EPISODE 79: THAI CHEF VANDA ASAPAHU & FIRST FEMALE HOST OF MASTERS OF TASTE
MEET: VANDA ASAPAHU
Vanda Asapahu, owner and chef of Ayara Thai and Ayara Thai Sauces went to college at UCLA and graduate school at Yale, then spent 4 years working for the UN in Thailand before returning home to Los Angeles. During Vanda’s stay in her native country, she took extensive notes, which included absorbing the Bangkok street food scene and reviving old family recipes.
After cooking with relatives and eating her way through the streets and countryside, it is these old recipes and new flavors that Vanda brings back to share at Ayara Thai, both through the restaurant and in her robust virtual cooking classes. While her mother still helms the kitchen, Vanda is the vanguard, taking up the torch of her family’s culinary tradition at Ayara Thai.
Vanda and Ayara Thai have been featured on Jonathan Gold’s list of Best Restaurants, in Los Angeles Magazine, LA Times, Food and Wine, LA Magazine, Food Network, and have partnered with many celebrity chefs throughout the world. In 2019, Vanda won the Rising Star Thai Chef competition and Ayara Thai received a Michelin Bib Gourmand.
Website
https://www.instagram.com/ayarathai
https://www.facebook.com/AyaraThaiCuisine/
SHOW NOTES
While it’s easy to look on the outside and marvel at Vanda's amazing accomplishment of being the first female host of Masters of Taste and the owner of Michelin Bib Gourmand-rated Thai restaurant Ayara Thai, her journey to today wasn't a linear path.
In today's episode, Vanda and I talk about the expectations she had to work through and how she found her true identity through multiple career changes, openly communicating with her family, overcoming perfectionism (kind of), productivity, and even how she wants to elevate people’s perceptions about how Asian food is just beyond “cheap and fast.”
We also explore:
FULL TRANSCRIPT
Judy Tsuei 00:07
Welcome to the f*ck saving face podcast where we're empowering mental and emotional health for Asian Americans and beyond by breaking through taboo topics. Life may not always be pretty, but it is indeed beautiful. Let's make your story beautiful today Today's guest is Vanda Ossabaw, who she's the owner and chef of Ayara Thai and Iyara Thai sauces. As a side note, I used to go to her restaurant when I was working for Neutrogena because it was right in my neighborhood. And it was delicious.
So when she mentioned in the interview about catering to different lax personnel, when people from Thailand would fly through totally makes sense because it's right near the airport.
She went to college at UCLA and the graduate school at Yale then spent four years working for the UN in Thailand before returning home to La during Vanda's stay in her native country. She took extensive notes which included absorbing the Bangkok street food scene and reviving old family recipes, after cooking with relatives and eating her way through the streets and countryside. It's these old recipes and new flavors that vana brings back to share at Iyara Thai, both through the restaurant and in her robust virtual cooking classes, while her mother is still home in the kitchen.
Vanda is the Vanguard taking up the torch of her family's culinary tradition at Iara, Thai vana and Iara type and featured on Jonathan gold's list of best restaurants, which, if you are an Angeleno, you would know about Jonathan golds and all the different restaurants he reviewed in LA.
They are amazing his critiques and his suggestions are amazing. She has been featured in Los Angeles magazine, LA Times food and wine, la magazine Food Network, and she's partnered with many celebrity chefs throughout the world. In 2019, Vanda won the rising star Thai chef competition, and Iara Thai received a Michelin bib gourmand.
Okay, welcome to this week's episode of flex saving face. And so over the last couple of seasons, we've brought a lot of different voices into the mix. And as I was working on my memoir proposal, I had to come up with competitive titles. So most of the competitive titles that I was pulling from always talk about food, because Asian culture is so closely tied to food. And that's why I'm so excited to have Vanda Ossabaw, who is here today, she is the second generation restaurant tour of Iyara Thai in LA. And I was born and raised in LA.
So I definitely went to her restaurant. So it was so nice that a couple of weeks ago, I got to interview her for another opportunity. And then we were able to talk about her being at the Masters of Tastes that's coming up, which we'll dive into in a little bit. But I'm going to turn it over to Vanda so that she can share her story of how she got to this point right here right now.
