Desperate Serbwife

Tip.

No matter what the world thinks of Americans, there is one segment of the world population that will always love Americans: the waitstaff of resturants. You see, Americans are by far the world's best tippers (and I've heard the French are the worst....shocking, I know). And, as a born and raised American, I find it hard to not tip at a resturant. While living in London, I was able to quickly adapt to not tipping bartenders (I mean really, a $1 tip to make a $4 drink is really kind of excessive). But as a former waitress and good American, I will never adapt to not tipping. If I don't leave at least a 10% tip, I begin to get that uncomfortable feeling inside like when you tell your mom that you're going to Laura's house when you're really going to Jason's (not that I would know how that feels). Luckily, my husband, the true supporter of the "working man" feels the same way.

However, one waiter in a resturant in Istanbul earned a different kind of "tip" from us altogether. Our second night there we decided to go to Hamdi resturant, which came highly recommended in our Lonely Planet guidebook. We made reservations and got dressed up for a nice dinner. It seemed nice enough when we arrived, and the waiter was certainly pleased that we ordered bottle of wine. Unfortunately, the bottle of wine was set on a table on the other side of the room for safekeeping between pours. But we figured that they'd refill our glasses whenever they were getting low (hahaha, how funny that sounds now). Anyway, after our first glass of wine was poured our waiter took away our menus (before we ordered anything) and asked if we would like to just have the "sampler" dinner. Hmmmm, um, ok, how much does that cost? "Oh, it's great, it has some kebabs, some grilled vegitables and a few other things, it's great!" says the waiter. Well, ok, we're in good moods, give us that. And immediatey the conveyer belt of food began.

First, there were three different appitizers. Then some kind of traditional pizza thing that was the "special" for the night.....not that we really wanted that. Then some kind of watery thing with meat and chickpeas. "Is that a soup?" I ask the waiter. "No, it's lamb and chickpeas" he says. "Yes, in a soup?" I ask. "No, it's lamb and chickpeas," he says. "Um, ok, and it's in a soup," I say. "No, it's meat - lamb - meat," he says while he looks at me like I'm stupid. "Um, yeah, ok, thanks......do I get one too....wait, where are you going?" I say. Apparently the lamb and chickpea SOUP was only for Mike. And where in his description of the "kebab sampler" did it say we'll be getting soup? Anyway, we had barely begun to get through all this food when the waiter sets an enormous try of 8 differnt kinds of kebabs in front of us. Did I mention that there were just two of us eating? This was an insane amount of food and god knows how much this was costing!!! We get down to trying to ingest all of this food and almost immediately the waiter starts trying to clear away some of our plates. Um, hello! I'm still working on that!!! And my wine glass is now empty and they are not refilling it - where did you go with my plate??? BRING ME MORE WINE!! What is wrong with this guy? Meanwhile the only conversation the waiter tried to make with us was to ask us if we were American, and then ask if we were from Texas. Um, no, we're not from Texas, but thanks for the insult, idiot!

As the resturant fills up, it is now becoming very clear that they are trying to get us moving quicker so they can have the table. How the hell am I supposed to eat all this food - especially without any wine!! So finally Mike and I give up trying to even eat half of it and decide that we'd rather get out of there, sooner rather than later. We ask for the bill. It is, of course, totally expensive. We decide that the poor service and the fact that this guy pretty much forced this huge dinner on us is worthy of a small tip. Mike signs the credit card bill and puts it back into the folder and we are looking in our wallets for some small bills to leave as a tip when the waiter comes running over and grabs the bill, looks at the signed credit card slip and says, "TIP." Note, he did not say, "tip?" He said, "Tip."(with a period) as if that is required.

At this point, I will provide you with some alternate endings to this story since there are many ways we would have liked it to end, you choose your favorite:

1. "I'll give you a tip - if there are bits of food floating in a liquid and you eat it with a spoon, it's called SOUP!!!!"

2. "I'll give you a tip - Do we look like we could eat a meal for 5?"

3. "I'll give you a tip - the bottle of wine goes on the table, not across the room so that I have to beg you for more of your over-priced wine."

4. "I'll give you a tip - if you have to ask for it, you didn't earn it."

5. "I'll give you a tip - I won't assume you're an idiot if you don't assume I'm from Texas."

6. "I'll give you a tip - Do we look like we're made of money?"

7. "I'll give you a tip - don't eat yellow snow." (This one makes Mike giggle every time he repeats it)

posted by Brooke @ 11:57 AM