Diary of a Restaurant on the North Coast

frank12

Gold
Sep 6, 2011
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Diary of a Restaurant on the North Coast
November 1st.

Today we met the cement guy, Enrique, and got a quote for labor?which he said should take no more than 30-days. Melky brought three guys to work and they started cleaning the refrigerators, deep fryers, ovens Bay Breeze, and other stainless steel kitchen machines. They were scrubbing all day long with bare hands?no gloves?using acid, bleach, and Brillo pads. If they had any skin left on their hands, it would be a miracle. They scrubbed off all of the stainless steel and then they started scrubbing all of the tiles down to the concrete in the kitchen.

Meanwhile, two guys started breaking up the concrete where the bar once stood. All of the mahogany wood was carefully taken off and placed in the hallway. Melky gave us his quote for how much he thought it would take to re-wire everything inside the restaurant. All the wiring needs replaced. The salt air has eaten through everything?including my 10-strands of hair, teeth enamel, and foreskin. Everything metal has been turned into a pile of oxidized rust. The piles of rust would rival looking into Medusa?s eyes. Nothing has escaped the wrath of the salt air. Nothing. Not even a half decent erection.

In many places, the wood has been eaten by termites so thoroughly, you can stick your finger through q 2-inch piece of wood. The restaurant was supplying generations of termites for 15 years. By my estimate, given the gestation and pregnancy period of a termite, the restaurant must have supplied and supported over 10,000 generations of termites and their offspring. They were so fat that they didn?t even bother running away when Jesus peeled back the wood from the bar. They just turned their heads and then slowly turned over and laid back down. Never seen anything like it. To say that they were fat would be an understatement. They were obese, and clearly related to their North American cousins.

Everything has been pulled out of kitchen?the refrigerators, Bay Breeze, stoves, deep fryers, cockroaches?and their extended families. The cockroaches were so fat from bacon grease that they simply turned their heads and laid back down and went back to sleep. They didn?t even bother getting out of the way of the workers. Instead they worked on their suntans.

One of the Motoconcho guys has gotten whiff of money and jumped into the cleaning rolls. He has rolled up his sleeves and started cleaning refrigerators and anything shiny. Every 10-minutes or so, he runs up to me and asks if he can take this or that home. He tells me things like, ?No es bueno. Es muy malo!? and then he pushes his lips out in a sign of disapproval and shoves aside a $5,000 stove or a bottle of Kettle One.

A lot of things have started to walk out of the restaurant whenever I go into the toilet to urinate. By evening, the restaurant starts to look less cluttered. It won?t be long before the restaurant is cleared out of anything too heavy to carry away.

We cut down the steel design that adorned the restaurant entrance. It had nice designs on it and resembled something you would might find on an Irish porn set or in art deco garden from the 1960?s. We cut the metal free from the concrete and carried it out to the front to get it out of the way. Before I made it back into the kitchen people were already picking it up and carrying it down the street. Did it matter that it weighs more than 200lbs and had no less than 40 coats of green paint on it from being painted dozens of times? No, they simply walked off with it and headed to the nearest scrap yard where it will be melted down and made into cheap costume jewelry that will be sold up and down the beaches of Dominican Republic from an army of beach sellers yelling out, ?Happy Hour!?

Nearly all of the refrigerators had to be thrown out. They all had holes in the bottoms of them from having a combination of salt air, beer, heavy cream, and fruit sitting in them for years. When we lifted them up and out of the bar, they looked like swiss cheese. When the sunlight hit the bottom of the refrigerators, it shined completely through...they had dozens and dozens of small rusted holes that ate clear through the bottom of them. They were unusable...or so we thought...some Dominicans came by and piled them into a back of a small 100-year old Datsun truck and drove off with them even as the lights shined clear through them like magnifying glass.

to be continued...
 

frank12

Gold
Sep 6, 2011
11,847
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I thought i would try and write a little bit everyday about what its like to restore a restaurant & bar in the DR. I especially want to convey what its like to deal with day laborers and workers--many of which are my good friends who i have worked with for nearly a decade--while others i do not know at all.

