chicken and rice

There’s a halal food cart that is notorious in the city for being the ultimate go to spot when you’re wasted out of your mind and want to stuff your face with the great quantities of food. After midnight people from all over flock to it like Muslims during Hajj. The only thing anyone gets there is a platter called chicken and rice. An ungodly combination of chicken, lamb, and beef over rice pilaf served with a sinfully tantalizing white sauce and the hottest god damn red sauce that could very possibly be Satan’s piss. It’s at the corner 53rd and 6th and you haven’t lived until you’ve had it after a hard night of drinking. No matter what the time of day, there is always a line of salivating people halfway around the block waiting dutifully for their chicken and rice. They even have a website.

I have a friend named Joe who has chicken and rice flowing through his veins. Once he cut himself on a broken bottle and chicken and rice hot sauce came out. I’m pretty sure if he lived closer to it he would eat it for breakfast lunch and dinner, every day for the rest of his life. No matter where we are in the city at the end of the night, Joe is always willing to pay a ludicrous amount of taxi fare to get chicken and rice.

The other night after picking up a fresh batch of the tasty morsel, we were settling down to feast when a massive fight broke out between a group of Koreans and Pakistanis. People were wildly flailing their arms at each other and chicken and rice went flying everywhere. They were so drunk I don’t think I saw anyone actually land a punch on anyone else. As an example of how loyal people are to chicken and rice, the people waiting in line who weren't part of the fisticuffs not only ignored the ruckus all around them, but also took the opportunity to cut ahead in line and get closer to the front.

Then I noticed Joe, scampering in between the brawl, dodging flying fists and drunken bodies everywhere. I yelled at him, “Joe what the fuck are you doing?” He put his head down like he was storming Normandy and bee-lined to a strewn chicken and rice container which had landed face up and grabbed it like his life depended on it. Running back cradling it like a new born child, Joe screamed “Hail a taxi! We gotta get the hell outta here!” The shit was straight out of a movie.