03:05
Hi, thank you for having me.
Judy Tsuei 03:07
I love it. It was before we got on to this recording, by the way, we're talking about the dually book concert. So yes. But I would love for you to share that you mentioned that you're a second generation restaurant tour. And I know that when we spoke last, you know, becoming a chef and being in the culinary industry wasn't actually your first path forward in your career. So you can talk about, like, where you were starting from and then how you got to here.
03:35
So I mean, I've always I've, I grew up in a household with serial entrepreneurs, my parents, I would label them as serial entrepreneurs. And so learning how to be scrappy was you know, before I knew what my multiplications are the you know, periodic tables are, you knew how to be scrappy, and so you absorb that and, but my parents never wanted an entrepreneur life for me. They wanted something stable, of course for all of their kids. I'm the oldest of three, you know, the model expectations for us to be a doctor or lawyer. And you know, I actually pursued pre med in college, I was at UCLA and they're like, Go pre med, go pre med, and I did I did for quite a while until I realized like it's really not for me, I'm not passionate about this. What am I passionate about? You know, and I explored I think I took every class there was in every department at UCLA from like dance.
I'm not a dancer, you know, from dance to like, music, ethno Musicology, like every building. I've taken it to architecture, just to explore and I think that they thought I was kind of going crazy, but I was. So this is my third year and I've done all of my prereqs for you for medical school, but I am just not happy. And so, um, you know, I found that public health might be something for me. I'm a planner I like to organize. And I have all of the science background, quote unquote, right.
So I pursued a graduate degree in public health at Yale, right after graduating, so I went from undergrad straight into graduate school, which I don't recommend to anyone anymore. If there's something, you know, take your time to explore and do, you know, explore, go work, figure your life out, travel, before you commit to debt, and more education. So anyhow, I made some best of it.
And unfortunately, during that period, the tsunami happened in Thailand. So there were many internship opportunities. I was in take him back to Thailand, after I graduated, as well worked in nonprofit worked with the UN, on issues of between tuberculosis all the way to maternity health to adolescent sexual health, we wrote a guidebook for adolescent sex health education, that was a model for all of Southeast Asia during that period.
But I also found that during that period, you know, this is, I guess, the epitome of success that your parents want from you, you know, they're very proud. And you would never admit it, because Asian parents would never say it to your face. But they will say it to your friends or share it with relatives that you know, my daughter, it works for the UN. And it was a very proud moment for them.
But at the same time, I knew they were struggling with their restaurant, which was their, like one of their the, they quote unquote, would claim that it's their last restaurant that they will ever attempt. And my parents have gone from multiple restaurants in the past, to catering from home, they used to cater for Thai Airways, making food for the airline crew while they had their layover in Los Angeles. But also, once they boarded the plane, they would have food to know to get them over the pond before they hit the motherland. So they did that for quite some time. But this restaurant was considered their last restaurant.
And when I was in Thailand, it was there, probably seventh or eighth here. And so for many businesses, if you I feel like if you've hit your like, two, three year mark, and you're over the, the hump of the uncertainty that you will succeed, you will succeed. And at that point, you need to have systems in place to make sure that you sustain your success. And those systems weren't in place as serial entrepreneur is serial, they would go from, you know, success to success, and then move on.
The sustainability of it was not their forte, they cook amazing. They, you know, are great with people. But building those structures was something that it was very foreign to them. At the same time, I was very burnt out from having gone to school, you know, got my graduate degree what an intern went to work at the UN for almost four years.
08:24
Also, because working in policy advocacy, the government changed, probably about four to five times, there were multiple coos in Thailand, which made it very difficult to make any change as well. So I didn't find that I was personally satisfied by the impact that I wanted to make. And most people would say, like, Oh, don't worry, you're getting paid you can have 30 days off paid days off a year. Why are you worrying? And I'm like, but that's a worry. Like, we shouldn't be, you know, there should be something more we should want to see the impacts of our work.
