Cooking with Culture.

Anne Lammott summed it up nicely. "There is ecstasy in paying attention."

Though she was urging budding writers to act as recorders and conveyors of the human condition, her words undoubtedly send ripples that lap at all shores, no matter your place or purpose. Because it's true. The more you see, the more you allow what's around you to permeate your beliefs and self-created certainties, the more you're apt to learn and understand. And hopefully, in a cyclical sense, you find yourself more equipped to pass on some shred of insight to others who are, like you were, finding ways to observe.

My summertime attention-payment is putting me in debt. Everywhere I go, whether at market, running circles around a downtown park, or in quiet contemplation on a layover in Salt Lake City, I always find myself wading in the endless primordial ooze of my own cultural theories.

Today's observations are the result of Bourdain overload. Now if you don't know Anthony Bourdain or his recent foyer for television and travel , I can bring you up to speed in a New York minute: Lifelong chef writes on the side. His book is well received, so he decides to travel to far off places to explore the food and culture, using his name and cooking connections as a platform for his adventures.

And I must say, in a summer void of all things new in the televised world, it's been nice catching up on Bourdain's adventures. He's a bit verbose at times, silly at others, and always a notch below annoyingly self-involved. But recently watching episodes from past seasons (in no particular order because it's not necessary), I've noticed the ways the show creates a harmonic aura around the bonds between food, culture, and community. Whether he's eating in with a farming family in Laos, at a vendor cart in Korea, or at a rooftop party in the slums of Columbia, the show puts exotic notions of cuisine and culture to rest by highlighting the way food tells a story. Bourdain himself confessed the belief that when someone serves you food, they're presenting to you a version of their life and story.

These stories are made enjoyable because the show lacks a pretentious Western view commonplace in the kitchen. No Top Chef, this man is neither teacher nor critic; he does not descend upon the people and places to guide their culinary hand. He's no Ramsey, yelling and shouting in a chaotic madness. He shows the necessity and value of sacrifice, ceremoniously offing a pig in one episode, and shooting rice whiskey to pay his respects in another. He swallows grilled sparrow and smiles, not because it tastes exquisite, but because he's a guest in a foreign place and knows the value of respect. In same vein, he also knows the merit of fried food and beer. He complements the hands that serve him pig "poop chute," and he's quite liberal with his cigs.

It's great watching a man who refuses to dance get up and do so at the request of his host. He arrives and leaves as a quiet guest, merely traveling and paying attention, and asking viewers to do the same.

And the more I watched, the more I cringed--at its genius, that is.

The sad brilliance of No Reservations isn't apparent until you set the stories told in worldly episodes next to those that unfold here in the states. Aside from a the fantastic display of food and culture produced in Hawaii (to speak plainly, it's very unAmerican), and the Pacific Northwest (odd), Tony's work at home paints a bleak picture.

The underlying connection between food and tradition so clear in his offshore work is absent, and in its place, we're left with a hodgepodge of ideas and pallets gone awry. Invited to parties and celebrations in other countries, we see nothing of the home or the community in the states. In Vegas we're left with upscale casino discomfort dining, trips to shooting ranges and strip clubs. In Jersey it's more of the same, deep fried something-or-others and TV-based bus tours. Once cliff jumping in Sicily, now we eat grilled cheese and Heineken at a dilapidated Ho Jo's on the Shore. They tell the same story, but in undeniably different tones.

Cleveland, Los Angeles, South Florida... there's no continuity here beyond the fact that we're in a place where the culture is distance.

Now, maybe it is Bourdain overload. Maybe I've taken too much time to observe. Maybe that cultural theory muck is like quicksand, and I'm just shouting my last thoughts before going under. Or maybe this travel show from a chef's perspective is pretty damn insightful. But can food really be the glue to hold it together? Can we really only focus on sustenance as it pertains to self, family, and community, and still make ends meet? If we set our schedules to include setting our tables, if we decide that tradition need be no more than nourishment and good company, will the rest fall into place?

Truth is, we probably can't pull off a large-scale value shift. But maybe as we scatter our stones through life, we'll send off the kind of far-reaching ripples that return the favors of the ones we've received.

But then again, it's only a television program.