Serving at an International Level

This week I was a Chinese waiter. 

If there's one thing people absolutely love, it's a brand-new waiter that doesn't speak the right language. He can't get you anything, he can't read the menu, and he doesn't know where anything is. It's a good thing no one in China works for tips, because I wouldn't make any. I was actually working in exchange for the restaurant owner's secret recipe miân tao (might not be spelled right), which is basically China's take on mini-doughnuts. 

I'll still need practice. 

It started as a joke. Despite a sizeable language barrier, I've become pretty good friends with the owner of my favourite restaurant. I call him Quing-ge, which as far as I can tell, means some portion of his name, and "older brother" as a sign of respect. So while I was hanging out there, enjoying a plate of miân tao (Wow you are learning so much Chinese!) one evening, he said he could teach me how to cook Chinese food. That sounded great to me, and I mimed being a waiter, saying I could pay him back by becoming an employee. We all had a nice laugh. But then I actually showed up.

We did the cooking lesson as planned; that was great and there will be more to come. But I don't think anyone expected me to actually stick around and do something! I pushed through the early doubts, and in no time fell back into my old serving habits acquired from 3 years' experience in Canada: sitting down at guests' tables, balancing plates, and flirting with the waitresses.

They thought they looked too tiny in the standing up picture. Photo by Andy.

So once everyone figured out that there was really little I could actually do, I just relegated myself to busboy and got busy with quiet tasks like clearing tables and sweeping up. It become abundantly clear that I was incompetent when a guest asked for toothpicks and I couldn't get it. Seriously? When someone says and mimes a toothpicking action and you don't pick up on it, it's time to hang up your apron.

I put in a full shift... in Western terms. I was at the restaurant for over 8 hours, but that doesn't constitute a full Chinese shift. A Chinese shift is approximately the entire day. To illustrate, those aforementioned waitresses were pretty excited to work with me. But I think they were pretty easily excited, because for a month they were living in the back of the restaurant and working from 9 AM to around midnight. And that was how they spent their vacation from university! So sure, if a white guy stumbles up and wants to be a bad waiter, it's fun to look at.

My friend and restaurant regular, Andy. We throw up a lot of peace signs.

That whole shift, I was just hoping I wouldn't hear "FÚ WÙ YUÁN!!" yelled at me. It means 'waiter' and guests just yell it out around here... the easiest pronunciation I can describe for it is "foo," and then saying "You are" really quickly. "Foo Ya'arr!" Please not me please not me not me not me not me....

If I could read the name I'd tell you it.