So I left without another job, which was like my parents were like, what? They're happy, I think, excited that I was coming home, but at the same time, like, what are you doing, like, where are you going to go? And I traveled, I went and traveled with my siblings. We did a whole month long trip from Peru to Bolivia. We tracked we, you know, fought, we cried together. It was probably the best bonding trip. And I was talking to someone the other day and I realized, wow, that bonding trip was like a pre like, you know how you have to go on an orientation trip before you do a big project with anyone usually like in splinted school related. That was our boot camp, to have to work together for a very long time, and eventually take over our family like our parents' business.
So I'm again the oldest of three. I have a middle, or middle child is my brother, who has a background in aerospace engineer Peter is a PA who and is now a PG, PG L is a PG ELA PG la golf professional. So he is a professional PGA coach, and my sister who's 12 years younger than me, but has worked in Michelin restaurants. Her name is Kathy ossabaw, who Michelin restaurants is a pastry chef recently just trained in, in France and south of France to to solidify her skills. As a pastry chef, she's already talented, but you know, us being like overachieving, we're like we always feel like we're, we're faking it till we make it.
And so to have that, under her belt, I think has given her much confidence. But we all now work together on this family business, in some capacity or other. And that trip was like the best bonding trip we could ever have. Because all of our frustrations, all of our moms said, this really triggered me forever, and you know, not realizing it and realizing your siblings had different experience, although we lived in the same household. And it triggered them differently. And we act out differently. So it was wild, it was what's
Judy Tsuei 11:28
Amazing. I was just gonna say yeah, sometimes I have those conversations. I'm the oldest of four and with my siblings, and I was like, you remember what from that incident, like, I It's a completely separate existence, even though like you said, we were in the same house at the same moment.
And the interpretation was completely different. And I love that you in college went and tried all these different things in the different departments, because I think that's also something that as children of immigrants, I didn't know. I mean, like when I had to cut the course catalog came for Berkeley, and I was looking at I was like, Wait, what am I supposed to do? Like an I have to wait, there's a major, I don't understand. So for anybody who is embarking on that, like you said, I highly encourage you to diversify and take classes beyond what you thought was possible. Like I didn't even know there were study abroad programs until I got to Berkeley and like by then it was kind of like too late in my school career to like, do something like that. But I made sure that because of the kind of learnings that I had going into college, that because my siblings are so much younger than me, I was like, You guys have to go study abroad, you guys have to, you know, try to run classes.
Because you never know what's going to spark your interest. And I think that, especially in the entrepreneurial field, you have to have a range of skills to be able to succeed in what it is that you're doing. While traditionally we agree. Yeah, yeah, like niche down. Actually, if you can pull from diverse opportunities or learnings that's going to help you move forward and whatever it is that you want to pursue. And then yeah, like maybe something out of left field will totally be the thing that sparks you and makes you come alive, right specializations
13:06
Are for insects, like I always says this. And we're always often forced to specialize and to focus. And, you know, you think the rat race ends when you get accepted into the college of your dreams. But then it's just starting again. Because you feel often when you go there, you're, you know, forced to focus, get all of your requirements. And if you've been fortunate to take AP classes and pass them, you're already a little bit more advanced than others. And so you skip all those prereqs. And those prereqs, I actually think are amazing.
They're not equivalent to the AP exam, and nothing gets you keys and you know, advanced education, but you really get a little more in college and the study groups and the TA periods. Anyways, I can go on about this whole college experience and how fucked up it is. And especially coming from a household that wants you to focus it already. Like lives, the same ethos lives in your house. And so it's double, and you're like, Okay, I got a full focus again, and that stress and eating and that's why Yeah, gain weight and call it
Judy Tsuei 14:20
like, it's funny, your sister, you know, you were mentioning that she's already super talented, but needed kind of a credibility to go along with it. And someone said to me recently, I was like, How have I not heard this before, but they were like, I'm not just type a I'm type A plus. And I was like, Oh my God, what an amazing term like for a recovering perfectionist, and especially when your parents have so much pressure on you, and then you internalize that pressure and put it on yourself. And so, you know, I used to say that it took me forever to realize that I didn't have fun, and I didn't know how to play.
