{"id":45697,"date":"2021-07-20T15:49:00","date_gmt":"2021-07-20T21:49:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/eat-zawadi-durangos-african-restaurant-suddenly-closes\/"},"modified":"2021-07-20T21:49:00","modified_gmt":"2021-07-20T21:49:00","slug":"eat-zawadi-durangos-african-restaurant-suddenly-closes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/eat-zawadi-durangos-african-restaurant-suddenly-closes\/","title":{"rendered":"Eat Zawadi, Durango\u2019s African restaurant, suddenly closes"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Arnold
Arnold Safari Ngumbao at his takeout restaurant Eat Zawadi on Friday in the plaza near Fifth Street and East Eighth Avenue. His meals are also served out of the Smiley Caf\u00e9 in the Smiley Building.<\/span>Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

Editor\u2019s note: This story has been updated to add details about a GoFundMe campaign launched Tuesday evening.<\/em><\/p>\n

On Friday, Eat Zawadi \u2013 Durango\u2019s only restaurant serving African cuisine \u2013 abruptly closed.<\/p>\n

The restaurant opened in May 2020<\/a>, quickly expanding from the Smiley Caf\u00e9 to a location on East Eighth Avenue and a food truck at 11th Street Station.<\/p>\n

Chef Arnold Safari Ngumbao said the closure was the result of an amicable, but sudden, split between him and his business partner, Grant Andrew, owner of the Smiley Caf\u00e9.<\/p>\n

\u201cA few things didn\u2019t work out with my partner,\u201d Safari said in a phone interview. \u201cHe wanted to do something else. Since he was the main guy on the side of cash, and I was the main guy on the side of experience and cuisine, in good faith, we separated.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Arnold
Arnold Safari Ngumbao makes injera, an Ethiopian flatbread, in June 2020. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald file)<\/span>Jerry McBride<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Eat Zawadi<\/a> \u2013 or at least the spirit behind it \u2013 might not be gone for good. Safari is seeking crowdfunding for a new food truck, Eat Zawadi\u2019s successor, through a GoFundMe set up by Tony Foltman and Terese Lyons<\/a>. They are seeking to raise $50,000.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want to put out a GoFundMe \u2026 so that can I bring back what the community deserves,\u201d he said. \u201cSo many people are calling me at home and driving here to ask me what happened and what are the next steps. \u2026 What I want to do is to continue doing it, but I don\u2019t have funds.\u201d<\/p>\n

Safari said he bears no ill will toward Andrew and is not dwelling on the past.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy main focus right now is just to forget what took place and move forward \u2026 giving service and good food to the community, which they deserve,\u201d he said. \u201cThe way they have supported me, I never thought it would come to an end. I just want to bring it back, whatever I can.\u201d<\/p>\n

ngonzales@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

seeks to revive the eatery with community support<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":45698,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[438,28,450],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-45697","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-food","tag-headlines","tag-restaurant-and-catering"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45697","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45697"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45697\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/45698"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45697"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45697"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45697"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=45697"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}