Ganda Suthivarakom

With fearless chops at writing, performing, living, and complaining, Ganda Suthivarakom could teach us all a lesson.  She is the author of the blog, “Eat Drink One Woman, not to mention that she sings and tours with Miho Hatori.  Okay, maybe we’ll talk about that.

How long have you been singing professionally?

When I was living in San Francisco, I was in a Stevie Wonder cover band.  But it wasn’t very serious.  Then I moved to New York and one of my girlfriends was dating the drummer from Cibo Matto [Timo Ellis], and he needed a singer in his other band.  So I sang with him, and then they needed a singer for Cibo Matto.  So I’ve been singing professionally since 2001, with Cibo Matto, then on Smokey & Miho albums, and Miho’s solo work.  I wasn’t going to be serious about it at all, I was kind of a karaoke singer.  And then this opportunity came up and I actually got to do it for real.
 
Why food writing? 
 
Food was sort of always how my father communicated his love to us—by cooking.  All of my memories seem to be of food, so it seemed natural to write about life through that perspective.  I started the blog as a way to exercise my writing.  After it was gaining popularity, I was able to get a food column in a magazine called Metropop, and then I started doing other freelance writing.  I try to update every day or five times a week.  But it’s hard.  And right now it’s kind of crazy with work, with music, freelance writing and things that are actually an obligation, things that pay.

So your father really was the character from Ang Lee’s “Eat Drink Man Woman”?

He was a great cook, and he put himself through business school as a waiter in a hotel.  And when we were kids, he had a lot of ingenuity.  Like, we would ask for lasagna, and he was this Thai Chinese guy, and he would make it with like, cottage cheese, and pepperoni, and . . .

That's real fusion food.

Yeah (laughs).  Total American in his soul.  And we would want to go to McDonald's for breakfast, and you know, an immigrant parent wasn't going to spend money on McDonald's when there's perfectly good food at home, so he would mold these scrambled egg biscuits so that the eggs came out in this perfect cylindrical shape.  He would always say, Chinese people don't hug, but then he'd do all these sweet things.

Maybe this has changed since your blog started out, but what do you hope to share besides "eating and complaining in NYC"?

I started the blog in 2004, and basically I sent out all these emails about gigs, and so my first post on the blog was like, the gig's here, come to it, and here are places to eat around this gig.  I've got this weird relationship with my blog, sometimes I want people to read it, sometimes I don't.  I went to this dinner the other night with these writers and they were asking what my stats were and how I was going to grow my audience, and I would just hate to become too self-conscious to make fun of myself.

What I really wanted was to start being able to make a living writing about food.  Now I’ve been thinking of travel writing.  And what a dream, who wouldn't want that job, it's like the best job ever.  So that was my goal, and I’m getting a lot closer and that's very encouraging.

Do you make things happen or do you sometimes let them happen to you?

I think that in New York, it's not like any other place.  You can really walk down the street, and opportunity will just fall in your lap.  Which is not to say that I don't work hard, because I work hard—but when the opportunity comes, you have to be ready to jump on the train.  Singing with Cibo Matto totally landed on my lap, my friend was dating the drummer.  Opportunity comes so often, but none with as much frequency as in New York—I mean, I’m from this tiny town in East LA County, and I just didn't get any of the people that I grew up with.  And I went to New York and people were doing amazing things all the time, people that you know, and people that you don't know. 

In February of this year, I did a musical that David Byrne wrote with Fat Boy Slim [Here Lies Love].  And it’s crazy.  That shit doesn't happen in La Puente California.  They were looking for Philipino singers, and couldn’t' find that many, and they asked Miho if she knew anyone that could pass as Philipino, and I got an audition.  So then I go to Australia to do the world premiere of this musical, so random, right?  And it totally landed on my lap.  So I consider myself lucky, I’ve had a lot of cool opportunities fall on my lap.

Who has a more serious case of “food madness,” you or Miho?

We're equally food mad, which is a great thing about being around her.  Especially when we’re on tours.  This next one [The 2006 Hotel Café Tour] is going to be one of those where we're going to sleep on a bus, with probably ten or twelve people, and we're making lists of the things we have to bring, like oatmeal, dried fruit, tea, honey—it’s very important to not be hungry when you're on the road.  It’s especially hard in these places like the Midwest, or in Europe to get vegetables, or fiber.

I think you can get it in powder form now.

Well I think we're going to stick to oatmeal.  It's not a very long tour, and I’ve also been soliciting advice from people on places we should go to eat.

How has writing about food and keeping up the blog helped foster your passions for food?

You have to find something new to write about all the time.  You can write about what you ate for lunch everyday but that gets really boring.  One thing I’ve learned as I meet more of food writers is a lot of food people are also music people.  I think there's something there, like people who love food love life, and love joy, and love experiencing all the things in life—alcohol, food, traveling.  I like that about people too.  It’s so great to hang out with people who love food.

Websites

http://www.eatdrinkonewoman.com
http://www.myspace.com/mihohatori