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The trip so far
Not everyone liked it when I suggested that vouchers have the potential to be "TARP for the elementary schools." With New York and Los Angeles in some disarray, Chicago is arguably North America's "coolest" city right now; the new contemporary wing of the Art Institute is the best "new U.S. museum" in many years. The Austrian-language dialogue in Brüno is the funniest part of the movie and enough to make it, despite its flaws, a comedy classic. I should not have told my Las Vegas cabbie (while he was driving) that the real estate market there will not recover for another twenty years. Lotus of Siam, in Las Vegas, is one of the best Thai restaurants in the United States. In case you had forgotten, here is how to order in a good ethnic restaurant. I haven't arrived in Mobile yet.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on July 12, 2009 at 05:10 PM in Travels | Permalink
Comments
Re: Lotus of Siam: their Tom Yum Soup is mind-bendingly good.
Posted by: Gil Roth at Jul 12, 2009 5:31:42 PM
Please clarify: do you need to understand German to enjoy Brüno?
Posted by: Tom Davies at Jul 12, 2009 5:50:24 PM
What suggests to you that Vegas real estate will take 20 years to recover?
Posted by: David Rotor at Jul 12, 2009 6:21:22 PM
According to all the mediaz, DC is officially the coolest city in America. chicago's got its museum, but DC has a functioning bike-share program. so there.
Posted by: hey! at Jul 12, 2009 6:32:33 PM
I doubt that would work in a Japanese restaurant...
Posted by: Ham at Jul 12, 2009 6:32:40 PM
I'd have guessed that something in North Dakota or Alaska was the "coolest" city in the US. Arf arf!!!
Posted by: happyjuggler0 at Jul 12, 2009 6:49:22 PM
Why would it make a difference whether you tell your cabbie when he's driving, as opposed to when the trip is done or when he's stopped at a light?
Posted by: Phil at Jul 12, 2009 7:25:54 PM
Tom: "understand German" != "understand Austrian". I've seen several Austrian movies in Germany that showed German subtitles. And they were useful -- I speak German fluently and would have missed several key lines without the subtitles.
Posted by: David Wright at Jul 12, 2009 7:42:36 PM
Interesting you said elementary schools could be like TARP. I thought the better analogy was like Medicare. Costs in public ed are rising faster than any sector, even healthcare, iirc, and its' going to get worse. Cost containment in regular public education is beyond the realm of possibility right now. But vouchers could be like Medicare, where costs are determined by the "fake market"-- by pretending that what the public schools charge is R&C, and then paying vouchers that are only some percentage of that, etc. And then cost containment could have new needs for rationing, in the form of denying AP classes to those with less than a B+ in prior courses, or putting kids on vo-tech tracks rather than liberal arts.
Posted by: allison at Jul 12, 2009 8:31:48 PM
I vastly prefer education tax credits to vouchers but saying that vouchers "have the potential" to be like TARP is a classic example of weasly phrasing.
I understand that reality is complex and the future is contingent, but you're going to have to make a more specific predictive statement if you're going to say something truly interesting.
Posted by: ck at Jul 12, 2009 9:59:48 PM
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Good ethnic restaurants require good ethnics. Our fastest growing group of hyphenates is Incarcerated-Americans. Unfortunately, the food is lousy.
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Posted by: cosanostradamus at Jul 12, 2009 10:00:37 PM
unfortunately, quality of ethnic food tends to vary inversely with the ability of servers to understand complicated requests in english. further, they rarely believe that you -really- want what they're eating in the back of the house. it's the kitfo conundrum - no matter how many times you say 'raw', they just -know- you want it cooked.
someone ought to market a small, wallet-sized notecard with 'omakase' in various useful languages on it.
Posted by: ibaien at Jul 12, 2009 10:43:47 PM
Mobile will be inbelievably hot. Find some place with A/C and stay there - perhaps for fried, stewed, or nude oysters at Wintzell's downtown. Although I've read the best Vietnamese restaurant is on Azalea Road, so you may want to go there.
Posted by: karen at Jul 12, 2009 10:53:39 PM
I had the lunch buffet at Lotus of Siam and it was very average. Thai Square in Tyler's backyard is the best Thai I have had.
Posted by: Paul N at Jul 13, 2009 12:07:41 AM
A friend of mine tried something similar in a Thai restaurant in Chicago once to impress a date. The waiter told me that he isn't really into Thai food...
So think twice before you try this at home.
Posted by: deriuqer at Jul 13, 2009 12:24:52 AM
Does anyone else think the word "ethnic" as applied to food is annoying?
What is ethnic food? Isn't everyone of some ethnicity? There are ethnic Americans, too! And not just native Americans. Unless it takes a certain number of centuries (more than 4) for a cultural/national group to qualify as an ethnicity?
To me ethnic sounds like an inadvertent reverse signaller. "I like ethnic food" means "I am Wes Anderson! People of other backgrounds play a prominent, artfully choreographed role in my tidily compartmentalized life."
How about "international food" instead? Or just, "I like lots of food?" How about that?
Posted by: mk at Jul 13, 2009 1:15:07 AM
mk: See Tyler's ethnic dining guide, which lists "American" with the note that "all food is ethnic food."
Posted by: Tom at Jul 13, 2009 11:00:45 AM
If there is one thing that people value more than their own education, it is that of their children. My grandfather (a farmer) saved up $150 to go to college. He did not qualify for financial aid. A friend saved up $50, and received $100. Vouchers will be _worse_ than the Guaranteed Student Loan program.
Tax credits -- so long as one cannot end up owing "negative taxes". And yes, we home school!
Posted by: Right Wing-nut at Jul 13, 2009 11:06:52 AM
Lotus of Siam IS the best Thai I have ever had, including Thailand. I am Lotus of Siam and had my wedding dinner there after being married by Elvis. Just awesome. They did the ordering for me, Cowen style. Excellent. Spicy mushroom dip is revelatory.
Posted by: Nick at Jul 13, 2009 7:54:56 PM
Two meal recommendations for the Mobile area: for the best pulled pork in the state, go to The Brick Pit on Old Shell Road. Make sure to get Mrs. Waits banana pudding as well. She makes it from scratch every morning. The ribs keep winning awards and praise too, but I just can't seem to get anything other than the pulled pork.
For the best seafood and a nice view, I recommend Felix's Fish Camp on the US-90 causeway across the Bay. Great view of the sunset, the USS Alabama and lots of water fowl. The BBQ shrimp and trout or grouper amandine (aka almondine) are the big winners, but I'm not sure there's a bad thing on the menu. If you're really hungry, start with the one - one and one soup with half-cups of gumbo, turtle soup and crab soup.
There are some surprisingly good Vietnamese places in the area because of the relatively large number of fisherman who escaped from South Vietnam and settled in the closest thing they could find to the Mekong Delta. I couldn't recommend anything specific at this point though.
Posted by: autolycus at Jul 14, 2009 2:42:58 PM
lotus of siam is very very average!! thai titaya in austin texas will cure you.
Posted by: yeltb at Jul 14, 2009 4:39:14 PM
