The great Gold Coast restaurant saga

  Wait!! 

Before you read this, pour yourself a drink or make a cup of coffee, prepare some snacks and take a toilet break. This tale is kind of long! That's probably why I called it a saga.

HOW IT ALL STARTED

As I've mentioned in previous posts, my mate and I had a habit of having boozy Friday lunches that stretched into the early hours of Saturday mornings. At this time, in the mid 1990s, we were both living on the Gold Coast. He, in his penthouse in Labrador and me in my modest canal front home in Broadbeach Waters. Why do you need this information? I have no idea.

As a hobby business, we had formed a partnership, buying failed restaurants, turning them into Mon. to Fri. business luncheon restaurants employing a chef/manager and selling the business to the chef/manager after 12 months. This was a great win/win deal for us and the chef. We received the profits for a year and then picked up a standard sale price of $60k. We also arranged finance for the chef to buy it, which meant he could own the business that he had built up over the past year with no upfront personal cash outlay. We did this 22 times, over the years. Eighteen times it was very successful and 4 times we crashed and burned.

Back to the saga.

Our pig farmer Prime Minister, Paul Keating, had just given us "The recession we had to have", part of this meant that people could no longer claim a tax deduction for their "business lunches", This unsurprisingly killed off the business luncheon trade and our hobby business.

The fateful day that created this saga happened at our Friday lunch, during the recession  There were three factors that caused this. My mate having a whinge about the demise of our restaurant business, three or four bottles of Wolff Blass Grey Label shiraz and my fat mouth.

During this discussion, my ego and fat mouth conspired against me to the point I where I told him that I bet I could still do it and, what's more, I could do it for under $1000. My mate saw an opportunity for quick dollar and bet me $1000 that I couldn't do it. I took the bet, but he gave a 3 month time lime limit to do it. I agreed. The next morning, I woke up feeling like death and then remembered the bet. Since then, I have never ever drank Wolff Blass Grey Label shiraz.

GETTING THE RESTAURANT

Finding a vacant restaurant on the Gold Coast was seriously difficult in the 90s, due to the influx of "wanna be entrepreneurs" trying to join "The White Shoe Brigade" (Google it) who infamously inhabited the area. Those wannabes, with pockets full of borrowed or misappropriated cash snapped up every business premises lease as soon as it hit the market. Most of them went broke almost as quickly, ensuring that the feeding frenzy continued.

Meanwhile, I had to find a restaurant quickly, if I was to have any chance of winning the bet. Having been a resident of the Gold Coast and an existing business owner (Marketing Consultant), I had the very real advantage of local knowledge. It came to my attention that a small, 48 seat restaurant was available fronting the Gold Coast Highway and had been empty for more than a year. There were no "For Lease" signs in front of it, nor was it listed with any agents.

It was located on the ground floor of a large residential high rise complex and screened from the road by tropical plants. Ideal for my purpose.

I located the owner, who owned the entire building and lived in the penthouse He was a very nice, elderly man who had deliberately left the restaurant empty to make sure the noise wouldn't disturb his tenants. When I explained to him that the restaurant that I planned would be a business luncheon  business, only operating mon. to Fri., 12pm to 5pm he was quite happy. When I further explained that it would have topless waitresses he actually roared with laughter and promised to be regular customer A promise he kept.

I signed a 3x3year lease and didn't have to pay any goodwill, as it wasn't a going concern. This was important, as the bet that I made with my mate  limited my start up cost to $1000. At this point, I had spent less than $200.

What I haven't mentioned was that the restaurant was completely set up. The kitchen was totally fitted out. The only things a chef had to bring were his pots and knives. So were the bar and dining room, right down to the crockery, cutlery and bar glassware.

STARTING THE RESTAURANT

I kept the restaurant's original name. Why? Simple. The name was already assigned to the premises along with the required licences, so it saved money.

