I was eating with a female friend at a reasonably nice restaurant. Not posh, but expensive. Before we were seated we grabbed a drink at the bar, and whilst sitting there she signed up to the restaurant’s newsletter.
Anyways, we sat down and my friend received a text telling her “how beautiful she looks”. She ignored it and another one came through asking her what she’s doing later. She didn’t have a clue who it was and ignored it.
As we were finishing up our meal, a third text came through saying she shouldn’t be with a guy like me and asking if she wanted dessert with a “real man”.
It became clear that someone in the restaurant had her number and we remembered that she had put it down on the application form for the newsletter. Considering the forms went into a box behind the bar, it had to be a member of staff.
After getting the manager down and him calling the number and pegging what member of staff it was, we learned that one of the waiters had taken her number and address off the form, written it in his phone and had spent the evening taking pictures of her from behind the bar. The police ended up involved.
We were at a bar that served food. The waiter was so bad, it really just became funny.
We were 99% certain that he was very high during his shift because he would just wander around aimlessly as we tried to get his attention. Then he’d start walking over to us, look over our heads as we tried to wave at him, and slowly turn and walk away.
When we ordered food, he brought the right dishes, but gave them to the wrong person, no big deal. As we are saying “oh, that one goes to him”, etc., he quickly said “oh sorry,” gathered the dishes, and started walking away! We were almost screaming at him trying to get him to come back, but he kept walking. Thankfully he came back 5 minutes later, with the same food. No idea what happened. We were so hungry after being teased with the food, we didn’t even care if he spit in it.
When he came around for my next beer, I said “surprise me.” This is a bar famous for having hundreds of beers. After 20 minutes, he brought me the same exact beer I just had. I was surprised!
He continued to bring us the wrong beers, probably what another table had ordered. But he took so long and it was so hard to get his attention, we started just drinking whatever we got.
When I was in high school I lived in a tiny rural hamlet. We would go on field trips to the city to watch plays and the ballet and always would stop at a new restaurant before the productions began.
On this day, we settled on Earls. There were thirty kids and one teacher, we were all well behaved and respectable country kids. We had all decided beforehand to tip our waiter ten dollars each.
We asked the waiter before we ordered our food if we could have separate bills between us, and he told us that due to the size of our party he was not willing to do that. We told him that we understood and would sort it out amongst ourselves.
We ordered our food and after it arrived our waiter was nowhere to be seen, no refills, no checking up on us, but we knew it was busy.
Without a word he walked up to our table and dropped a bill in the middle.
We started calculating who owed what and after we figured out the bulk of it began counting out change. The waiter walked by, saw the change and tapped me on the shoulder. I looked up at him and in the most disgusted voice he said, “You kids realize that I put up with you all evening and that (pointing to the money on the table) is NOT 10%”
I was so shocked. We hadn’t even started getting our tip money out. We were planning on leaving $10 dollars each on a bill of $955.65 (that was the total for all 5 tables). That would be a 31.39% tip.
After that, my teacher told us not to leave our tip.
I went to Chili’s for lunch with my husband.
The place was empty. We were finally seated after a ten minute wait (it was this or nothing, and I was starving). The waiter arrived, took our drink and appetizer order. But he never came back.
More customers arrived, maybe four tables, and we watched our waiter sit down with what we assumed were friends of his. So we flagged down another waiter, who practically threw our drinks at us. He took our entrée order, threw those at us too.
I cut the chicken and I was surprised it didn’t cluck and jump off my plate, it was so raw. The original waiter came over and I showed him the still-pulsing bird and he rolled his eyes and said, “It’s rare. You want me to microwave it for you?”
I explained that I want it cooked through, not heated, and that poultry isn’t served rare. He snatched the plate and left. I never got my food back.
Meanwhile, my polite husband was waiting for me to start eating. I finally told him to go ahead, at which point he opened the bun and found a fake fingernail. We attempted to get someone’s attention so we could pay and leave, but 15 minutes later we just got up and left. I’ve never gone to another Chili’s.
I was at an IHOP with my then fiancée having our usual Saturday IHOP treat meal.
We had ordered our regular meals (blueberry topped, stuffed crepes for me, and a bacon and ham scrambler for her), and chatted while waiting. Everything was great as usual, then the food came.
My crepes were cooked badly and cold, her scrambler was not the right one and also cold. We complained, (politely mind you, we liked this place after all) and wrote it off as a new cook. When the food came back out I noticed right away that my blueberries were missing and the food was cold again.
We told the waitress who retrieved the manager, who apologized profusely and went into the kitchen. We were seated in such a way that we saw the cook when the manager opened the door, and I noticed two things right away. The cook was indeed new and also appeared to have a learning disability.
The manager came back to us and explained that the cook used to be the dishwasher but was shadowing one of the regular cooks and trying his best. The regular cook had called in sick that day leaving the ex-dishwasher cook to fend for himself. The manager comped us and said that he tried to help but was too busy to constantly be back there. Then this happened.
The manager had one of the wait staff step in to cook while he BROUGHT THE DISABLED GUY TO OUR TABLE and had him tearfully apologize to us. That caused the manager to tear up as well as my significant other. Then the manager FIRED THE GUY IN FRONT OF US! We of course left pronto.
I went to a Chinese restaurant and had a decent meal with a group of friends. The serving staff wasn’t very friendly or nice but oh well, we were hungry.
