The Coolest Cab Driver in San Jose

Jay is a bus driver in San Jose. He is young, maybe still in his twenties, and speaks with a thick Indian accent. In our conversations, we learned that he can't stand the traffic in Los Angeles, particularly in consideration of that night when he was stuck in gridlock at 12 a.m. But he loves San Jose and he is the raddest, yes, I said raddest, cab driver we have had in all our travels.

Jay picked us up from a hotel that is supposed to be in downtown San Jose, but is actually a minimum $8.50 cab ride from the center of the city. It's basically like getting stuck in Highland Park, when you thought you would be in downtown L.A., something that is particularly annoying when you don't have a car with you. We asked him to take us to Smoke Tiki's, which we found on Yelp. He knew the place, although he hadn't been there himself. We pulled up to the restaurant/nightclub and, alas, it was closed. Jay could have left us to our own devices. Instead, he drove us up a few blocks to where he knew there was a string of restaurants, clubs and bars. Then he gave us his cell phone number to call him when we needed to go back to the hotel.

We grabbed a very late dinner at The Loft Bar & Bistro, where we dined in hip surroundings with a bunch of people who are probably high-powered geeks. The Loft is pricey, but the food is worth it.

Afterward, we walked around trying to find something to do. A whopping six cop cars lined up in front of the sports bar across the street from the loft. We then scoped out Toons, where we heard a mix of commercial hip-hop music and saw a large sign that read "Dress Code Enforced." A few doors down was The Dive Bar. Although it was smaller in size than Toons, it appeared equally unappealing.

Finally, we stumbled upon the Voodoo Lounge. This bar/live music venue is similar in style to Safari Sam's in Los Angeles, but, stylistically, it seems to cater to, as Carlos noted, a "Long Beach" crowd, aka punk guys and rockabilly girls.

There was no band playing tonight, and so there were maybe fifteen people inside the club at it's peak. Most of the club was blocked off by leopard print and red velvet curtains.



The club also has a door guy named Wolfe, which automatically makes it a cool spot, and the bartenders pour stiff cocktails. Two hours later, I'm still buzzing off of two vodka tonics. Nice.

There's apparently a metal show tomorrow night at the club, so we might head out to that if we aren't too exhausted after we complete the Quest for Finger Food (more on that later) and our trek to San Francisco. I might break the bank at the Sanrio Store. You never know. Regardless, I hope Jay is working tomorrow night because this guy is a godsend for those of us who can't even discern north from south in San Jose.