Perhaps not surprising for a place geared to an Indian clientele, the food struck Mr. Ray as very authentic, perhaps the most authentic southern Indian food in the city.
I was in a lodge near Alter do Chão, a town in the Brazilian state of Para and an attractive riverside place geared up for tourists with lively open-fronted restaurants and the best Amazonian handicrafts.
The diverse menu, with no specific ethnic theme, the large impersonal dining rooms we passed on our way to the bar, the neon beer signs flashing outside our windows, all made me suspect that this was a place geared to banquets and large gatherings, not cooked-to-order dining.
In Santa Fe, a place geared toward bright light and the outdoors, The Five Graces is inward, cool and mysterious, an ongoing makeover of a '50s-ish apartment complex into a kind of sweetly dreamy caravansary, with Tibetan carvings, kilims, Thai silks and weathered Indian ceiling beams.
"You don't necessarily want to go into a place geared for people who want a tie-dyed T-shirt".
In the book, Meyer speaks frankly about the challenges of working in the funeral industry, especially in a place geared toward lavish, expensive, and over-the-top funerals.
