Hey everyone! I have some downtime at work, which means bloggity blog blog. I indulged in some narcissism and read my past entries. I saw that a while back I said that I was going to talk about how restaurants work in China. I realize now that I'm a terrible person and never did that.

I mean, the basic premise is the same. You sit down, you order food. Something I have noticed though while dining with Chinese friends is that they're really picky on where they sit. I know some people are in the States, but pretty much every Chinese person I've had a meal with will reject the first seat offered. I don't know if this is some cultural dance I'm not privy to, but they seem to really care about where they sit.

Upon grabbing said table, you get menus, of course. Chinese menus are big on pictures, which is good for me. However you usually only get one menu per table, which I have to wonder if there is some cultural thing to do that - it's certainly not designed for efficiency. Now while you're all doing the dance trying to figure out what to order, your waiter is standing there. Waiting. And waiting. And waiting more. Honestly it's downright creepy, but they don't leave until you've paged through and decided. But then eventually, off they go.

When the food comes, it does not come out all at once. Everything is cooked to order, so the quick dishes with no prep will come out first. It's not customary to wait, so if you ordered the Thanksgiving Day turkey, be prepared to watch a lot of people eat. After that, the waiter disappears, and this is where Chinese restaurants do it better than we do. The waiter doesn't come back periodically, check to see if you need anything, "Is everything cooked alright?", or something like that. They just hang out, and when you need someone, you yell the Chinese equivilant of "pretty girl/handsome boy". And I do mean you yell, because they need to hear you across the restaurant. They come over, you tell them what you need, then they leave. There's no waiting. You get what you need, now. They don't have to constantly check like they're some clingy girlfriend. Really everyone wins, and I promise you I'm not actually being rude.

Oh, and the best part about restaurants over here? All the dishes are shared. Yes I suppose you can be greedy and say "This one is mine", but they go in the center of the table, and everyone has a tiny plate for the food they're about to eat. This sharing is totally awesome, and we should steal it. That's right. I'm advocating theft.

I don't really have a relevant picture this time, so here's a class that put a bow in my hair.