My Arabic Guests

In one of my first posts, I gave examples of some of the strange things people ask me. Some of these are due to people not listening to me, being too drunk to understand me, or just having some very odd notions about what kind of service we are willing to provide.

One group of guests managed to excel themselves, and provide me with the most trying service I've had so far. These were my arabic guests.


They were a group of 4 business men in their 40s, who spoke very little english, and were referred to me from one of the waitresses (she was Russian and it was proving impossible for the order to be taken in english).

They decided they wanted a full 3 course meal. This is a little unusual in the bar, but still feasable.


For drinks, they wanted juice - I told them they could have orange, grapefruit or pineapple. They wanted apple, and told me they'd had it for breakfast. We only serve apple juice at breakfast, but I decided it would be easier to 'borrow' the kitchen keys and get apple juice than try to explain this, so duly took the order


For starters, they wanted melon - We don't do melon. I've watched them flick through the menu for 5 minutes. At no point is melon listed. Instead, I managed to persuade them that the soup was very good.


For a main course, they wanted fish - I told them I could get them salmon or tuna. They wanted haddock. When I explained we didn't have haddock, they said...

"Oh, in that case 'Swordfish' will do"

Call me crazy, but in my opinion 'swordfish' is not common. I'd go as far as saying that 'swordfish' is somewhat of a delicacy, that you would be hard-pressed to find in mainland Britain... How is that the backup to Haddock?! I convinced them to have salmon, but ended up having a debate with them about whether brioche was a sauce, as they wanted no sauce.


For dessert, they wanted fruit - I informed them that our fruit salad was very good. They didn't want fruit salad. They wanted fresh fruit - As a hotel, we do not prepare our fruit salads from fresh fruit; we have the fruit salad delivered to us pre-prepared in a tub. Again, I decided it would be futile to argue with them, so would instead raid the kitchen supplies when I went to 'borrow' the apple juice.


When I had finished the order I emerged from the bar, almost sweating, to be greeted by a round of silent applause from 3 waitresses, who had been watching my performance. The Russian girl had spread news of these difficult guests, so the rest of the restaurant staff on shift had come to watch the struggle.