Now, ten days had passed since the bet, so I had to get a move on. I advertised for topless waitresses and a chef in The Gold Coast Bulletin which cost about $50. The response was amazing! I only needed 6 waitresses and received 100+ applications. More than 20 chefs applied for the one vacancy, so I called on my mate to interview the waitresses and choose 6. I had absolute faith in him, as he a lot of experience in other restaurants we had owned in the past and he didn't let me down.

I deliberately decided to interview the chefs myself, because I was looking for a specific kind of person, plus a spare. All will be explained in good time.

The starting chef had to be a home owner/buyer, a family man and an excellent chef who had no experience in working with young, bare breasted waiting staff. As I said. All will be explained in good time.

I explained to all the chef applicants that they would not be paid a wage, but would get all the profit from the kitchen, while I would get the bar profits and the entry fee ($10/head). Running costs would be shared. 

Most of the chefs were OK with that, because they would make more than a normal salary. It was good for me, as I would not have to bother with stock control or wastage in the kitchen. I also explained that I would require a $1500 bond because they were an unknown quantity to me and were responsible for running half the business and they would have to sign a contract as a sub contractor, not an employee. The bond stocked my bar, keeping that cost to zero.

The other firm rule was they were only there as a chef and NO harassment of the staff would be tolerated.

So, there I was. Three weeks in and about to open the restaurant and still only spent less than $400.

THE OPENING AND THE DEMISE OF CHEF #1

The week prior to opening, each day I placed a small "Bookings Essential" ad ($70) in The gold Coast Bulletin. By Wednesday we were booked out. Two weeks later, we were booked out two months ahead on Wed, Thurs. and Fri. Before long 75% of our bookings were permanent. The problem was that I wasn't getting the income from the kitchen. I found this annoying because it was totally my idea and hard work that started the whole thing.

Fortunately, fate stepped in, which made my problems go away. It came to my notice that the chef was starting to act inappropriately towards some of the waitresses and they felt uncomfortable collecting meals from the kitchen. When I confronted him about it, he became defensive and abusive. There was absolutely no way that I was going to accept that so, in collabaration with my mate' s partner, the chef's wife got an anonymous phone call, asking if she knew the kind of restaurant that her husband worked in. She didn't believe the caller, who then suggested that she go through the restaurant's kitchen door around 3pm on Friday and check for herself. The caller then hung up.

Why 3pm?  Food service had ended then and a couple of waitresses were in the kitchen, helping to clean up.

I was busy in the bar when the chef's wife arrived around 3.15, so I'm relying on the report from the waitresses working in the kitchen at the time. Apparently, she literally stormed in, took one look at the waitresses and grabbed the chef by the shirt and dragged him out the back door while screaming abuse at him.

There are two things to learn from that. Be honest with your wife and treat employees with respect.

To continue, a locksmith arrived at 5.30 to change the locks and my "stand by" chef, who only wanted to work for a salary, was told to report foe work the next Monday.

SAYING GOODBYE TO THE RESTAURANT

As I mentioned earlier, many of my customers had permanent bookings. Two of my regulars were a lawyer and his accountant mate. They were great customers but, after a few too many drinks, would call me over and tell me that I had the best job in the world. Little did they know how full on it was. So much so, that it was affecting my main business, the Marketing Consultancy, and I had already decided to sell the restaurant.

After about 6 months, on a Friday, the lawyer and his mate called me over, as usual, and started on their "best job in the world" routine, so I asked them why didn't they buy it. Of course they asked how much and I told them $60k, walk in walk out. I went home and never thought any more about it. On the following Monday, the lawyer walked into my Marketing Consultancy with a bank cheque for $60,000 and a contract of sale. We did the deal in record time and we both parted, very happy. I never set foot in the restaurant again.

A  PARTY AND THE POLICE

Shortly after the restaurant opened, my mate, who lost the bet and graciously handed my $1000 winnings, decided to have a party on board his 12m game fishing boat, to celebrate the restaurant's success. His parties were legendary, so I readily agreed and having just pocketed $1000, I offered to pay for the booze. He "forgot" to tell me that he had invited about 15 other people. No wonder the booze bill was closer to $2000 than $1000. He hates to lose as much as I do....bastard!! Great party, though.

