Pho Real: Saigon in Williamstown.

I know I've only been doing this a little while, but I've already run into one factor that I've seen be an issue over and over again with reviews of any kind: what is the subject being compared to? If a movie is a schlocky, ludicrous action movie, but executes that genre perfectly, do you give it high marks for precisely hitting it's target, or low ones for not being particularly intellectual or artistic? How do you grade an album by a legendary artist if it is below their usual standards, but would be a great effort coming from someone else? Do you compare a restaurant to all the others of it's "genre" you've been to, the other restaurants in the area, or to some platonic ideal of restaurant-dom, the best of all possible eateries?

This last question was brought home to me when a new Vietnamese restaurant, Saigon, opened here in Williamstown, specifically on Spring Street,the only significant commercial drag near campus. For those who haven't been up to this distant corner of Massachusetts, there had previously been only two sit-down restaurants on Spring Street, one Indian and one Thai (a pub has also since opened, which I have yet to try), so I was really eager to have another option, especially as I happen to be rather fond of Vietnamese food.

Within a week of it opening, the posts about it on our student forum began. Most were not kind, and neither was the review in the campus paper. The general consensus seemed to be that the portions were too small, the prices too high, the menu too small and (what got me onto this topic) the quality was low as compared to places they'd been at home. Several posts had variations on "just go to New York for real Vietnamese food."