And so even now with my daughter, she seventh, I have struggled with figuring out how to play with her, it seems so boring to me. But that's only because I haven't learned how to just do something for the sake of doing it not because there's any results or outcome that we're gonna get. Oh, yeah, like, I feel like I'm wasting time because my mom was always super all about,
15:21
You have to be efficient, you have to make sure you're doing 20 things at once. While this is cooking, you can go do this. While that's doing this, you can do
Judy Tsuei 15:29
it. And so now, you know, and science has shown by the way that multitasking is a farce and your brain actually can't handle it. Like, no, it takes you forever to switch from one year to the next. And then you go back to the other thing. And so I see that trained in me now. So then there's this quiet anxiety sometimes when there's not a lot to do that I don't really know what to do with myself, and for you like as an entrepreneur. And for me, I have a branding and content marketing agency. And so there are rarely lols.
But when there is a lull, I started stressing out and being like, wait, what, what am I supposed to fill this time with. And so then I tried to find things. And when I was learning, yoga, I remember learning that like, as you're letting go of certain old habits that are no longer serving you, you create space. But if you don't fill up that space with something purposeful that you want, it creates this vacuum, it'll just kind of suck in like whatever's around. And so you have to be mindful of that. And I see that happening now. of just like, dude, just learn how to chill,
16:32
Just chill. Jannik I think for for those who grew up, kind of I think we grew up very similar with moms that are like, not just tiger moms, I think tiger moms are a little different. My mom is like yours efficiency, cutting things and doing it fast. And doing it well is like what you know, is her excellence. But this vacuum of time during the pandemic, I think with growing up in that environment is made me even more productive.
Because now there's like, no more social activities. So you got to fill it in with everything. And the uncertainty of when we're going to come back to this norm has kind of like we don't know, and we got to just fill up our time and do our best and do more. And after you know, people are returning back to work. I'm like, I never had time off. Like this pandemic. I wasn't Netflix. Vacation.
Judy Tsuei 17:33
Yes, I need a vacation for what was supposed to be like, you know, vacation. introspection. Yeah, no, I didn't have that. No. And you were talking about your mom with the efficiency thing. So I read very quickly, because in the back of my head, I can hear my mom being like, you should read faster, read faster than that. And so there are times that I will be sitting with someone and they'll like pull up something on their screen or like, you know, show something to me and I will glance at it. And they'll be like, okay, and they're like you didn't just read that. Did you have like, Yes, I did just read that really fast? Because I have that voice.
18:05
Like, hurry up, you
Judy Tsuei 18:07
can read faster. So I totally I think that we had very like similar moms for sure. I wanted to ask you, and the masters of taste is coming up. Can you tell us a bit about that and your role within it as being the first I'm gonna let you fill in the blank.
18:25
First female hosts. So we're celebrating the fifth anniversary of masters of taste and masters of taste is the biggest food event on the field of the Rose Bowl. Like I said earlier, I'm a Bruin. And my family's assimilation to American culture was through football. It's a very good Bobby's family. And to cook on the field of the Rose Bowl, is pretty epic experience. When I signed up for the first year, it was like, Let's go we were we're going in the whole family went just to be on that field. And to be asked to host and to be the first female host is amazing, like I never expected. I'm a mom and pop shop with one unit. You know, we have one restaurant here in Los Angeles, and we're currently still takeout since the pandemic. So I you know,
I was super surprised but also nervous. Also, you know, wanted to raise the bar being a female being minority being everything we often you know, get looked at like, so what are you going to do? What are you going to add on? So I took the opportunity to kind of asked to sit on every board and sit on the planning committee to bring it involve my community. The wonderful thing about masters of taste is that they never select restaurants that are competing in the same area. So I've always been the only Thai restaurant that's ever served for masters in this room like, you know, there's amazing Thai restaurants in Los Angeles where the Los Angeles is the biggest community of ties outside of Thailand.
