misterpeace replied to your quote: In a perfect world, individuals would be free to…

this guy is a sanctimonious, hypocritical, self-proud douche. I don’t know why you keep quoting him, like he’s brilliant or something.

Above are responses from two of my very favorite bloggers concerned about my affinity for Anthony Bourdain - and so I will answer to their, probably justified, questioning of my admiration.

As for the quotes on my blog, they are almost always directly from something I am reading at the time in which I post it. From my blog’s creation, I have always used it as a way to archive snippets from books, articles, and whatever else I am reading. I checked Bourdain’s Kitchen Confidential and Medium Raw out from the library a few weeks back, so naturally, that is why there have been an excess of his words on my site lately.

Bourdain himself is in the rare position of having had fame and fortune thrust upon him in his mid-40s and he did so by writing a entertaining as hell book about the “underbelly” of the cooking world, something I enjoyed even more having myself worked in a fine dining restaurant from the ages of 16 to 24 (and I still go back from time to time). I don’t think he is some genius nor do I think he is changing the world with his intellect. Rather, he is someone who is legitimately amazed by his own celebrity, who is well aware of his flaws as a human being (and is unapologetic about some of them, i.e. the drinking), and most importantly, he seems to really get my idea of what it is to live life - travel to new places, get away from the tourist traps and eat, drink, and meet people, my god, just meet people! And he does a great job of expressing in words his fascination with the world.

He’s not without his hypocrisies - though nor am I, far from it - and he has certainly said some offensive things over the past decade - of which I am also guilty - and this is part of his schtick (although he has played it down in recent years and apologized for much of it in Medium Raw). The comments he has made about obesity, while definitely having made me cringe at times, have mostly been related to his call for the food industry in America to revamp itself and make quality, healthy foods available and affordable… and by healthy, he doesn’t mean amp up broccoli production in America, but for our industries to stop exploiting while cutting corners with their products by needlessly processing them (often with ammonia as a cleanser) and filling them with poisonous trans fats and food additives. He wants, like many of us, accessible natural foods for all.

I get why people think the guy is a douche, because he can be - but even to those people, I would recommend his books, which I finished recently. He has his moments, but he’s much more self-aware and self-deprecating and much less self-righteous than one might think. I like the guy. Maybe it’s because he reminds me with a lot of the people I worked with over the years or because he’s the kind of guy I’d find myself hanging out and arguing with at my local dive bar. All I know is that even if I can’t defend him, I like him. And his shows: are there better produced travel shows out there? If so, I’m yet to find one.