What I've Been Up To Under COVID-19 And Putting The Passenger On Pause

Hey there, fellow passengers. Thought I should give you all an update on what's going on with me, with the show, and with the world. Since March 15, I shuttered my restaurants and recalibrated them to serve 7,000 meals a week to those in need, both emergency workers and underserved communities. So that has kept me busy. I'm not traveling, obviously, and so a travel show is not, shall we say, pertinent to the current state of the world. So for the time being, I'm going to focus on doing the good that I can do, and we'll be hitting "pause" on The Passenger for right now. We'll be back. Until then, take care of yourselves, take care of each other, and wash your hands. If you want to keep up, follow me @hughacheson on Twitter and Insta. Thanks for listening.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
I'm Hugh Atchison, and this is kind of the passenger.
It's more an explanation as to what I'm doing these days. Um,
since March fifteen, the IDEs of March, I've shut down
my restaurants. I'm not traveling. Therefore, a travel podcast is
not really pertinent to the ways of the world right now.

(00:29):
During the pandemic, my restaurants have been um recalibrated to
serve between Empire State South and five and ten in Athens,
and then you know, Empire State South in Atlanta. We're
serving about seven thousand meals a week too. Indied communities,
so first responders and police departments and fire departments and

(00:52):
amulatory services, and then housing projects in Latin X communities
and underserved and power stricken areas of Atlanta and Athens.
And we're doing good. Um, We're feeding people. We're doing
what we know how to do, which is nourishing souls
and giving them good food and sustenance. And you know,

(01:13):
the reaction to this and our ability to dispatch and
react quickly and get a game plan together is also
how it will eventually reopen, but not yet. UM, We're
gonna take a right now. It's April twenty four, and
I think that it's probably gonna get us to at
the bare minimum May fifte. George has been through a

(01:35):
lot and we're still kind of getting through the pandemic.
I don't think testings at a notion or at a
level that I can feel comfortable in opening my doors
and putting at risk my really proud employees, my family,
myself and my customers. So we wait and we get

(01:56):
a game plan together that's going to be good, UM,
because I think as every restaurateur, we have to be
able to prove to ourselves in a documented fashion what
opening up looks like? What's the new landscape for serving
at a distance, for providing full hospitality UM in a
non contact setting? Has payment work? Has the host grew

(02:19):
you at the front door? How's the restaurant space? How
are cleaning procedures done in a like hyper attenuated fashion
that's different than it once was. And we've always been clean,
We've always had health departments, and you know, give us
good accolades and thank us for the work that we
do in a safe environment and cooking food and providing service.

(02:40):
But it's got to be well beyond that now for
me to uh to want to serve you. We'll get
back to the passenger someday soon, and we'll get back
to traveling. We'll get back to showing the little nooks
and crannies of places that I adore around this world.
But all right now, I'm looking at my window in Athens, Georgia,

(03:01):
and a lot of birds. There are a lot of birds,
birds and migratory patterns they're allowed to travel. Trying to
get a bird into a podcast is not easy, though,
so I'm gonna work on that. But until then, I
want to wish you well and be safe and wash
your hands and take care of the ones around you
if you have the ability to take care of those

(03:23):
in your community. Everybody needs to make a big list
right now of the people who helped out in this pandemic,
that helped them and their communities and those around them.
And then there's another side of that list of the
people who didn't. So make your lists, check it twice,
and we're going to figure this out. Until then, Hugh Atchison,

(03:47):
and thank you