So naturally, there's tons of amazing Thai restaurants, and many of them are fret my friends, and I want to invite them and they're like, perfect, let's do it. I also want to invite Thai trade and Thai select Thai select is a certification program from the Thai government for sort of a seal of approval of authenticity, but also sort of five food products as well. And so all of us, you know, four of us are our restaurants, our certified Thai select restaurants, and that I should give them a plug to it.
So my restaurants AR a Thai, there's going to be holy basil based in downtown LA, they just got, I think, LA Times 100 restaurants so love to eat, which is a staple in the Hollywood area, Southern Thai cooking, and then oldest high, which serves the most amazing Thai breakfast.
So we're all Thai restaurants. And I often tell you know, my, these friends, and then my parents too, we are not like your generation. We don't need to feel that we're competing, because we all do our own craft. We all do our own food, and we can still be friends and support each other.
So anyhow, the forefront the four of us, along with Thai trade, we're going to transform the endzone, which is like amazing because usually, we as a non hosts, you your booths are on the side of the field, but at the end zone into a Thai pavilion, in celebration of Thai New Year, which is so glad that happens in the same month of April. That's amazing.
So I'm super excited for this year, I think tickets are selling out, I was just told there's like only 50 left. So I always get a text every year. I know you're going Judy, so but other people if you need tickets, get them now because they always sell out. And I always get attacks last minute from a friend, or like a friend that I haven't seen for a long time and asking you for tickets, tickets sold out.
Judy Tsuei 22:12
When you say sold out, like it's the Rose Bowl, how many people are interested in attendance,
22:16
close to I think, two to 3000. My gosh, this is real. So it's not like the stands. But you're welcome to go into the stands like people can, like you can feel comfortable. And like if you need your masks on, put your masks on, collect your food and go up to any one of the seats that you've ever wanted to sit at, and eat and enjoy. Or you can sit on the field, there's benches Santori whiskey is being some Tory has the platinum sponsorship. So they're forming this amazing bar on the 50 yard line, which it's a booze food fan.
Judy Tsuei 22:57
That's so incredible. You know, when we spoke last, there was something that you said, which I feel like needs to be underscored. And you wanted to shift the perspective around food in terms of, you know, I'll think a lot of people perceive Asian food as cheap, you know, like cheap Chinese food, like whatever it is. But you were kind of explaining like, how much work goes into preparing a lot of the dishes, how long it takes to prepare, and then just shifting that perspective that like, you know, yes, I think, in general, my family did grow up trying to find every sort of bargain, you know, when you go to the Asian supermarket, things are probably going to be cheaper. So like, but I would love for you to kind of talk about your philosophy around
23:39
That. I mean, I it's something that I'm still coming to terms with, I think inheriting a restaurant that has been established is, is a challenge of itself. Like people often say, Oh, you're lucky, you know, your family has already built this for you. But they don't see it as a you know, there's a challenge to growing it.
Nothing is nothing that remains still like language, culture change, food also changes, right? And the expectation of what you're cooking, also will change and that's why chefs reinvent and invent often on all the time. And I've been wanting to cook a little more of things that you know, is true to to who I am as a Asian American as a Thai American as an Angeleno. And I often struggle with you know, the price point and what people expect of you to cook so my parents put you know, when they first opened the restaurant in East LA chow mein and an orange chicken because they had to label it as Thai Chinese in order for people to understand typhoon, now typhoon is mainstream, but people are still limited to your color of the rainbow curries.
You know, and your pot tie and that's kind of it And they expect it to be fast, they expect it to be cheap. And that's, that's, you know it. And there are so many other dishes that, you know, I grew up eating and grew up exploring when I lived in Thailand, family recipes that we eat, but can't really share. Because it's just not mainstream enough, but I want to share.
But when we raise those prices, on those, or even the prices on part time, because everything has gone up in price, it's really hard, it is a struggle to do that. Because of those expectations, I think there was a New York Times article on all of the Asian food. And Japanese always scores the highest in terms of quality as well as price. And I think Indian doesn't is a little below that.