Now for the police bit.

A few months after I sold the restaurant to the lawyer, I had knock on my front door from the police. They wanted to know if I had sold the restaurant to that particular lawyer for $60k. When I said that I had they told me that the lawyer had used his clients trust account funds to buy it as well as to cover his gambling debts and they required me to refund the money.

I explained to the police that I was not involved in any of his illegal activities and was paid with a perfectly legal bank cheque and had a legal bill of sale for a legitimate business and would not be returning any of it. I then gave them my lawyer's business card and told them to take it up with him. I never heard from them again,

I later heard that the lawyer who bought the restaurant had been charged, found guilty, disbarred and jailed for six months.

Here endeth the saga.

A retrospection: Sasha and "Darkie"

  I met Sasha (Alex) in primary school. His parents had emigrated to Australia, from Russia, shortly after WW2. We became best mates until his untimely death in his mid 20s. This is a true story that happened in the mid 1950s.

Our homes were divided by the River Torrens which kind of flows (very sluggish and often green) through Adelaide and its northern suburbs. Its banks were overgrown with trees, reeds and weeds and it was inhabited by snakes, water rats, ducks, swans, yabbies and fish. Obviously, the perfect playground for Sasha and me.

My father has deserted my family and Sasha's was never home, either working or out whoring and drinking, so we were both raised in households of women (mothers and younger sisters). Not ideal for a pair of fearless ratbage, totally devoid of fatherly guidance. Needless to say, we spent every waking moment before and after school, as well as all weekend, at the river. Fishing, hunting water rats and ducks and swimming.

We were always well armed with quite lethal, home made bows and arrows, spears and knives that had mysteriously "disappeared" from our mothers' kitchens. We used to bring home the ducks that we had killed to our mums, who appreciated the fresh meat for our families The yabbies that we caught were sold to the local butcher for a few pennies a pound, which also were given to our mums. As for the fish...nada. Try as we might, we couldn't catch a fish. 

Until we met "Darkie".

No-one knew his real name and he never told us. Darkie was a man who the locals named, due to to his unkempt black hair and beard and his dark sun tan. He never spoke to anybody and everyone was frightened of him. All the  kids were told that he was dangerous and to stay away from him.

I think Darkie was suffering from PTSD as a result of his WW2 experiences but, in those days PTSD was pretty much unheard of, let alone understood.

Sasha and I often saw Darkie fishing in the river and we always kept a respectful distance from him although he always nodded "hello" to us, as we did to him. As I said before, Sasha and I could never catch any fish, despite many hours trying. Darkie, on the other hand, ALWAYS walked away with a bagful of fish in less than an hour. You can't believe how frustrating this was for a pair of intrepid hunters, such as Sasha and me.

One day, after a very long, fearful discussion, Sasha and I decided to put our fear aside and ask Darkie how to fish. I clearly remember that day, when 2 eight year old boys, almost crapping their pants in fear, quietly approached Darkie and, very politely, asked him to teach us how to catch fish.

I think we were the fist people to actually speak to him in a very long time. He just stared at us for a terrifyingly long time, then smiled and said "OK". Over the next few months, he not only taught us how to fish but also how to make very effective water rat and yabby traps. He also showed us how to cure water rat skins so that we could sell them as wall as lots of other useful hunting skills.

He was a wonderful, gentle person and never posed a threat to either Sasha or myself. One day, he just disappeared and we never saw him again. My mother said the police had taken him away, because he was a danger to people and he was either in jail or a mental asylum.  Sasha and I were devastated.

In later years, I think that our experience with Darkie made both of us aware of peoples' ignorance and intolerance and, I hope it was responsible for our passion for social justice that we we both shared, despite our political differences as adults,.

Surviving a Yakuza's wife.

 I bet the title has you intrigued. Be patient, all will be revealed, in due course.

I was married to a lovely Japanese woman for 20 years, before she had enough. Strangely, she is still great friends with my current wife and me. I'm very happy about that. Having said all that, I moved to Japan in  1996 for a year, supposedly to learn more about the culture and the language.

