Letters to the Editor

What You Say

Get Well Soon, Hickey

Brian Hickey was a great help to my boyfriend and me this past fall [News, "The Accident," Doron Taussig and Mike Newall, Dec. 4, 2008]. His work helped restore my faith in the people of Philadelphia. I hope he recovers quickly. This city needs people like him.

Best wishes to Brian and his wife.

Melanie C.
Via citypaper.net

As evidenced by the success of Momofuku (New York), Schwa (Chicago) and even Joel Robuchon's La Table (Paris), people want more casual, not more anal-retentive rules and service. Michael Carlson of Schwa and two other cooks are the entire staff. No busboys, waiters, dishwashers, hosts. Do you think they care about bottled water?

The dining scene is going to be revolutionized very soon across the world: no bread, no flowers, no valet, no host, no reservations, no boring music playlists. People are sick and tired of rules and worthless 100-point systems and phony service staff.

Davis Chang of Momofuku (GQ and Bon Appetit magazines' 2007 Chef of the Year) said it best before he opened up his first place: "Screw everything else but the food."

Jose Oviedo
Via e-mail

In a perfect world, there would be no need for Marc Kravitz, professional service industry tattletale. In an ideal restaurant environment, volatile chefs would berate, insult and harass servers, ensuring that they never make mistakes. High-strung aging queens would hold managerial positions from which they could condescend and micromanage at will. Restaurateurs would be greedy paranoiacs, and fellow servers would be slack-jawed, eye-rolling hipsters.

Alas, this is not a perfect world. It is a world where diners in expensive Center City restaurants are routinely abused and ignored by selfish, bullying servers.

As we all know, restaurant servers truly live the life of Riley: job security, lavish perks, healthy romantic lives and dental care that we poor, pathetic diners can only envy.

You think they'd at least be grateful for their lives of underserved privilege, right? Far from it! Instead they condemn us to half-empty water glasses, halfhearted table crumbing and minutes spent looking for them while they no doubt cackle in some back room, planning to salve their consciences later on with boozy revelry! 

And how do we respond? How do we defend ourselves? With silence! As is well-known, Center City restaurant-goers are among the most timid and conciliatory in the world.

Only now, after so many years of abuse and humiliation, we finally have a hero, an advocate. Thank God for Marc Kravitz!

Cloaked as a mere ordinary patron, with only his ragtag band of shoppers and a bunch of wealthy restaurant owners to aid him, (oh, and apparently the City Paper too), Kravitz daily risks life and limb to protect us all from the scourge of subpar table service. And he does it the way that only someone who has never in his life had to wait tables can. Thank you Marc Kravitz. And thank you City Paper! If only your article had contained a photograph of our fearless leader. Oh well, I'm sure we'll find one soon enough!

Juliet Wayne
Via citypaper.net

Isaiah [Thompson], you are amazing. [Your library coverage on] The Clog is comprehensive and the first real public data finally released. The analysis is spot on. Keep it going. We need to question every closure. The goal is to provide libraries and access to information for all citizens in every community. Appreciate your in-depth reporting. You obviously care.

Karen Lash
President, Friends of Holmesburg Library
Via e-mail