This will be totally unedited and full of mistakes and blemishes. I simply do not have the time to go back and re-write everything. I'll do that later.

Each day's diary is accompanied with daily photos i take at work; i post them with the stories on my FB page (its too time-consuming to do it here).

The restoration is already starting out with some fascinating and intriguing twists and turns...many of which i'll go into detail as the story progresses each day.

Each day is full of surprises, and each day brings lots of hurdles to overcome.

Frank
 

AZB

Platinum
Jan 2, 2002
12,290
519
113
dairies? anyone actually read all this BS dairy that he writes? frank you must do nothing in life useful so you have all this time to write dairies and blogs?
Hint: find a real hobby or a real job.
AZB
 

Meemselle

Just A Few Words
Oct 27, 2014
2,842
386
83
dairies? anyone actually read all this BS dairy that he writes? frank you must do nothing in life useful so you have all this time to write dairies and blogs?
Hint: find a real hobby or a real job.
AZB

I didn't know Frank had a dairy, and I myself would read anything Frank wrote, even if it were about cows.

The diaries are pure brilliance and I will be checking this page every day for the newest update.
 

markryan

New member
Jul 16, 2014
374
0
0
dairies? anyone actually read all this BS dairy that he writes? frank you must do nothing in life useful so you have all this time to write dairies and blogs?
Hint: find a real hobby or a real job.
AZB

I read it AND enjoy reading it.
 

AZB

Platinum
Jan 2, 2002
12,290
519
113
I would rather read dairy labels on milk bottles than real his diaries. Any person who writes daily blogs on useless topics has no purpose in life.
Maybe he should join the red cross and spend his life standing in front of walmart ringing a bell.
AZB
 

lifeisgreat

Enjoying Life
May 7, 2016
3,271
1,162
113
I would rather read dairy labels on milk bottles than real his diaries. Any person who writes daily blogs on useless topics has no purpose in life.
Maybe he should join the red cross and spend his life standing in front of walmart ringing a bell.
AZB
*

I guess same could be said for person who reads and flames a poster AZB... So remember always smile when you great people and let us know when there was s decent sale walmart...
 

RV429

Bronze
Apr 3, 2011
1,574
1
36
Did someone force you to read Frankie's literature?

I would rather read dairy labels on milk bottles than real his diaries. Any person who writes daily blogs on useless topics has no purpose in life.
Maybe he should join the red cross and spend his life standing in front of walmart ringing a bell.
AZB
 

markryan

New member
Jul 16, 2014
374
0
0
I would rather read dairy labels on milk bottles than real his diaries. Any person who writes daily blogs on useless topics has no purpose in life.
Maybe he should join the red cross and spend his life standing in front of walmart ringing a bell.
AZB

Seeking attention much?
 

spanky27312

Member
Dec 7, 2008
208
8
18
dairies? anyone actually read all this BS dairy that he writes? frank you must do nothing in life useful so you have all this time to write dairies and blogs?
Hint: find a real hobby or a real job.
AZB

Maybe AZB's accomplishments are wrangling Dominican hookers down to 500 pesos...I'am also a fan of frank.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

the gorgon

Platinum
Sep 16, 2010
33,997
83
0
Maybe AZB's accomplishments are wrangling Dominican hookers down to 500 pesos...I'am also a fan of frank.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

getting Dominican hookers down to 500 pesos is not an accomplishment. it?s the right price.
 

GringoRubio

Bronze
Oct 15, 2015
1,162
116
63
Love it. Keep them coming.

You need to hire a security guy that takes his job seriously. Night and day, you can share a goon with a neighbor, but somebody needs to just say that's not theirs.

I was at a discotheque last week when a guy stumbled through the door only to be pinned by a security guy. It turned out to be a friend of the owner's, but the owner gave him a 500 peso note as a reward. He didn't want his pit bull going soft.
 

dv8

Gold
Sep 27, 2006
31,266
363
0
i don't want to see any more attacks on AZB. he has the right to his opinion and he can freely express it.
 

dv8

Gold
Sep 27, 2006
31,266
363
0
he expressed his opinion. it's nice to see someone who's not a part of an echo chamber.