I absolutely loved the country and the people. So much so, i took a job as an English teacher with the largest language school in Japan and spent 7 years there, until home sickness got the better of me. I remember getting off the plane in Cairns and immediately wanted to reboard it back to Japan. All this, while having a heart attack. A bit weird, huh?

OK, now to the Yakuza thing.

At the school where I was teaching, apart from classroom lessons, there was a conversation lounge, where students could practice their English, with a teacher moderating. The lounge was a large room, seating about 20 students on casual sofas and the moderating teacher changed every 40 minutes. It was very popular with the students.

One day, a new student was in the room. She was in her early 50s, spoke good English and was wearing that much gold and diamond bling, her knuckles almost dragged on the ground. She was a very pleasant person and introduced herself as Meko, or that's what I heard. I was quite new to Japan then, so I wasn't very familiar with Japanese names. You can see what's coming, can't you?

As with all new students, I tried to encourage her to speak, frequently referring to her by name. During this time, her face became darker and darker and it wasn't difficult to see her anger. Fortunately the bell rang to signal it was time to change teacher, so I fled the room.

I was followed out by one of my regular students who pulled me aside and asked if I knew why the new student was angry. I told her I had no idea and asked her why, She asked me what the student's name was.

 I replied, "Meko". She said the student's name was Mieko, not Meko. She then asked if I knew the meaning of meko. I shook my head. she then told me it was one of several rude slang words for vagina. I had just spent 40 minutes calling the new student the "c" word. Then she told me the zinger. Mieko was the wife of one of the biggest Yakuza bosses in Nara Prefecture. The term, "I crapped my pants", almost took on the literal meaning.

Self preservation reared its ugly head, so I waited for Mieko to leave the conversation room and approached her and immediately apologised. I explained how I was new to Japan and was unaware of my mistake, until after I had left the room. She was a very gracious woman and told me that she had guessed as much and, to my embarrassment, she told me how her and the other students had laughed about it

She often came back to the conversation lounge, after that incident and, I'm happy to say, we became great friends,

The downside was that, after that day, whenever a new student came into the conversation lounge, while I was there, they always wrote that student's name on the whiteboard. They obviously shared the story for years.

The Ayers House Incident

 There is a famous restaurant in Adelaide called Ayers House. Today, it's very different than it was in the '70's. In those days it was OK to smoke in a restaurant, but Ayres House was much more than that. You had to book several days in advance. 

Upon arrival, you were greeted with a glass of real champagne and a woman was also presented with a perfect single rose. When you were seated, there was a glossy, black book of matches, with you name printed in silver, sitting in the middle of your table. There was a separate waiter for every course and another with a choice of the finest quality cigars after the dessert..

Are you getting the picture? Was it expensive? Bet your booty, it was. Was it worth it? Yep, every cent.

I'll get back to Ayers House later. Let's rewind a few months.

As I have mentioned earlier, my mate and I thrived in playing practical jokes on each other. One particular Wednesday, we were having a quick business meeting in a small seafood restaurant. Yep, we had few small partnership ventures, too.

We were the only customers in the restaurant, at the time. The very gay waiter took an immediate shine to my mate, touching him on the shoulder and asking if he needed anything else on repeated occasions, while totally ignoring me. And, no I wasn't remotely jealous. Trust me on that. However, I did see the opportunity for a great practical joke.

During lunch, I got up to go to the toilet. On my way back to the table, I handed the waiter one of my mate's business cards, quietly telling him that my mate really fancied him and to phone him at home. I also told him that my mate was very shy and that he should be persistent with his calls, Later, I called his wife and told her what I'd done. She thought it was hilarious and promised to go along with the prank.

The poor, lovestruck waiter drove my mate crazy for a couple of months before he gave up, phoning him several times a day. My mate's wife finally gave me up and, once again, I was threatened with revenge. Yeah, yeah, what's new?

A short time later, I had been introduced to a very beautiful lady at a party. This person was a professional singer who I had admired for years. I finally got up the nerve to ask her out for dinner at Ayers House and she accepted. Yep, I was out to impress.

