THE LAST BUGEISHA

A Tribute to Angel Lemus, by Peter Hobart

With due respect to Robert Fulghum, almost everything I know, I learned as a bartender:

• Welcome everyone through the door, but be ready to show it to them again if need be.

• Treat a pauper like a princess, and a princess like a pauper.

• There isn’t much that men (and women) of good faith can’t solve over a beer.

• Clean as you go, and if someone drops a glass, clean that up for them as well.

• Be nice. Be nice. Be nice (until it’s time to not be nice—this one courtesy of Roadhouse).

And the list goes on…

Bartenders the world over will tell you that in this profession, you generally encounter two types of regulars: Those who want to tell you what they know, and those who want to ask you what you know. As a barkeep, I generally preferred dealing with clients of the former type, since they were usually easier to handle. In friends and colleagues, however, different metrics apply.

Angel Lemus was decidedly of the latter type. Despite his own seniority as a martial artist, in the time I was honored to work with Angel, he was always interested to learn what other people knew, and what their journey was like. Read more at https://www.ittendojo.org/articles/angel-lemus-tribute