|
REALLY MAD HATTER
I am compelled to write to you in response to Roger Porter's review of my new restaurant, the Rabbit Hole & Mad Hatter Lounge ["Street of Culinary Dreams," WW, Sept. 17, 1997]. I feel that you have done us a great disservice. Below are just a few of the points with which my partners and I take exception. Mr. Porter came to our restaurant in early July. We were open only a couple of weeks and still had some bugs to work out of the system. Mr. Porter felt the need to point out the most minor of these bugs up to and including a typo on the menu. Does a misspelled word on a brand-new menu really merit pointing out to the public? Is it standard Willamette Week policy to send a reviewer to a restaurant only once before writing their review? The other papers in town that I checked with have a policy of at least two visits to a restaurant before reviewing them so as to get a more accurate feel for the menu and its consistency. Is it also standard Willamette Week policy that the review be held for two months before it is printed? Our dinner menu changes every month, so in effect Mr. Porter reviewed dishes that haven't been on the menu for two months. Repeatedly Mr. Porter got basic facts wrong. Our hours were listed incorrectly, and Mr. Porter stated that "the smoked salmon was less satiny than desired." We had cured salmon on the menu, not smoked. Mr. Porter berated the server for "not being particularly knowledgeable about our fare" and that he had to "retreat" to the kitchen to get the desired answers. Mr. Porter peppered our server with questions about a duck dish that was not on our menu. The server was quite knowledgeable about the duck dish that we did have on the menu but tried to find the answers to Mr. Porter's questions anyway. For these courtesy trips up and down the stairs his demeanor was referred to as "Aw Shucks." If the server would have flat-out told Mr. Porter that he was asking about a dish not on our menu, would he then have been called rude? Mr. Porter did bring up some valid criticisms in his review, but they were lost in a sea of pompous overstatements. Time and again Mr. Porter used phrases like "amateurish" to describe the Rabbit Hole. It seems he had some preconceived notion of what we should be and reviewed us based on that assumption. I would like to clear this issue up for him. We found a beautiful space with loads of character and decided to start a restaurant and lounge. We have very creative chefs who are free to create both classic dishes and newer twists on some old favorites. We have kept our prices very reasonable and have had only one complaint from anyone about our food. Unfortunately for the Rabbit Hole, he just happened to be able to give his opinion to 80,000 readers. For Willamette Week to base such an important review (important to us at least) on our first few weeks' performance and on only one meal from an outdated menu seems unjust. Give us a chance to build up some clientele before you scare them away. One more thing. We were still stinging from Mr. Porter's blasts about an hour after we read the review when in walked a Willamette Week advertising agent selling ad space for the upcoming Willamette Week fine dining guide. Seemed like the punch line to a cruel joke. Bill Leeds, co-owner and manager
Rabbit Hole Restaurant and Mad Hatter Lounge Editor's note:For a full review, WW restaurant critics do visit a restaurant at least twice. For smaller reviews, as this was, they sometimes make only one visit. We did list the restaurant's hours incorrectly, and the menu does say cured, not smoked, salmon. We regret the errors. MEN HAVE FEELINGS, TOO Your story on Frédéric Canovas ["Screwed," WW, Oct. 29, 1997] was fascinating in a number of tragic ways. It is a story of a society hopelessly mired in abuse of power and one that typically uses sex to assert that power. It is an indication of just how out of control we are when we feel the only avenues to personal strength are our crotches and our guns. What distressed me were the responses I read in the Nov. 5 issue. While the writers repeatedly boo-hooed the tarnished image of Reed College, they completely missed the issues involved. If Canovas had been female, he would have been portrayed as a heroic victim; and Samuel Danon, alleged villain, would be wearing a scarlet letter and languishing in the unemployment lines. The mere fact that Canovas is a man means he is disposable in our culture. He is more likely than a woman to die on his job or to lose custody of his children, simply because the notion of men having rights and feelings of their own has been ignored so long. Sexual harassment is wrong, no matter which gender perpetrates it. It is abusive and therefore inexcusable. Reed College's unconscionable termination of Canovas and swift reward of Danon with a fully funded sabbatical does nothing more than glorify misuse of power at all levels. Consider as well the implications in a supposedly free and democratic society when people cannot feel secure in the pursuit of their careers or jobs without the threat of some type of harassment: sexual, religious, moral, political, etc. Is this what happens when people's seemingly desperate need for power at one another's expense jeopardizes basic civil rights? Emily Calkins, Southwest Whitford Lane, Beaverton
RAGS TO RICHES FOR NIKE WORKERS
Josh Feit's "Alas, Poor Nike" (WW, Nov. 5, 1997) came close to figuring out why "Nike is the most reviled company in the galaxy." The definitive answer was set out in Robert Sheaffer's 1988 book Resentment Against Achievement. The so-called pursuit of social justice, or class struggle, is really resentment in disguise. Those who resent the wealthy would rather tear them down than work to raise themselves up. Resentment therefore produces nothing positive, and is virtually guaranteed to keep its adherents in poverty. Nike's Third World workers are not well-served by their defenders here in America. It wasn't too long ago that Nike hired the "poor Japanese," and soon afterwards American populists were afraid the "rich Japanese" would buy America. Don't be surprised when Nike's current "poor Asian workers" become more successful than Nike's detractors here at home. Then we can sit back and watch American protesters attack those "rich Asian capitalists" that Nike helped create. Steve Buckstein, president, Cascade Policy Institute
PHIL, OUR HERO
In the rush to have Phil Knight drawn and quartered, it might be fair to pause for another view before the knives come out ["Alas, Poor Nike," WW, Nov. 5, 1997]. Those leading the charge against Nike embellish their principal concern, wages of workers in the shoe plants, with comparisons to Knight's income and the money spent on endorsers such as Michael Jordan. $2.50 a day for the workers. Millions for the Chief and his endorsers. Thirty years ago when Knight was selling shoes out of the trunk of his car on evenings and weekends (in addition to his day job), he was fortunate to average $2.50 a day from the shoe operation. It was his tenacity and his extraordinary skills as a capitalist (a pejorative designation for the sign wavers) that created the most increditable success story in the history of Oregon business enterprise. His concept of marketing with endorsers was key to the success of Nike and continues to be an important element in their successful operation. The economic wealth he has created for our society in wages and taxes are almost beyond calculation and our state would be a far poorer place without him. We Oregonians do have our heroes. Some from politics, many from sports. I suspect if you could poll individual Oregonians you would find Phil Knight ranks considerably higher than his vocal critics imagine. Bill Landers, Southeast Stark Street |
