All posts tagged: Parts Unknown

Anthony Bourdain

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In March 2015, Anthony Bourdain visited Okinawa to film an episode of his travel series Parts Unknown for CNN.  Yuki and I played a small part in the production. I helped set things up for a couple of weeks before shooting, and Yuki worked with Tony and the crew for several days during filming. It was a happy and exciting time in our lives, as on March 25th 2015, during preparations and filming, we also bought our home in Motobu and got married.   Yesterday, June 8th 2018, at age 61, Anthony Bourdain took his own life. https://edition.cnn.com/2018/06/08/us/anthony-bourdain-obit/index.html The tragic news has made us look back on the impressive work of Anthony Bourdain. To be honest, as a vegetarian I had never watched his shows to pick up tips on cooking. I saw him as a travel writer and filmmaker, rather than a celebrity chef.  One of the first episodes I ever watched was “Bourdain in Beirut” from the series No Reservations. I had never seen anything like it. Bourdain came across as a man interested in …

Prime Cuts – Okinawa

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  In a previous  blog post I wrote about working on the Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown- Okinawa Episode. (Season 6 Episode 3). I was mainly a location fixer organizing a few things behind the scenes. I  was also asked to help with a reenactment where they wanted to visualize the story of Minoru Kinjo. Now a well known sculptor, Kinjo-san was a young boy when the Battle of Okinawa took place. The reenactment never made it into the Okinawa episode but they were shown recently in the “Prime Cuts” special which shows scenes from the season that never made it into the main episodes. Anthony Bourdain explained about the Okinawan reenactment: The idea was to illustrate and give background to a very complicated Okinawan story, Okinawan history. Ultimately, I don’t think it was right for my show, but a noble effort. And beautiful.  The Prime Cuts episode shows Minoru Kinjo telling his story intercut with the reenactments filmed  on the beach in Yomitan. My friend Hayakawa-san, his wife, daughter and grandson acted as the Okinawan family, …

Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown – Okinawa

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Last week CNN aired an Okinawa episode of the travel show Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown. I worked on the show for a couple of weeks before Anthony arrived helping set up some of the interviews, locations and  arrange permits. This mainly involved driving around the island, making a lot of phone calls and having interesting meetings. Anthony Bourdain, famous as a straight talking, hard living chef has recently become passionate about jiu jitsu. He was therefore extremely interested in the martial arts heritage of Okinawa. This is why karate and Okinawan sumo featured so much in the episode. James Pankiewicz of the DOJO bar in Naha is the guy performing kobudo on the beach. I was taking photos of the 100 Kobudo event while the camera guys were getting B-roll footage for the show. James was also the man showing Anthony around the Makishi Market in Naha, the beach wrestling on Kume Island, Hokama sensei’s dojo, and the Dojo bar itself in the concluding scenes. The DOJO Bar is a great place to visit, or …