And then I think Chinese falls kind of in the middle lower, but Thai food is at the bottom, high food, which is I think, has become that go to Asian food and take out food for many Americans score at the lowest point. And oftentimes restaurants I can tell you, it's not run by a big corporation, there is no PF Changs of Thai foods that I know of, often it's run by Mom and Pop similar to my parents, and now, you know, run in may perhaps being run by second generations, like myself and my siblings. And I think we all struggle with that I've spoken to our annulment, he his family is based in Nashville has the oldest Thai restaurant in Nashville.
And it was it used to be a little market with a little like, take out scoop area, he's kind of reinvented that into something new. But he had you know, he, they have an amazing community. But he also struggles with something of that sort to have the identity of how to frame ourselves and how to make it ours and be proud of it. But at the same time you know, still honoring our family in a way.
Judy Tsuei 27:15
Yeah, I mean, you said that you're a second generation. And I know, you had said that this wasn't the initial path that you were going to take, but I can hear in your voice and in your work that it has become a source of pride. And it's so important. It's also like an opportunity for you to stay connected to your family, like from ancient lineage to like, even your immediate family. You know, what has that been like for you? As the second generation? What has it? A friend of mine recently said, you know, with everything that's happening in the world right now, with like the Ukraine and Russia, I was saying that it's growing up with parents who grew up in Taiwan, but who fled China to go to Taiwan. I know what that like fear is like, and yes, like, I have not had bombs dropped around me. But that fear is pervasive. And it passes through generation by generation. Yeah, so I wanted to kind of hear about that experience for you like forging your own path, and then also honoring the past.
28:13
I think it's, I mean, first off, I'm not second generation, by I'm second generation restaurant. But I am first generation. I was born in Thailand, I 'm actually an immigrant, I moved with my family when I was five. So I've, I remember, you know, our life before we moved into having to pack everything and being a bit confused, and having to board this plane, leaving my grandparents which was so close to, and not knowing when we would be back to visit them, you know. And so I remember, I remember the struggles that my parents had, you know, establishing themselves here in Los Angeles, and everything that they had to do all of that anything that probably affects me a little differently being the oldest than my other siblings, like we were talking earlier.
Same experience. We're in the same room live in the same household. It triggers all of us a little differently. And I think that has given me like a sense of being responsible almost for what happens with my parents, my family. And me, my my youngest sibling, Cathy has mentioned like, you don't need to be here you can go and do you have other talents.
You know what, those days where you feel like oh, this is like it's a lot and you you bitch about it. And my sister so you can leave, you can go do and I'm like really? Can you really? Like I don't see a world where that is, you know, truly, truly possible because even if I'm doing something else, there's always a sense of are my parents okay? Are they going to retire in grace? Will you know everything else be okay?
My team members now like we have an amazing team who's been with us forever, are they going to be okay? You know, even during our construction, I'm always worried like, why I want to keep everyone employed during the pandemic, we never let go of anyone, let's find work for everyone.
And let's move on. And so there's always that sense of like responsibility for for everyone. And I think that's growing up, seeing those struggles firsthand and what they've built, and what they've kind of modeled. Because my parents were that for many people in the Thai community as well, the unofficial caretaker, and the people who would check up on the elderly is because they're living alone and making sure that we bring food to this Auntie or uncle. So that lives deep and true in me. And it's really hard. I think therapy has helped a bit. Like you said, we inherit this kind of mentality. Yeah.
Judy Tsuei 31:06
And I think like, you know, therapy is so beneficial, but like, it's everyday work, to continue to shift perspectives. And still, like, I catch myself in like, really, I feel like I would be over this by now. And it's still it, there are just some things that are so deeply ingrained. And so it's this personal evolution continually. I wanted to ask you two other questions, I wanted to ask what it's like for you as a woman in the space. And as an Asian American woman in the space,
31:37
I'm, I think, I'm lucky, I'm lucky to have other women in the space too. I'm part of a amazing group of women called regarding her, which are all restaurant owned, restaurants that are owned by women. And it's a great community that was built through the pent during the pandemic, amazing women, and that community, but at the same time, I think being an entrepreneur does make you feel like you're working in a silo.
