, 2008

Court sketch of DC Administrative Judge Roy Pearson Jr. during his $54 million lawsuit against Korean dry cleaners whom he accused of losing his pants. It's been over three years, but the legal ordeal of a Korean couple in Washington DC may finally be over. The District of Columbia Court of Appeals turned down an appeal by former DC Administrative Judge Roy Pearson Jr., who came to symbolize frivolous lawsuits when he sued Jin and Soo Chung, owners of Custom Cleaners, for an astounding $54 million. Pearson claimed that the Chungs lost a pair of his pants when he brought them in for alterations, and that signs in the shop promising "Satisfaction Guaranteed" and "Same Day Service" meant he could take the couple to court under consumer protection laws, which allowed him thousands of dollars for every day since his loss. The Chungs claimed they gave him his trousers but Pearson said the couple substituted a cheaper pair of pants. The public opinion sided with the Chungs, because of the amount of damages Pearson asked for. Apparently, so the the courts. The Chungs may have lost his pants, but Pearson lost his suit. He took his case to the District Court of Appeals, which turned him down today. The Chungs' attorney, whose firm took on the case pro bono, said the appeals court "ruled resoundingly in favor of the Chung family and denied Mr. Roy Pearson's appeal of the case completely."
December 15, 2008

Bento Zanmai in Boulder serves wonderful, rich ramen. OK, I can stop whining. I've been on a ramen hunt for a couple of months. But I've finally sated my jones, with a trip top Bento Zanmai on the Hill in Boulder. Unlike Los Angeles, where a row of ramen shops take up most of a block along Little Tokyo, and San Francisco's Japantown, which has a several stellar restaurants that specialize in ramen, Denver is a ramen-lover's desert island. We're stranded in a place with no ramen in sight, and we're left holding an empty bowl and a pair of chopsticks. I overstate our condition. We used to go to Oshima Ramen, but it's not as good as it was when it opened a decade ago. Plus, their ramen is pricey. We've heard about a couple of Japanese restaurants north of Denver that apparently serve ramen, but we just don't feel like driving that far. We'll make the trip someday. But when we were dining at one of our favorite restaurants, Amu, in Boulder (we live close to Boulder, so it's not so far), we were talking with the owner, Nao-san, and we groused that he should serve ramen. He said, quite nonchalantly, that he was already serving ramen. Conversation at the izakaya's bar, where he was making up people's tapas-like orders, came to a silent halt. The 10 people at the bar asked, in unison, "You make ramen? Why didn't you say so?" He explained that the ramen was available at his new restaurant, Bento Zanmai, at 13th and College in Boulder's University Hill neighborhood. He warned that the ramen was only available from 3 to 6 pm -- weird hours -- but I was ready. I wanted ramen.
December 14, 2008

The bun dac biet and noodle soup are Vietnamese specialties of Peking-Tokyo Restaurant. Erin and I had dinner tonight at a restaurant we hadn't visited in a couple of years -- it's been too long. Peking-Tokyo Restaurant is located in the southern part of the suburb of Lakewood, across town from where we live. Back a decade ago, when we both worked a few blocks from Peking-Tokyo Express, as it was called, we ate there often. It had an interesting menu of Chinese, Vietnamese and Thai dishes. Despite its name, there were only a couple of token Japanese items on the menu (the name was a holdover from the business' previous owners). Erin's favorite was a noodle soup with two kinds of noodles, the Vietnamese rice noodles that are now familiar to fans of Pho (but this was before Pho was as common and popular as it is now) and thin egg noodles like the kind you might see in Chinese lo mein, or Japanese ramen. The soup is topped off with slices of chashu pork, shrimp, chicken and chunks of crab. My favorite was bun dac biet, a combination of grilled meat served on top of cold rice noodles, lettuce and cucumbers with a side of vinegary fish sauce. The meat includes pork, chicken, beef and shrimp, and an incredible and unique treat: a stuffed grilled chicken wing, plump with pork, flavorings and clear noodles. We usually ordered Vietnamese spring rolls for appetizers, and I'd usually order Thai iced coffee or ice tea as an energy drink before such things as Red Bull existed. We've tried both the Thai and Chinese food there too, and the flavor is full and the servings substantial. But both our favorite dishes are so superior that after a while it was hard to order anything else. We liked he place so much that we got our friend John Lehndorff at the Rocky Mountain News to go and review Peking-Tokyo Express. We learned the story of the family, the Wangs, who own the restaurant. We got to know one of the daughters, Melissa, and one of the sons, Tommy. I had assumed they were Vietnamese, but it turns out they're ethnic Chinese. Tommy and Melissa's grandparents had moved to Vietnam decades ago, but the family got caught up in the turmoil of the Vietnam war and ended up coming to the US with the Vietnamese "boat people" refugees in the late '70s, when Melissa was a baby. Tommy told us the heartbreaking story of their Aunt, who was murdered by Cambodian pirates as the family escaped Vietnam.