Anthony Bourdain

I've lost tract of which town I'm in, what country I'm in or what planet I'm on. I travel a lot and sometimes when I'm in a beige hotelroom it all kind of blur together. I work for the Food Network, I go to restaurants all over the Solar system and eat food and talk to the chefs. I've written best selling novels, kicked several drug addictions and am the current bad boy celebrity of the food world. Which is actually pretty fucking difficult, I have some stiff competition.

I peered around the room and looked at the markings. Hmmm gravity was off so that meant either Mars or Venus, I got up, and went to the window, easiest way to tell the difference between the two? The smell, I opened up the window and looked outside.

"Venus... fucking hell."

That meant I probably had a handler walking me around, people say non-muslims can't come to Venus, and truthfully that's bullshit. You can come, you just can't stay, well unless you're willing to convert. If your not a muslim and want to visit you just contact the League and they work with you. You pay for your Visa, pay for your allotted time, pay upfront for your hotel, which is booked in advance and then you go. A handler makes sure you don't try to stay illegally.

Officially Venus is a democracy, Unofficially it's ruled by a collection of Thinkers from the old countries who make damned sure that Venus doesn't become the fuck up that home was. The streets are all up to snuff, the buidlings are up to code and If I had to compare Venus to any place, well I guess closest thing you can get is Islamic Singapore, the planet.

I heard a knock on the door, and a man in a suit stared at me.

"You clean?"

"Yes."

"I pat you down again, no drugs."

I lifted my arms and let him pat me down, another rule no drugs, they take this rule really seriously, as in they have killed people seriously. Though they only do that if you have really fucked up. Mostly they just take the drugs, and beat the shit out of you. If your not a muslim they kick you out and you have a lifetime ban. If you are one, you now have to go into forced rehab, you know after the beating.

So yeah considering my reputation I'm not surprised that I was searched so many times.

"You're good, you go to Jinns now, do your show."

"Yeah and then I'm out of your hair."

He shrugged.

"Is not personal, things back home are unstable, we don't want that here."

I walked with him as my crew was assembled, I worked for Food Network, we were one of the most popular networks on television back home, why? Well I could say everyone needs to eat, or that bored housewives make for good customers. Truthfully though I think it's the war, before the war being a chef wasn't a glamorous job, now though. Now you're skirting the edge of the law there's an element of danger, of glamor.

As for the industry its been both a blessing and a curse, if your restaurant existed prewar, you got grandfathered in and you were now immune to ration laws, because of the loophole, but if you wanted to break in? Well then you had to prove that you were adding some thing unique to the city you're in. Take let's say japanese restaurants. If there's another japanese resturant in town? Well tough luck kid you can't open up a restaurant, unless you can prove that your take on japanese food is sufficiently different from the guys who already exist.

The Chain's got hit the hardest, Fast food especially, if you had a restaurant in town? Well that was it no more for you, Mcdonalds, Burgerking, a bunch of other places tried to fight the new laws but sorry there's a war going on so tough shit. Some chains just couldn't survive, Applebee's for example ended up going bankrupt and doesn't exist anymore, but the war wasn't all bad.

I smiled as my crew looked at me with tired eyes.

"Come on people."

Like I said you had to be unique, that was the rule so the war years became the era of family owned restaurants, of small business, of the creative, of the terrible, and the weird. If you wanted to make it in the new world you had to be bold, you had to experiment, it was the era of the chef as an artist instead of a programed assembly man. I loved the change, the big companies hated it but you know fuck 'em.

I walked with my crew to the small restaurant where a smiling man waved at me.

"Welcome to Jinns."

I got ready to do another show, after this I would go to another restaurant and once my tour of Venus was over I would travel the stars again. People ask me sometimes why I took this kind of job, and the adventure is part of it, the money is part of it, and the fame has its' perks, but honestly I'm just running. Running away from myself, trying to escape my own issues, but fuck, if you have to do that might as well do it in style.

"Let's have a great show people!"