
My journey continues and ends here.
The setting was perfect: I fucking love Royce Hall. I remember falling in love with its majestic beauty as a prospective freshman way back in the day, its soaring towers and romanesque arches calling out to me: "Study here, study here..." And so I did. Interestingly enough, it was in my favorite class in my entire experience at UCLA--in a seminar I took my final quarter called History 197K: Asian American Food, History and Culture with Dr. Valerie Matsumoto--that the idea about writing about food came to me. We had multi-faceted discussions about food during our weekly 3 hour seminars and were assigned weekly writing assignments and term papers where we had to explore and analyze menus, family gatherings and cultural food phenomenons. Needless to say, I got an "A."
"You know," Dr. Matsumoto once told me, "you should really consider publishing some of your writing one day. Maybe a collection of short essays about food?" Unfortunately, the information superhighway and blogs weren't as widely available back in the 90's. But it was partly this class and my professor's encouragement and that led me to start Daily Gluttony and become so interested in food culture and food writing in the first place. It was how I came to discover and appreciate food-centric literature including Bourdain's. Seeing Tony Bourdain speak at that same hall that sucked me into becoming a Bruin 20 years ago made me feel like I had come full circle. It was truly magical.

He did a spot-on impersonation of Ina Garten swooning over her dearest Jeffrey, and discussed his admiration for Bizarre Foods' Andrew Zimmern being able to eat animal testicles and scrotums and such day after day without drinking. He likened the reason that people keep watching the Man vs. Food dude stuff his piehole week after week to the reason why people kept watching Siegfried & Roy: we simply keep hoping that the show we're watching is the one in which they're going to die. (Insert LOL here.)






-Singapore Airline's food is about as good as airline food can get.
-His worst memory from No Reservations is the massage at the Uzbekistan bath house.
-Two countries he thinks that more people should visit are Vietnam and Colombia.
-He thinks that New York has an edge over LA when it comes to high end cuisine, but where LA has an edge over New York is its "low end, ethnicky stuff." He'd love to spend time exploring Jonathan Gold's food finds.
-He adores Mario Batali but thinks his PBS show "Spain...On the Road Again" is a total crock because he's traveling with Gwyneth Paltrow, a vegetarian, to a place that probably has the best pork on the planet.
-When asked "Lakers or Celtics," he had to choose Lakers simply because he's a Yankees fan and could not root for anything Boston. (Probably the only part of the show I booed under my breath at since I am not a fan of LA's precious purple and gold. Yeah, whatever.)
-When asked if Giada or Nigella would win in a knife fight, he answered without hesitation: "Nigella."
I wish I could have afforded to shell out $175 for a VIP ticket to meet and get a picture with my food idol. Those special peeps even got a backstage pass looking thing that they could wear around their necks on a lanyard just like Wayne and Garth did when they met Alice Cooper backstage. That's OK though; it was a dream come true even being in the same room as Bourdain. The buildings of Royce Quad glowed against the black sky as we left my alma mater, and I immediately felt inspired...
...to read.
To write.
To cook.
To eat.
To laugh.
To be a better parent.
To appreciate more.
We're not worthy, Tony Bourdain. We are so not worthy.
If you who missed Bourdain speak at UCLA, don't fret. He will be doing another speaking engagement at the Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts on February 18, 2011. Tickets and info are available here.
14 comments:
Thank you so much for the recap, Pam! And thanks for including all of the little details. It made me feel like I was right there with you!
AWESOME.
This is making me seriously reconsider splurging on the gig in Cerritos....I just need to find someone to come with me. What a cool ethnic studies class, we had nothing like that in our anthro dept at UCD. And one of the best meals I had in Tokyo was yakitori from a street cart (I was drunk, but shhh!) GREAT POST!
Yay for Singapore Airline, I love that they stock up on curry buns in the kitchen. Darn, wish I knew about the Food history class! Instead I think I took some Greek Mythology class and got a C...
That was great, Pam! Thanks!
such a great post! I was there that night too -- it was so exciting. can't believe i didn't know about the food history class when i was at UCLA!
I was at that event at Royce Hall! How did you get such clear pictures of the stage? I got a scolding from an usher about trying to use my camera!
thank you for the great post! i only recently started reading your blog, but instantly liked it- and am now totally hooked with our shared love of tony bourdain between fellow bruins! you've also now tempted me to consider splurging on those cerritos tickets! I've also had prof matsumoto- but didn't realize there was a food class at that time- or i would have been there toO! i'm looking forward to reading more! -erica
Such a wonderful recap; so inspired. I feel like I was there. But am so jealous I wasn't. :)
great recap I wish I would have been there! and i love the wayne's world reference :). yay bruins! i wish I had an awesome class like your asian food and culture but there was nothing like that in my anthro major which is surprising.
The man is a "f*lching" GOD! I worship him, so thank you for posting this. I've never had the honor of seeing him in person.
this post was so fun to read. i hope you can fork out the cash to meet the man next time. imagine how awesome that blog post'll be?
I took that class with Valerie too in 2006! I loved the seminar and still keep in touch with my foodie classmates. Does she know about your blog??
I am sure that even some locals have not been able to explore everything journey has to offer. But some places you just can`t miss!
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