New Years

Well my new years was...not what I expected...

Instead of spending it in the local pub in Felinheli where I'm moving soon I was in Angelina's restaurant during a 6 hour shift when the radio countdown told us it was midnight,

At midnight Rhys and I shared our kisses ( as he was also wrangled in to work) and then, as the last of the customers had left ten minutes earlier I excused myself for ten minutes and watched the fireworks from all around, although mostly from the restaurant/pub opposite. It was chilly but I hardly noticed as I 'boom, boom boom'd with the fireworks, a cheesy grin on my face, After they, unfortunately, died down I did another half hour of cleaning in the restaurant and then got taken home with a few pots of food items as a gift ^-^

The most negative aspect of the evening was this group of nineteen customers that were just SO incredibly rude!!!

When they first came in the tables they were supposed to be sat at hadn't left yet and although we were trying to hurry along we couldn't exactly kick them out so we placed the 19 people on the couches and across a couple small tables by the couches and I sent Rhys off to take their drinks order.

Almost immediately the head of the group ( the rudest) made a snide comment ' Is this your first night or something?' to which Rhys could easily say ' well yes actually, I'm just helping out for new years' .. that didn't stop them from being rude though.

During their starters and main courses there wasn't too much fuss but its when the time came for the desserts to be ordered that all the trouble came.

Unfortunately I don't put their bad attitude all not at our own faults as moments after sending Rhys off to take the deserts Ian told me we had none left so I quickly ran to Rhys to tell him that and that's when the attitude began ' you've got to be taking us for mugs. your taking the piss. we booked nine weeks ago this just isn't good enough. well we should deserve a refund.. what are you thinking on new years eve...' blah blah blah there was so much more . after apologising profusely I escaped back to the kitchen where Ian corrected himself by saying that there was only ONE dessert that had gone with only  left of another and all the rest were perfectly in stock. unfortunately when rhys went out to tell them the REAL situation he started saying it wrong saying that there were only  of the thing that there was none of and etc so I had to run out and correct him to which we got a very arsey ' And hows that going to help 19 people with only  three of them. I then said that there was still the other desserts and ice-cream and coffee's etc but because of his obvious stubborn attitude he would have none of it and continued to be extremely rude until I had Ian go and talk to them as the owner of the restaurant I thought they'd do better complaining to him! There's only so many times I can apologise but really there was nothing I could do. If we'd run out of desserts it was beyond my power and the man was blaming Rhys and I like we'd chosen to make too little. If anything complain to the chefs at least but even then it's not really their fault as Angelina's on a whole don't get that many dessert orders. They're an Italian restaurant which do HUGE portions so when it comes to dessert not many are needed and so the chefs made what they thought would be enough.

After the most of the abuse was over Rhys was told to at least offer the kids desserts to which the SAME man instantly said 'NO!' so he offered them drink and, taking after their parents footsteps, they replied 'no, they'll probably take too long to get here'... which is when I got really annoyed!

What cheeky whotsits!! - for one thing we'd been extremely fast with their drinks the entire night, super fast considering we were under staffed and Rhys and I were just fill ins who weren't experienced with waiting in a restaurant. Also when they first arrived we were at our busiest of the evening with ALL the tables full so you'd be silly to expect that the waiters/watiresses don't have other people to tend to as well.

Forty minutes later and they left after one man very kindly explained to the other waitress working why we werent getting ANY tip on their five hundred pound order because really we'd done it to ourselves and we knew better for next time really and even though the food was lovely and the service was good, the desserts really let us down... So basically because we didn't have crème brulees and only had 3 sticky toffee puddings left but still had the panacottas, ice-cream and tiramisu we didn't get ANY tip.. where'as we would've apparently gotten almost a hundred more if they had tipped.. which would've been a TENNER on to every persons tips!! so thank you very much kind man for telling us that we could've gotten another tenner onto our tips on a night we're sacrificing our own plans to be there for you - NOT getting double pay as the restaurant can't afford it this year! and really rather wishing we were else where... thank you very much.

off of complaining though and onto positivity - the rest of the customers there thought the group were being ridiculous and were ALL lovely and had NO issue with the dessert situation at all. in fact they were getting even more annoyed with the large group of 19 because after all the commotion was over then -4 of the teenagers in the group decided to spend the remaining time in the restaurant running up and down the stairs to the loo'd. one customer even told us that when she came out of the female toilets two of the boys were there lying on top of one another in the hallway . I mean really... Seriously?! what a way to be immature.

BUT - all I can say is 'm not going to let it get to me too much - waitresing isn't my job and I'm sure there are customers like that all over the place, all the time and it's just something you have to deal with. I'm obv just not cut out for the job and that is fine with me :P

To end on a positive note I've come up with my revised and complete new years resolution list but I shall put it in a new blog post so easily accessable when I feel a little lack-lustre :D

Love, Always
Luciie Panda
xXx