Fans Are Flocking To One Of Kobe Bryant’s Favorite Restaurants In The Wake Of His Passing
It's been almost two weeks since the death of basketball legend Kobe Bryant, his daughter Gianna, and seven others, and fans are still finding ways to honor him. Other than donning his jerseys, sharing his past achievements, and penning tributes, fans are also finding another unexpected way to remember Kobe: eating like him.
Fans are flocking to El Camino Real, a Mexican restaurant in Orange County, CA, where Kobe had been a regular for more than 20 years, according to ABC 7.
"Right here, I consider this holy ground because his spirit is here," said Margie Aguirre who visited the restaurant with her husband. They were sitting just a few tables away from Kobe's preferred spot, which was a table closest to the register.
“He always greeted us and if someone asked for a photo he never said no,” said Martha Castañeda, the owner's daughter, told NBC4. “He was always very kind. We are going to miss it."
Manager Rodolfo Garcia told ABC that when Kobe visited, he didn't want special treatment and wanted to be served like any other customer would be.
"I remember when he told me he wanted to be treated as a customer, 'please do not treat me as a star because I want to feel like a regular customer,'" he said.
His favorite foods from the spot were apparently a carne asada tostada, carnitas, and flan, which he ordered in Spanish. Bryant shared that he learned Spanish in an effort to converse with Latinx fans.
"My Latino fans are very important to me because they were the first ones who embraced me the most when I first got here," Bryant said in a 2016 interview, according to NBC News. "So I told them, 'Give me two or three years so that I can learn a little bit of Spanish.'"
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