Boyi

Hungry after visiting the Old Dragon’s Head — and desperate to recharge my phone — I stumbled on a strange restaurant in town called Boyi [sic] Music BBQ Bar of the “crazy crap on the wall” school of decor.  Over a base of faux brass steampunk was a layer of indiscriminate Western accents:  a photo of the Beatles next to a Mississippi license plate next to a poster for Benicio del Toro’s Che.  I was the first customer and I found a half dozen young employees literally lounging in the foyer.

The menu was all in Chinese, but I muddled through.  (Southern license plates aside, the “BBQ” in the name meant grilled meat skewers.)  I ordered a glass of red wine and chaos erupted.  They took a single bottle from the wall of matching wine bottles behind the bar and then fossicked around in drawers until they found a corkscrew.  As I watched two kids try to open the bottle with the wing corkscrew — which they had clearly never used before — I confirmed that I was the first customer to ever order wine.  After several failed attempts, I asked them if I could try (i.e. teach them.)  As I opened it, I said, “魔法!”  (“Magic!”) and they both laughed.

The food started arriving — and was quite good, actually — as other customers started to trickle in.  The staff turned on a giant, floor to ceiling video screen on which they only played J- and K-Pop videos.  AOA’s “Like a Cat” stood out:

An elementary school girl then arrived at my table.  She had been sent over to my table by her parents, as sometimes happens, to practice her English.  “Hi,” she said reluctantly.  Between my waitress’ broken English and my broken Mandarin, the three of us were able to talk long enough to satisfy the girl’s parents and she wandered back to her table after a few minutes.