After we paid and left the restaurant, walking towards the car, the owner of the restaurant came running at us yelling, ” where is the hot sauce?”. At first we didn’t understand what she was saying or why she was yelling.
Finally we understood she meant that we had stolen the hot sauce bottle. We said we didn’t take anything but she kept demanding and yelling for it. Five minutes into this her staff called her back and she just walked off. (Imagine yelling and then no noise.)
We walked back to the restaurant and asked her what happened. She made little eye contact and ignored us and then her staff told us that they misplaced the hot sauce and found it again. We asked the owner again and she just said, “hot sauce found” as if none of the yelling in front of the parking lot had happened. No apology.
A friend and I were sent to Buenos Aires for business. We arrived 2 days early to have some time to walk around the city and enjoy ourselves. After a red eye flight and a really long customs and immigration process we finally arrived at our hotel, changed out of our travel clothes and hit the street for lunch.
We made it to this one cafe where not one of the 3 employees even glanced at us after they saw us walk in. Hungry and annoyed, we left and walked across the street to another cafe. We sat down and a nice old man brought us water and took our order. Everyone was staring at us but we didn’t care, we were hungry.
An unusual amount of ladies began to walk in and out. Each sitting at their own table, dressed up with makeup and heels, sipping on some sparkling water. There were no other patrons aside from them.
Our waiter brought our sandwiches and damn they were good but something felt really odd about this cafe. It hits us at the same time – this was definitely a brothel.
As we paid our tab some tourists (men) walk in and stare straight at us like lobsters in a tank. We made it to the door pretty quickly after that.
Went to a restaurant, a bit more than an hour before closing for a quick bite to eat.
Us: “are you still taking orders for dinner?”
Waiter: “yes!”
We sat down.
Almost instantly they packed up ALL the other tables. They put the chairs on top of the tables, and started vacuuming. It was surreal! We were sitting in a maze of tables and chairs.
We persisted, and ordered quick and easy meals. The food took nearly an hour to come out. The meals were all wrong, cold and horrible. Worse still, our vegetarian friends ordered vegetarian panini. They came out loaded with pink stuff. We finally managed to call the waiter over.
Us: “Are you sure this is vegetarian?”
Waiter: [sigh] “I’ll check..” …
[minutes pass]
Waiter: “yes, it’s vegetarian”
Friend shrugs, takes one bite.. Sandwich is filled with some prosciutto/ham type meat!
The kicker happens when we complain.
Us: “Excuse me, we ordered vegetarian panini.. This is full of meat!”
Waiter: “Oh. The kitchen must have stuffed it up because I definitely wrote down vegetarian..” [Shrugs, walks away and doesn’t come back]
We wait because after walking off like that, surely our waiter is going to check on something or fix the problem!
Nope, he’d left for the night.
Went to a restaurant, a bit more than an hour before closing for a quick bite to eat.
Us: “are you still taking orders for dinner?”
Waiter: “yes!”
We sat down.
Almost instantly they packed up ALL the other tables. They put the chairs on top of the tables, and started vacuuming. It was surreal! We were sitting in a maze of tables and chairs.
We persisted, and ordered quick and easy meals. The food took nearly an hour to come out. The meals were all wrong, cold and horrible. Worse still, our vegetarian friends ordered vegetarian panini. They came out loaded with pink stuff. We finally managed to call the waiter over.
Us: “Are you sure this is vegetarian?”
Waiter: [sigh] “I’ll check..” …
[minutes pass]
Waiter: “yes, it’s vegetarian”
Friend shrugs, takes one bite.. Sandwich is filled with some prosciutto/ham type meat!
The kicker happens when we complain.
Us: “Excuse me, we ordered vegetarian panini.. This is full of meat!”
Waiter: “Oh. The kitchen must have stuffed it up because I definitely wrote down vegetarian..” [Shrugs, walks away and doesn’t come back]
We wait because after walking off like that, surely our waiter is going to check on something or fix the problem!
Nope, he’d left for the night.
There’s a sushi restaurant at a certain major train station in Japan which I’ve been to at least 50 times. Two of those times I’ve seen a cockroach running across the counter. That’s not good, but not as shocking as it might sound, as the front door opens right onto the street. Anyone who’s lived in Japan knows, even the most meticulously clean environment can get a cockroach wandering in from time to time.
On the occasion in question, I spotted the little guy running towards me, about a meter away. Nobody else seemed to see him so I discreetly grabbed an empty tea cup and dropped it over him like a cage. I’m not the type of person to make a scene; I finished my sushi and asked for the bill.
The waitress brought it to me while carrying a tray of miso soups. I whispered to her, “watch out, there’s a small cockroach under that tea cup” and indicated the one I was talking about. She apologized profusely and I started to leave.
What she did next is a bit hard to understand. She didn’t serve the miso soups that were on their way somewhere. She didn’t clear my plates. She didn’t call anyone for help. She went straight to the cup.
She clearly understood my Japanese because she stood way back from it and tapped it a couple of times while wincing. Then she picked up the cup. The bug happily scampered out.
She absolutely lost it. Miso soup went everywhere as she pointed at the bug while screaming/crying. Everyone in the restaurant stood up to look at whatever she was pointing at. Then she looked back at me. Everyone in the restaurant looked at me.