I was over the moon about my upcoming date and couldn't help bragging about it to my mate at our regular Friday lunch, not realising what a stupid thing that was to do, particularly so soon after the gay waiter thing.

The eventful day arrived and my date was suitably impressed with the Ayers House venue and, better still, we were getting on really well. I couldn't have been happier.

About halfway through the main course there was a commotion in the restaurant's foyer. A very large, loud, indigenous Australian woman, dressed in grubby clothes was demanding to come in. My date and I tried to ignore the scene and continued with our dinner.

The woman at the door finally burst into the room, ran straight over to me, grabbed me by the shirt and screamed, "Come home, you bastard. Your dinner's on the table and the kids are waiting for you!". With that, she stormed out of the restaurant.

I was absolutely stunned. The restaurant was deathly silent. My date ran outside in tears and the management asked me to leave. All the way home, I was literally in shock, not to mention totally embarrassed. Nothing like that had ever happened to me before.

By the time I goy home, I had calmed down a little and I suddenly realised that I had been revenge pranked. I was furious! I grabbed the phone, ready to hurl foul abuse at my, so called, mate. Obviously, he was expecting my call and all I could hear from his end was roaring laughter. Game, set, match.

I turned out that the woman who burst into the restaurant was an actress that he had hired and, what's worse, the Ayres House management were in on it. Needless to say, I never saw my date again.

The Yacht

 Just a couple of things before I start. I will never reveal my mate's name, out of respect for his family and any potential embarrassment it could/would cause them. Our friendship covered  40+ years, until his passing. He was able to relax and let the "ratbag" in him surface when we got together, unlike the serious businessman he usually had to be. Generally, we spent most of our time creating practical jokes towards each other, no holds barred. The only rule was "no-one got hurt". However, the better the joke, the wilder the retribution....and there was ALWAYS retribution. You have no idea how much I miss him.

Now, to the yacht.

In my mid twenties (circa 1970) I bought a little 7 metre, plywood sloop, which I kept moored at a marina near Glenelg, in Adelaide. Over time, I became bored with it and it spent most of its time at its mooring. 

My mate used to borrow it quite often and wanted to buy it. I always said no, just to see the disappointment on his face. He responded by ordering an expensive bottle of wine, when it was my turn to buy, during one of our Friday lunches. We both knew what was happening but chose to pretend that we didn't. It was just part of the game.

One day, after a particularly heavy storm, the yacht filled with water and sank at its mooring. The marina manager broke the news to me and asked if I wanted raised. When I found that only a metre of its mast was above the waterline, I had a great idea for a prank, as I was behind on the practical joke scorecard, at the time.

Yep! You know what's coming.

I phoned my mate and casually asked him if he still wanted to buy the yacht. We agreed on $1500 and arranged to exchange the documents and mooring lease for the cash at Friday's lunch. On his way home, he called into the marina to let the manager know the boat was his and to lodge the transfer of the mooring lease. It was only when the manager asked if wanted the yacht raised that he realised the problem.

The phone call I received that night was decidedly frosty, not helped by my cackling laughter. Strangely, and quite unexpectedly, he swore revenge. That only made absolutely roar with laughter.

After about a month of no Friday lunches, things seemed to have calmed down. The lunches resumed and he seemed to have forgotten or forgiven. I should have known that he was only biding his time. Stupid me!

At this time, it was my standard practice to close my office at lunch time, every Friday. My office girl had a final job for the weekend, which was to get a taxi and collect all our outstanding accounts for the week and take them home. prior to banking on Monday. One Monday, she came into my office to tell me she didn't feel safe using taxis for the Friday collections. I understood and agreed to buy a car for her to use to and from work and the Friday task. It was a great idea and she was really happy.

One of my mate's many business was a new car dealership, so I called him to see if he had a reasonably cheap car for my office girl to use. Of course he obliged. He told me that one of his employees would deliver a blue Holden for $900, the next day. It was "off the books" so he wanted cash. I agreed. That should have sounded alarm bells. My bad!

