{"id":1645,"date":"2009-06-01T17:02:26","date_gmt":"2009-06-02T00:02:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/2009\/06\/pass-the-hookah-pon-the-left-hand-side\/"},"modified":"2009-06-01T17:03:32","modified_gmt":"2009-06-02T00:03:32","slug":"pass-the-hookah-pon-the-left-hand-side","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/2009\/06\/01\/pass-the-hookah-pon-the-left-hand-side\/","title":{"rendered":"Pass The Hookah ‘pon The Left-hand Side"},"content":{"rendered":"

from The Los Angeles Times<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Living and breathing the hookah culture<\/h1>\n

\"Hookah<\/p>\n

Jay L. Clendenin \/ Los Angeles Times<\/p>\n

Alfonso \u201cAbou Salim\u201d Ramirez prepares a hookah for customers at Phoenicia restaurant in Glendale. His fiercely loyal clients say he\u2019s \u201cthe best\u201d at preparing the traditional Middle Eastern pipe filled with fruit-flavored tobacco.<\/em><\/p>\n

Alfonso ‘Abou Salim’ Ramirez has mastered the art of preparing Middle Eastern tobacco pipes, even carving trendy bowls out of fruit. The Mexican immigrant dreams of visiting Lebanon someday.<\/p>\n

By Raja Abdulrahim
\nJune 1, 2009<\/p>\n

Standing outside his hookah station at a Middle Eastern restaurant in Glendale, Alfonso “Abou Salim” Ramirez grabbed a red apple and, using a sharp knife, sliced off the top. He flipped the apple over and made four quick incisions, creating a small square.<\/p>\n

“This is my secret,” Ramirez said, jabbing a finger into the square to pop out the core. He then stuffed red, apple-flavored tobacco into the hole and covered it with a piece of tin foil.<\/p>\n

“I love when I’m doing this,” he said as he carefully poked holes in the foil with a toothpick. “I forget my problems. I forget everything.”<\/p>\n

[ click to continue reading at LATimes.com<\/a> ]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

from The Los Angeles Times Living and breathing the hookah culture Jay L. Clendenin \/ Los Angeles Times Alfonso \u201cAbou Salim\u201d Ramirez prepares a hookah for customers at Phoenicia restaurant in Glendale. His fiercely loyal clients say he\u2019s \u201cthe best\u201d at preparing the traditional Middle Eastern pipe filled with fruit-flavored tobacco. Alfonso ‘Abou Salim’ Ramirez […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1645","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-culture-art"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1645","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1645"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1645\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1645"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1645"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1645"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}