But then I've never worked as a chef, like, in a big male restaurant, like Byron, our restaurant has always been run by my mom, which has, you know, her culture is I she will do everything, she will actually do it faster than you, and she will help you do it. And it's not quite like a top down, like you'd need to do you got to do there's, you know, like that masculine culture.
So I never I've been fortunate to not grow up in that or have that in our restaurant doesn't have that mentality. But I do see it when I you know, attend food events, like in pre pandemic, where I'm the only female chef who has to cook for a bunch and we have to share a communal kitchen. And, you know, the the takedown or the, you're invisible, and there's a males club, and you're sort of there on the side. And like, Honey, can you carry that? Do you need help, sweetie? And like, do you you know, they don't know who you are, really. And so you just, you know, in the past, I play towards that. And just like, Yeah,
I can't carry it, carry it for me, just to get the guys to help out so I can load. I'm always running late, right? And so, but at the same time, I'm thinking like, you know, I shouldn't do that I need to, like, say something back or do I not enjoy, like, embrace, there's so many, you know, things and I don't think anything is, is there should be one way or the other. I think this is situational, and you have to just embrace your femininity, embrace being a woman, it's hardest, it's easier to say than to do. But it's still a struggle.
I think it's a struggle when we look at the restaurant industry and see that, you know, men who are married are more like when we're hiring the industry as a whole. And I find myself with these biases to men who are married with kids are often like, most sought out, and women with kids are most at the other end of the spectrum. And there's something to be said about that. If you're trying to diversify your kitchen, but you don't staff the diversity simply because society puts different roles on our different genders you know, and where women have to are often put into the roles of the child care provider. And therefore the you know, is expected to leave often or go to doctor appointments and pick up their kids from from school or have an emergency come up, and therefore they can't show up to work.
It makes them not as feels like it's they're not as dependable versus men who are married with kids. If they're stable, they're you know that they're the breadwinner, therefore they're going to show up to work and be there on time every day because they have that responsibility. But, you know, in that I don't think our industry can really fix it. But I think society needs to fix it like childcare after school care. All of that is an issue for everyone, and makes it even harder on the blue collar. Class. And, yeah, it was really hard.
Judy Tsuei 35:34
I fully agree and what you're saying earlier, I think, the decision fatigue that you have to have as a woman or a person of color to be able to, like make the choice in the decision, do I say something right now? Or do I not? Do I like stand up for myself right now? Or do I not, it's exhausting. And it's this constant, like, having to manage this. Like, what is going to create the best outcome, and especially from cultures where it is like high context, like you want to take into consideration.
Everyone in the space, my friend just said to me recently, she's known me for a very long time, and we were watching a show. And she hadn't seen the first couple of episodes. So I was trying to catch her up during the show. And she goes, It's okay, I'll just watch the first couple of episodes like later on my own. But she's like, you know, you just have this really sweet quality where you just don't want to leave anyone behind. And I think that there's so many traits that make us wonderful, and like make us like caring empathetic individuals and whatnot.
But then it's also a double edged sword, where like, you could care too much, or you could, you know, yield when you should be standing firm. And I think that that is the challenge. And you're right, like, so many things need to change from a broader systemic level, like, as a divorced parent to, you know, I don't have family around here. But I've definitely made a family of my friends and my community, which is great. And yet, like, I can see just, you know, so many challenges. And my same friend who said, like, you, it's, that trait is so sweet.
She's also watched me now. And she's like, I don't know how you do the things that you do, like you are doing this all by yourself, like creating your own business, but also caring for your daughter, and like all of these things. And so I think, like so many people, we just do it, because we have to do it.
And as an entrepreneur, you're just like, before we got on this call, you know that you had said like, if someone is not available on your team, then you're gonna fill in for them. And so like, so much of it is we're just doing whatever we can. And I don't think that's the exception to the rule. I think that that's generally most people are trying to figure that out. But you know, I appreciate you saying, like, as a woman, what it is that you have to work through? And how can we change it? Like, I don't know if anybody else has any other thoughts about this, please, you know, email me and like, let me know what you've been doing. To be able to kind of shift the discourse around it.
