this, you know, redwood in, and all this cherry and all this. but, to this day, i can t touch certain things here. roy choi: i can see he doesn t let you change the uniforms either. roy kim: uh, no. roy choi: yeah. [ laughter ] roy kim: well, he still controls the restaurant. roy choi: you just do the work. roy kim: i just do the work. [ laughter ] as a korean, he knows. anthony: we start with bonchon, all those delicious little freebie plates of pickles, preserves, kimchi, a spicy squid snack or two. no bonchon? no meal. roy choi: and you know what this restaurt has that a lot of restaurants are going away from? is the, um, is the chair-less rooms. anthony: you don t do the, the feet under? knees forward, feet under? roy choi: oh the, the tea ceremonies. anthony: straight ahead? oh, no can do. roy choi: the seating, yeah. that was punishment for koreans. roy kim: yeah. roy choi: that s, that s a punishment. roy kim: and with the book over your head. roy
and were unsatisfied with the answers you were getting? what if you were an insanely talented artist and a small startup company called facebook asked you to do some murals in their offices, and they paid you in stock, and you became ridiculously wealthy and you still didn t give a ? well, then, you might be david cho. david: hi. i m dave cho. [ drumming ] be like me. anthony: is that an ak piñata? david: that is an ak-47 piñata. anthony: wow. david: so, i mean, this place is in downtown l.a., so i try to have as many weapons, like, hidden throughout. i got ninja swords and ninja stars and stuff. anthony: you need you need a puppy, man. [ laughter ] anthony: you need a puppy. david: i do need a puppy. [ laughter ] i m going to paint you today.
anthony: oh, i know what i m doing. i m going for the full south of the border experience here. david: all right. awe, there you go. anthony: oh, no, no. i m not kidding around here. oh, yeah, now we re talking, my friend. david: it s a little bit nicer than i remember. there it is. that s the best bread that you can get, so you tell me if you like that. anthony: oh now, wait a minute. are you saying that the cheese toast is complimentary? david: it s complimentary. and once we found that out, we would order stacks of it. so, it was our favorite part of sizzler. and we were like, we need to figure out how to manufacture this at home. anthony: so, were you good sizzler customers, your family? do you think they were happy to see you when you come in? i mean david: um anthony: i love this dish, man. i might, i might when i go back, i might have to have a meatball taco. david: um, so, we didn t, we, like, gooched the system a little bit, but not like completely
anthony: david would have a very different reaction. david: my brother stole a car, and we went into, like, all the neighborhoods and then quickly realized it wasn t, like, about race. it was just about people stealing stuff. and, but we were out looting. we were causing chaos. and, you know, i don t think we got anything good. i think i got a tv stand. anthony: was it life-changing for you? david: it s like you grow up and you things are explained to you. like, he s police. they re not doing anything they re supposed to do. there s just, like, normal men and women of society just, like, acting like animals. and i was like, oh, everything i ve, like, been taught and, and learned my whole life is just disintegrating before my eyes. but, in the end, we re you know, from great disasters come great things, right? i mean, koreatown burned down. but it s like we own l.a. now. it s, like, half of l.a. jim: now it s korean culture. k-pop and psy all over the world influence, yo
all that was happening was, just don t break down my store. making sure our parents, our uncles, our families, these stores, this town, stays alive. anthony: 58 people were killed. only a quarter of korean-owned businesses survived, either destroyed outright during the riots or abandoned afterwards by owners who felt the entire underpinning of their contract with america had shifted. yet today, koreatown is bigger and better and forever changed by what happened in 1992. dong il jang, however, is as unwaveringly old school as you get. roy and i sit down with roy kim, whose grandfather opened the place in 1978. like most korean restaurants at the time, you didn t mess with the original, ever. and like most korean father/son relationships, you obeyed dad s wishes, no matter what. roy kim: my father put all