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This is Fresh Air. I'm David B. Kooli.

Across his career, Michael Chequee Azaleena says he's been threatened, cursed at, punched, and called every ugly name imaginable.

He's also had people press a hundred dollar bill into his hand, sometimes more than one of them. That's because for years he controlled a very valuable commodity,

the tables at high-end Manhattan restaurants.

He's written about his experiences in his memoir,

Your Table is Ready.

Tales of a New York City, Made or D, now out in paperback.

Checkie Azaleena has encountered celebrities, captains of finance, plenty of nice regular folks,

and one bona fide mobster who repeatedly threatened him for a perceived slight.

In his book, Chequee Azaleena takes us behind the scenes of the restaurant world, where we learn who gets choice tables and who doesn't, but also how restaurant staffs in the 1980s and 90s worked, fought and loved in adrenaline-fueled workplaces

where booze and cocaine were plentiful.

Michael Chequi Azaleena has worked as a server, Mader D, and manager in several exclusive restaurants.

Last year he opened his own modern bar and grill in New York called Checkies.

He spoke with Fresh Air Contribut contributor Dave Davies in 2022.

...