Phillip Ozaki’s culinary journey began not with utensils and ingredients in hand, but as a 16-year-old dishwasher in a Mississippi restaurant. With the freedom and trust given to him in his first job, he happily became more involved with the restaurant, picking up basic cooking skills over time before working his own station. From there, Ozaki’s passion for cooking took root and began to blossom.
Daisy Flores is the daughter of the manager and cook at Tia Gladys Restaurant in San Gabriel. Throughout the years of helping her father and family with the restaurant while growing up she learned a wide array of life skills without her being conscious of it. While attending college Daisy found a new appreciation for her time growing up at the restaurant with all the ups and downs. Not only can she now recognize the skills that were acquired during that time but she also sees the beauty in how she grew up.
Paul was born in Taos, New Mexico, and lived in Eastern Europe for two years from the age of 9. His family then moved to Dubrovnik, Croatia for a year and a half. When Paul was 19 he moved to Los Angeles with the dream of becoming an actor. After a year in the American Academy of Dramatic arts he left acting to become a youth soccer coach. At 30 years old he started his own business teaching children. Paul continues to work with children between the ages of 2 and 16. Paul has started a non-profit organization for underprivileged children. Recently he wrote and self published a children’s book titled ‘The Magical Soccer Ball’
Ryan Christiansen is the Self-proclaimed Queen of Direct Response Marketing. She was born and raised locally in North East Los Angeles. She is the proud founder and CEO of NINE2FIVE Marketing, a Traditional Marketing Agency. If you have driven down any of the main streets in Los Angles, chances are one of the bus ads you saw, was placed by NINE2FIVE Marketing. As of August 2022, N2F’s clients are on 1/3 of the total buses throughout Los Angeles, the San Gabriel Valley, and the San Fernando Valley roads.
Brandon Rogers is an American comedian, actor, director, and writer. He was born on August 3rd, 1988 in Hayward, California. He was fascinated by cinema and acting at a very young age and decided to become an actor around the age of nine. After completing high school, he attended college in San Francisco. Before making his way down to LA, Brandon attended many film festivals in the Bay Area. In 2006 he created his own YouTube channel which has now amassed over 6 million subscribers.
Natsumi Saeki is the owner of Ducks Restaurant located in San Gabriel. She is the daughter of founding owners of the restaurant. She went to San Gabriel High School and graduated from Cal State Long Beach (CSULB) with a Bachelor in HealthCare Administration. During her time in school she played basketball and volleyball. After college when it became apparent that her parents needed to rest from the family business, Natsumi took over for them and continues the job of serving the community the food and taste that she, and many of the neighborhood families grew up with.
Carlos Puente started CARDON Media in 2016 as a family-owned company with experience in sales, customer service, advertising and marketing. Their first client was the long-established community newspaper Mid Valley News and represented them in the community handling all their distribution and sales. The next few years CARDON Media grew to represent other local newspaper covering 15 cities in the SGV. In 2018 CARDON Media published its own newspaper called “El Monte NOW” which later grew to “San Gabriel Valley NOW” newspaper which published its last issue in 2021. The San Gabriel Valley NOW brand has grown into social media, radio and soon video streaming (Roku) and will start publishing the ”San Gabriel Valley NOW” magazine and “SGV NOW $avings” Magazine this year.
Carlos Aguilar is from La Puente, CA and is a multimedia producer, writer and content strategist with over 20 years experience creating content for broadcast and digital audiences. He wrote, directed and produced a series of documentaries on American Idol, NASCAR, The WWE and Oprah Winfrey. He served as Sr. Story Producer on Bristol Palin’s Lifetime reality series and produced for the Daytime Emmys.
The hosts, Scott and Russell, are once again joined by Victoria to share some moments from each show that stood out to them. In this 3rd part of Review Time they go through Episodes 40 – 60, starting with Danny Woo all the way to Tomoko Hino.
Sam Xu & Bo Xu are twins from Xiamen, China. When the boys were nine years old their mother immigrated to America but due to some misfortune in the paperwork only Bo was able to go with her. Four years later Sam was able to join his family in Lemoore, CA. During High School Bo started up his YouTube Channel (bomiiao) posting some comedy skits. A turning point in their channel happened when they posted a different look at a trending video topic and it went virial. With the knowledge of how to create good content that people like to watch the boys took to TikTok with a passion. Sam was the one to make his own TikTok account first where he started to gain a lot of views. When Bo joined TikTok he started a fun competition between their accounts. Making use of the trends on TikTok they were able to grow their accounts to the point where they could take brand deals and support themselves. With the money they made posting content they bought their own place in the San Gabriel Valley and an apartment closer to the college they are attending.