Francisco Morfin remembers his first visit to a barbershop in Bowling Green, Ky. As he sat there waiting his turn, other customers would come in, get their haircuts and leave. After being ignored for an hour, Morfin got up and left quietly.
That was 16 years ago.
“At first when I came here, there was a lot of racism,” says Morfin, a Mexican immigrant. “They didn’t know other nationalities, didn’t know how to treat them.”
Six years ago, he opened El Pollo Azteca in a concession trailer. He worked hard and saved enough money to move his restaurant into a building on Morgantown Road in 2008.
Inside, crepe paper streamers are strung across the ceiling. Boxes of candy and bubble gum are propped around the counter. The labels on the drink machines are handwritten in Spanish and English: agua de tamarindo (tamarind punch), agua de mango (mango punch), and horhcata (rice water).
Booths along a far wall and a few round tables give patrons space to dine in. Morfin estimates that half his customers are white.
On this day, a man comes in and places his order in Spanish, then turns and greets another customer in English.
Morfin, working the counter, takes the order. Behind him a SpongeBob SquarePants ad can be seen taped to a refrigerator. It reads: “Find your happy place.”
