They met in cyberspace, where they communicated with each other on the joys of fine wine. But it was in a Chinatown restaurant that 23 wine aficionados - some from as far away as Israel and Louisville, Ky. - came FTF (that's face to face in cyber shorthand), many for the first time.

It all began on March 22 with an 11:11 p.m. posting on CompuServe's Bacchus Wine Forum bulletin board that draws more than 10,000 wine lovers across the world. In Message No. 505586, David C. Sit, sitting in his Upper West Side apartment, wrote:
"Here it is, Yakfest-East to welcome Yak and Dorit Shaya to the Big City." In the 12-line memo, he gave the details of what would be a $40 per person multi-course classic Chinese banquet.

"Since Yak and Dorit are coming from half the globe away, we'll have the chef pull out all the stops for this dinner," it said. "Although Yak is a Burgundy maven, this would be a good opportunity to show him there are other great wines other than Burgundies - American, Bordeaux, Italian, Alsace . . . so bring something interesting. Please R.S.V.P. to this message."

They were there to celebrate the U.S. visit of Tel Aviv computer consultant Jacob (Yak) Shaya and his wife, Dorit, who were on their way to a Las Vegas computer show. Yak Shaya, who is knowlegeable about the wines of France's Burgundy region, had been posting notes almost daily on the wine forum for more than a year.
"It sure was nice to finally meet longtime on-line buddies and some of their spouses as well," Arthur Johnson, a direct-marketing consultant from Chadds Ford, Pa., said in a forum posting after the gathering. He added, "Yak, whatever your take may have been on me, you were just like I pictured."

The Bacchus Wine Forum - one of several wine-related bulletin boards available on the information superhighway - is available around the clock, but live, on-line wine tastings, in which participants drink simultaneously and type in their reactions, take place on the first Wednesday of each month, while less-formal on-line chats occur on the other Wednesdays. Other wine boards can be found on Prodigy, America Online, GEnie and on the Internet. A Murray Hill wine bulletin board also exists.

To be sure, this was more than just a few folks sipping wine while chowing down on sweet and sour pork. This was a knowlegeable group bent on some serious indulgence with Bacchus, the god of wine in ancient Greece, surely present in spirit.

Over four hours, attendees sampled 30 wines, starting with bubblies from France and California. There were famous red wines from France, Italy, Australia and California. But one of them, a '78 Chateauneuf du Pape, from France's Rhone region, had seen better days, participants agreed. And, there were Cabernet Sauvignons (reds) from Israel, South Africa and Arizona, a state not ordinarily associated with fine wine production. White wines came from Alsace, Oregon and Long Island. And with dessert, there were intensely honeyed wines from Germany, Australia and California.

The off-line gathering, arranged by Dave Sit, managing director of WNYC-TV, involved a 12-course, gourmet Chinese banquet that included such exotic fare as baked minced conch and seafood with coconut curry sauce in shell, sauteed salt and pepper frogs legs, and tapioca and melon coconut soup for dessert.

"I'm still reeling from the thirty-something samples," Mike Miles, of Port Washington, L.I., wrote on-line about 14 hours after the participants said their goodbyes. "I really should have spit, but the growing glow in that room just made it impossible."

Steven Wolfe, a silver-haired Park Avenue attorney, was initially concerned about his age relative to rest of the group - most were in their 20s, 30s and 40s, he said. Wolfe, who has delved deeply into wine for the past four years since a trip to Burgundy with his wife, has participated in the CompuServe forum for about a year. He said he had been to similar gatherings with wine buffs on Prodigy.
"It's created a whole new circle of friends at mid-life. All of these wine amateurs come together and find they have a number of paths that intersect in their lives," he said.

Reach Me? yak@yakshaya.com

Copyright 1996-2003.
Jacob "Yak" Shaya.