As promised, the next day a young guy came to my office, handed me the car keys and left with the cash. I gave the keys to my office girl and told her it was the blue Holden in the car park. She was overjoyed. She ran downstairs and jumped into the car to see how it drove.

Several minutes later, she came upstairs, quite upset that the car wouldn't start. It was then i guessed this was a bit of revenge for the yacht and he had sold me a car with a flat battery. I went down to see if I could start it. Nothing! When I lifted the bonnet, there was nothing there. No engine! Bastard! He had had the car towed there and pushed into the drive!

Naturally, having totally lost my cool, my phone call was a tad abusive. In between fits of laughter, he told me I had just bought the car and the engine was available for another $600. Do the sums. It took me a few weeks to stop spitting the dummy and restart Friday lunches. Well played! A great revenge. Ten points to him.

The rub was that my office girl had a huge crush on him (not a problem) and when she found out what had really happened, she fell about in fits of laughter, every time she looked at me. That was a problem for my fragile ego.

I can feel your sympathy for me.....not.

Our "Tame" Magistrate.

 Way back, in my mid twenties, I was the MD of a legal (not criminal) retail business. I had to clarify that, so you wouldn't get it confused with anything to do with lawyers etc. In fact, all the previous information is totally irrelevant to this story.

My best mate was also a very successful businessman. Who cares, you ask? It's relevant because, every Friday, we had a boozy lunch together in a very popular and somewhat expensive business luncheon restaurant. The food and wine were excellent as were the strippers and topless waitresses. It was also a place where, after several bottles of wine, we solved the problems of the world and our businesses.

One particular afternoon, while on bottle three or four, or something like that. we were both bitching about having recently been sued, albeit unfairly, as is always the case. One of us brilliantly came up with the idea of having a new best friend who could help us in such situations...a Magistrate!

At that time, we were aware of a single Magistrate who was still living at home with his mum. What could possibly go wrong? Over a period of a few months, we managed to "run into him" at a number social functions and, to our surprise, formed a friendship with him and invited him to join us for one of our Friday lunches.

Now to digress for a moment. As I previously mentioned, the restaurant had strippers as entertainment. One in particular was a tall, beautiful, Cook Island girl with a great body and very funny. Obviously, she was immensely popular. Except she wasn't born a girl. The only thing that gave her away was her 5 o'clock shadow. She never removed her bikini bottoms, so that was never an issue. One day, she just vanished. We later found out that she had gone to Thailand to complete the transition.

Meanwhile, our friendship with our new friend was going well and he became a semi-regular at our lunches. We also found out that he was a virgin, which is why he probably enjoyed the lunches so much. I daresay that they were stimulating for him. What could possibly go wrong?

I forgot to mention that we had a permanent Friday booking at a raised semi circular booth towards the back of the restaurant.

On this particular Friday, about 3 bottle o'clock, our missing stripper was back. It was the first time our Magistrate friend had seen her. I swear his glasses fogged up, he broke out into a sweat and , I swear, he started drooling. Bloody disgusting!

He was sitting between my mate and me and we both awkwardly shifted as far away from him as possible. After Jazzie (not her name) finished her show, she walked up to our table to have a drink, as usual. What could possibly go wrong?

The first thing she did was lift up her skirt, sans panties, and proudly said, "Look what I've got!". What could possibly go wrong! My mate told her it was lovely and asked her to kindly put it away.

That's when she noticed our new friend. Now Jazzie was never shy (strange, that). She promptly climbed across me and plonked herself down next to the virgin Magistrate After a few minutes of chatter, all from Jazzie, Our new mate was bright red and panting. Jazzie noticed his discomfort and provided her idea of calming the situation. She promptly grabbed his hand and jammed it between her legs, saying something like<"How good does this feel?". What could possibly go wrong?

When she found out that our Magistrate was a virgin, she took him home with her. Since she was technically a virgin too, it probably seemed appropriate to her. 

That's what could possibly go wrong!

My mate and I never saw him again. we later heard from the restaurant manager that they had moved in together. God bless them.