Hopefully, this podcast is an opportunity to kind of have that I've been aiming to bring on more Asian American men to to have conversations around that. Just people doing whatever we can, like, I think sharing stories is one thing that you can do, because then you have more awareness and empathy and compassion. But then also, like, how do you take more of those action steps? Like why
38:12
can we and I think that for us as a single restaurant, to make that big change for the industry is so hard like my mom, I mean, we've talked about this and how many who we want to hire, you know, have issues with childcare. But at the same time, we can't afford to pay everyone like a childcare provider, so that they can come to work. Like we just simply can't, the math doesn't work out. And so my mom's like, when I retire, I'm just going to transform the house into like, a big, like, she's going to babysit every employee's kids and pick them up from school. I'm like, Mom, I don't think they want like an 80 year old woman driving their kids with like, you know, a million car seats in the back of the van. Like, no, like, you're gonna be okay. It's just like, but that's the only way and I think that mentality of like, we fix it with it, like, we can't fix everything, but we can fix what we can fix. And that's kind of her always been her motto, like, we can do it, we'll make it work within our thing. But I really think, you know, we we need to do something differently.
Like if you want people to come back to work, and we're, you know, staffing shortage is huge in our industry. Because people it's crazy hours, we're working six to 10 hours on our feet. You know, sometimes we can't even get a drink of water because we're busy or go to the bathroom and we have health issues because of it. And so just getting childcare to come to work is already a challenge. And people say, Oh, they've worked from home all my friends are like, Oh, it's wonderful to work from home. I wish I can work from home. I wish I can work from home making your food
Judy Tsuei 39:57
and that's true. Apple
40:01
hire staff I wouldn't have an overhead costs right? We could just do it via zoom. It's still need food. Yeah, I think it's the only David Chang I think set this on his, one of his Netflix or Hulu shows is that food is the last thing that you can just plug in. I'm butchering it, but everything else can be digital. Like our entertainment is digital. We're working out digitally. We're meeting people digitally and you know, seeing people's Facebook food, you can't just plug in your there's no such, you know, there's no digital aspect to it. You have to eat it physically to do it,
Judy Tsuei 40:40
eat it in the metaverse. nourish yourself that way. Okay. So my last question then is if you had to say fuck saving face to something, what would you say fuck saving face to
40:56
UK saving face to Thai food being cheap and fast. Lauren expand. Yes,
Judy Tsuei 41:04
amazing. And thank you so much for your time today. I've loved connecting with you. For anyone who's listening to this, if, by the time that we debut this if masters or taste hasn't happened yet, and I hope that you go if not, I hope you go next year. But I also to go visit your restaurant. So I'll share the website. Definitely, you know, support local businesses and just support businesses that are doing our best all of us.
41:30
Be patient when dining out everyone is still you know, either training or recovering. And we're not even recovering. We're still working through all of our issues. So recovering is the ideas were through it. We're not through it. So please, please be patient when you dine out.
Judy Tsuei 41:48
Thank you. I hope that you enjoyed today's conversation with Vanda, I also hope that you get a chance to go try out her delicious food at her restaurant, if you're ever in LA or you live in LA, which is my original hometown, and it's still where most of my family lives. I'm looking forward to bringing more conversations that are breaking through the bamboo ceiling that are integrating ancient lineages with current modern wisdom so that we can evolve for these modern times. And to truly just have some food for thought, pun intended for how we can shift the dialogue and take action and be inspired to create real change in our immediate environments and everything surrounding us. I will see you in a future episode.
Want to support this podcast? You can do so in crypto. If you'd like to send your dollars aka fiat currency to me via the Cash App, which uses a superfast Lightning Network I can convert it into Bitcoin. You can find me on the Cash App by typing in dollar sign Judy Tsuei.
That's T S U E I. But if you'd actually like to send me direct cryptocurrencies email me at hello@fucksavingface.com And we can exchange crypto wallet addresses more ways you can support the podcast or by sharing this with your friends, family, anybody you think might enjoy this and remember to go get your copy of The Little Book of Tibetan rites and rituals at Barnes and Noble, Amazon, audible or wherever you like to get your books. Make your story beautiful today.
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