I don’t want to overreact, but I may have been marked for death by a Chinese fighting tong.
It all started, as such things often do, with brunch at a buffet restaurant. Such establishments are dangerous, threatening places. Oh yes, they may LOOK wholesome and everything, but you have to watch your step, believe me.
The obvious hazards aren’t the ones you really have to worry about either-people like to sneer and make snotty comments about food poisoning, but that’s unfair. Buffets are, for the most part, clean, hygienic places. I will defend most buffets against ptomaine slander to my last breath.
Nor are you ever in any REAL danger from stampedes of very large patrons making their way to the ice cream bar when fresh hot fudge is put out-if you are reasonably nimble and keep your wits about you, you can dodge out of their way-particularly if you think to bring a cape and matador hat to dinner with you.
No, it’s the cultural land mines that pose the real danger, more specifically, tipping. What IS the tipping policy for a buffet, anyway? I mean, what does a waiter DO in one of these places? The customers serve themselves, even dessert and beverages. There is a separate staff that puts the food out and busboys who clean and restock the tables, so what is the purpose of paying the waiters?
Such was my reasoning at any rate, recently, when I unwisely stiffed my waiter.
The bill came to $17.20, and because I was paying on my card and would have to do the complicated math later which might involve subtraction AND decimals, I rounded the amount up to $18 and filled in that amount on the line marked “Total” on my slip. My waiter, whose command of English was a bit limited, seemed thrown for a loop by this.
“Hey!” he shouted. (I use the word “shouted” deliberately. He addressed me in a tone of voice one usually uses to alert a zoo keeper to the fact that one’s child is being eaten by a polar bear.) He thought for a second, stymied by the challenge of calling my attention to an oversight.
“Hey!” he repeated, finally, then stabbed his finger at the middle line on the payment slip marked Tip. “Tip!” he pointed out in an emotional voice.
I sighed. I’d actually been hoping that I could slip away from my table and out the door without actually addressing this issue. I took out my pen and filled in the middle line-$.80.
I don’t actually speak Mandarin, which is a shame, because I suspect that I would have learned something really interesting about my parentage and anatomy from my waiter’s ensuing diatribe, which was delivered at a frequency and volume sufficient to stun small animals at 20 paces.
Actually, I wasn’t without sympathy for him. Think of the situation from his point of view-he comes from overseas to find himself in a completely alien (and frankly, silly) culture. He finds that it is the custom here for people with too much money to give away extra money every time they eat at a restaurant. Very few countries in the world tip waiters as Americans do, and it is a bizarre and bemusing custom to the rest of the world.
As my waiter sees it, his job is to collect money. My job is to give him money. He didn’t make these silly rules, he just profits by them. Suddenly, here is a customer who can’t seem to grasp this very simple relationship. He’s lived up to HIS end of the bargain, he’s waiting patiently for me to give him his money. He’s willing and ready to take it from me. Somehow though, I just won’t come across and live up to my end of the bargain.
I have seldom, if ever, been given such a dark, disgusted, disdainful look by another man.
I suspect that my erstwhile waiter has taken out a contract on my life. It may just be my imagination, but I’ve seen flitting shadows over the past few days where flitting shadows have no business being. They conveniently disappear when I look in the broom closet at work or under my car, but I think it’s just a matter of time until I get mine.
