Sixteen years ago, Ko-Hsin Fan found herself sobbing over her restaurant’s giant wok. It was Thanksgiving Day. The chef had walked out in a fit of anger after a dispute with the sous chef.
She had to step in and take over the kitchen. “I had no idea what I was cooking,” she says, “my tears just drop and drop from my eyes, mixing with my sweat. I was counting every second of that day.”
The restaurant was fully booked for Thanksgiving, which had a set menu, but as of 9 A.M. on the morning of, Fan did not even know how to start a restaurant stove. Servers hid in the kitchen, afraid to tell customers what was happening behind the dining room. Her sous-chef couldn’t help, as he was busy with slicing Peking duck. Angry customers ran into the back and demanded their food or a manager to explain the situation. Fan was hopeless. “At one point, I told my servers it’s okay not to take the money for that night because I failed them.”...
Positioned high over the La Brea Avenue stoplight, a billboard advertising Hulu’s dramedy Shrill, featuring the SNL’s endlessly lovable Aidy Bryant, stops traffic cold.
In her magenta bathing suit, knocking knees together, Bryant is a sick-thoughted modern take on Botticelli’s The Birth of Venus.
But if her character, Annie, is Shrill’s Venus and goddess of love and beauty, then who is the show’s Adonis, her doomed mortal lover?
It turns out he is Ryan.
And
Ryan sucks.
Immature, inconsiderate and incompetent, Ryan is the kind of guy who sends our heroine one-word texts reading “Fuck?” and expects her to leave through the back door when they’re finished so as to not annoy his roommates.
He’s a bona fide schlub, the definition of the emotionally stunted bare minimum with no discernible ambitions, and yet Annie keeps going back as he dangles commitment over her head. ...
Chinese lanterns, raised middle fingers, a surveillance camera and Chinese passport -- images of written Mandarin characters made of bamboo and silk cast shadows on the Marciano Art Foundation’s walls in the crammed lower level gallery dedicated to Ai Wei Wei’s installation Windows (2015).
What would my mother think?
Whereas I see coded messages and Ai’s subterfuge, I imagined my mother, who lived most of her adult life in Beijing -- where I was born as well, living there until I was seven before moving to Vancouver, Canada — taking these shadowed objects for exactly what they depict: lantern, hand, and texts....
After an intense basketball game (well, as intense as a bunch of ten-year-olds running up and down a court gets) my reward was a pita sandwich. It did not matter whether we won or lost; my father would always drive my younger sister and me to Tarzana Armenian Deli (TAD) to grab a bite. I’d enthusiastically skip into the shop while my sister and father would lag behind. The employees greet me with a familiar smile. My father orders three turkey sandwiches while my sister and I run to the chip rack to choose our favorite salty treat. “WAIT,” a lightbulb would go off in my mind. “Mom wants us to get Armenian string cheese!” I run towards the white, braided cheese with sprinkles of black sesame dispersed throughout.
As we collect our treats and groceries, my father walks to the coolers in the back of the shop to grab tan, a yogurt-based drink popular in the Middle East. Once our sandwiches are ready, I take my bright red tray to the small white table near the windows....
Original beef
Black pepper beef
Spicy beef
Original pork
Spicy pork
Tender pork
Original bacon
Spicy bacon
Mr. Yap—who goes by no other name—displays ...
When push came to shove for Nipsey Hussle, he decided to fight. He bought back his block one store at a time, showing black and brown people the key to keeping our city in our hands. It started with The Marathon Store, but it was so much more than that. When I saw the video of the 33-year-old artist, community activist, father, and mogul lying bloodied and dying in front of his own place of business, I felt a part of our city dying along with it....
As a send-up of the postmodern discourse about art, The Plagiarists is hilariously successful. But as a work of art in itself, it feels uninviting and closed off, insulated by its own convictions....
