Sunday, May 10, 2009

We Love Chinese

Yesterday I had the strangest dining experience of my life ever. Four of us went to a very popular Chinese restaurant on Park Street called Bar-B-Q (If that isn't a strange name for a Chinese restaurant I don't know what is!)

Going to a popular restaurant on Saturday night at 9pm in a city that loves to eat out isn't a good idea in the first place. But they're one of the few restaurants that serve good "Indian Chinese", so had to go!

When we reached we were given a waiting time of about half an hour. After waiting for about 45 minutes we got a table right near the entrance of the seating area! There were at least 50 people waiting to be seated right next to us! Each glaring at us, possibly b/c we were the only ones completely exposed to them. While we were eating, the crowd of people waiting just got larger & larger, until finally this one guy was standing right next to us!!

Despite repeated requests from the restaurant staff manning the entrance, he wouldn't move. And then suddenly he was yelling at us, "Can't you guys eat faster? Don't you see there are so many people waiting?"

We were shocked, we didn't know what to say! We had been seated not more than 20 mins...our starters had just arrived. And not that our getting done would've made way for the more than 50 people who were waiting!! There were about 396 other people eating at the restaurant!! I'm not exaggerating...the restaurant has three sections, each with their own kitchen and can accomodate upto 400 people, I think.

Guess the hotel staff had had enough by then. They got the man escorted out of the restaurant. Which brings me to the question...why let such a situation arise in the first place? If you know there are 50 people waiting to be seated in one section of the restaurant alone (I'm sure there were people waiting in other sections as well), why keep letting people in?

Why can't restaurants tell patrons that they're stretched over the limit? Is it greed or hospitality? Given that we're in India, my deductive abilities tell me it's the former. Pure greed to mint money. Which I'm sure the restaurant is doing enough of given it's capacity. So why ruin your equity among your customers by letting such unpleasant incidents occur?

5 comments:

Moonshine said...

Same thing happened to us here.. went to Rajdhani.. waiting time was half an hour.. since it was really hot, we waited at the opp restaurant .. drinking.. and then the crowd milling around the guy seating ppl was totally unbelieveable.. and people really do not have manners.. they just do not allow anyone to eat peacefully!

Scarlett said...

I think Indians are one of the most mannerless people in the world, if not THE MOST mannerless!!! They just have no respect for other people's space or time.

Kalyan Karmakar said...

I am aware of the Bar B Q crowds. But what happened is aboslutely not done? The 5 spice crowds are as long but I can't imagine this happening there

Scarlett said...

@Knife - You dont have people glaring down at you at 5 Spice. They mostly wait outside the restaurant for their turn. Besides, the Bombay crowd I would say is more well-behaved & classy than the Calcutta crowd.

Kalyan Karmakar said...

the last time I remember such chaos was coincidentally at Oh Cal on Bong new year's at Bombay