ABSOLUTES

Alcohol fills the streets and stores and restaurants of Beijing. Street drinking appears to be a favorite hobby in my neighborhood. Walking home in the middle of the morning or the thick of night or the slip of dawn, you can spot clusters of shirtless faces sucking on rice wine grinning from ear to nose. Every thirty steps, promising liquids promise all too familiar promises from behind distorting glass.

Chopsticks, chopsticks, chopsticks. Bent, contorted fingers. I needed to know if I could still use a fork. You never seem to appreciate the abundant. Over the weekend, this funny talking European recommended a place devoted to steak in my brother‘s area. He sketched a map in my notepad and wrote a name: Café le Post.

I needed to taste a bloody slab of medium rare steak. Maybe I was craving a familiar taste to counter the ongoing blast of unfamiliar to my palette.

I needed to build a small army of fellow degenerates. The brother was working late on some design work, so it was up to me to organize a team to tackle Café le Post. I pulled Aileen into the fold as well as two new characters to this blog, SOITH and GUS, two architects crashing fresh into Beijing from New York. Soith was an undergrad with my brother. Gus is allergic to alcohol.

The steak was not amazing, but the restaurant owner was eager to win my heart. As we were paying for our check, the awkward moving fellow hops over to our table with a translucent bottle glowing at the core. He cheerfully slams the bottle in front of our collective gazes. Some fruit swelling and sliding inside the bottle winks at my soul. The owner tells us: ‘drink up’. The owner tells us: ‘not to worry“. The owner tells us: ‘open late‘.


There was no discernible label on this ominous bottle, but Gus began to pour. The owner looked like someone I could trust. He had a sexy cover of “The Killing Moon” playing in his bar mix. The gesture felt like a challenge, the owner bounced with expectations, we had to empty the fire from this bottle.

After three of us cruised through half the bottle, we noticed a notable performance across the restaurant. One of the waiters was playing with an all too similar looking liquid to summon fireballs. I smiled and poured another three servings.