1) A (middle aged-ish) (South Asian from South Asia) couple come in and order some stirfry and some tom yum soup with noodles, and when they get their meal, they eat the stirfry first, and then turn to eat the soup like 20 minutes later.
"Excuse me, this soup doesn't have enough broth," the one (early 40-something) woman said to me in (Indian-accented) (English).
And, I had to explain to her that because it sat, the noodles soaked up all the broth, and if they want broth and noodles, they have to eat it right away, or order so it comes to the table later.
"How weird," I was like to my one (chubby) (Thai) coworker later that night.
"They should know," she was like. "They're Asian."
2) A (white) couple order the shrimp with all the deep-fried noodle things pointing every which way, and then really don't eat it
"We thought it would be more spicy," they were like
"No," I was like, "It's really just the shrimp and the noodle things."
3) Five (skinny) (polo-shirted) (incredibly dark-skinned) (grad student)-age (South Asian from South Asia) guys with (off-kilter to normal social interaction) STEM demeanors come in and eat a lot of appetizers and entrees or whatnot and its late at night and they don't care and they just have their leisurely meal anyways, laughing and talking and not finishing up their meal, even when they're the last people in the restaurant and the last person has the last bite of food left on their plate for like forever and they're just not eating it, and when they finally finish, only at that point does one remember to go to the bathroom and after we turn the lights off and go to leave a second one who was somehow still there and we didn't see emerges from the men's restroom into the dark restaurant as we all are going to walk out the door, too.
And, when one guy picks up the $132 bill, he signs very quickly and leaves the restaurant right away, and he leaves a less than $3 tip. Which, worked out to something like sixty cents a person, on whats equivalent to like $26 of food per person for all five of them.
(i really do swear that a lot of [South Asian] customers must travel in packs of five, to avoid being six at our restaurant and setting into motion the 18% automatic gratuity that that brings. )
4) An (East Asian) (20-something) calls in her order so it's ready for her to sit down and eat when she arrives, and when she arrives and we bring it out she gets it and is like, I didn't order that, but my one (chubby) (Thai) coworker is like, "Yes, you ordered that, I take order on the phone,"and my coworker (as far as I know truthfully) insists that she did indeed say that she had wanted the glass noodle dish, and not the pad see you.
And, that (20-something) talks forever on her phone as she eats, like just taking a preternaturally long meal to do so, like maybe for almost an hour, like to the point where you wonder why she needed her meal pre-ordered.
And, she leaves no tip.
5) Four (South Asian) people two like (student)-age and two like (parent)-age sit on a patio table, and they say they've been up for over 18 hours and just flew in and want something light, since they are hungry but need to go to bed soon, and it comes out that it's two different students starting programs at the local university and the parent-age people flew in with them all the way from (India) to accompany them how much airfare, for all four of them? ! -- and eventually the bill is $41, and the (well-dressed) (parent)-age guy pays with a corporate-looking credit card, and he leaves a $3 tip.
6) A table of five (South Asian) people come in, and we get them water only to have them need water with some different combination of ice and no ice, and then we serve it and some of them want bottled water, but then the (older) guy specifies not chilled, so my one (older) (Thai) coworker who's a whiz at the phones goes and digs out bottled water from crates from some place where we keep it before we go and put it in the fridge where we keep the beers and white wines and (Thai) coffee and (Thai) tea, and meanwhile while all of this is going on, like three other tables are there who also just walked in that need our attention, and then that same table needs two glasses for the water, and it's the first table I've ever seen where theress not only a problem with their water order, but they change their mind about a water order, and it's actually to the point where it's disruptive to the service of the other tables that have been coming in.
And, when they leave, on the like $87 bill, there's no tip.
7) At lunch a table of five (South Asian) people come in, led by this very domineering woman who insists but does not ask that we can make this one soup with vegetable broth when she orders it and I say that I need to check on if the cooks can do that and she says that she has ordered it that way before here and they know it -- perhaps she has, but I've never seen her in my life, and when was that?! -- forcing me to reply that sometimes the same cooks aren't on duty and I need to make sure that it's possible and there aren't mistakes, and so I go and check and arrange that and then they order everything and the apps are there and all of a sudden she's like, "We need the [some noodle dish] now, he is leaving," and I have to go run back to the kitchen to get them to put it on, and at another point she calls back across the entire restaurant for us to bring out some dishes, and then later she calls back to check that the salmon is getting made -- "Yes, ma'am," I was like, "It just takes longer to roast, and that's why it's not out yet" -- and honest to f*cking g*d, every time you turn around, it's her wanting something right now or changing her mind mid-stream, and it's way the f*ck more special treatment and chaos than it needs to be for a five person table.
(I feel like a certain type of [South Asian] woman does this a lot, perhaps as a way of signaling to everyone at the table that she is in charge and obtains hospitality for them, perhaps, besides the general disorganization of the table and probably none of them having worked in restaurant or service roles like many [considerate] [U.S.-born American] customers have.)
And, anyhow, after all of that meal, one of the (quiet) (older) (South Asian) gentleman pays, and it's like $5, which works out to something like a 7 or 8% tip, which (as my one [chubby] [Thai] coworker would say) is "Good for Indian," but, still.
(Here it should be noted that it's not good to stereotype; since they were eating fish, those sh*tty tippers who by all appearances hailed from that part of the world may very well have been Pakistani or Bangledeshi, and not Indian.)
(And, it was another pack of five [South Asians], you might note. When it comes to money, they can be very, very sly. )
. . .
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