When I was in my late teens I used to frequently go to a local restaurant in my hometown in the UK to treat myself. Sometimes I brought my girlfriend with me. I new one of the members of staff at this restaurant so I really liked the place.
But one afternoon a family consisting of two women and two little girls sits at the table next to me. I have never felt comfortable around children and things were only going to get worse. The girls decided to constantly harass me by shouting at me. The women tried to get them to shut up and let me eat my dinner in peace but to little effect. The girls continued to shout “HELLO! HELLO! HELLO! over at me. I tried ignoring them but no luck. The women must have realised I was on the verge of loosing my cool as I was turning steadily more red and clutching my knife very hard and told the girls to shut up, still no effect. I restrained myself from saying anything to the family and left quietly. But now I wished I said something and showed the little brats some harassment of my own!
Tagged as:
babies & children
My husband and I spent our honeymoon over Christmas in London a few years ago. We had heard Christmas tea at the Ritz was (while of course a bit touristy) a special thing to do in London around the holidays. So I booked a champagne tea for two months in advance and swallowed our sticker shock at the price – it was $2 to the pound back then but we knew it would be a memorable treat.
Well, the tea was memorable, but for a different reason than we anticipated. The decorations were lovely, I do remember that. The service was mildly attentive but not what you’d expect from a hotel of this caliber. What we both vividly remember was the two year old at the table squarely in the center of the tearoom, behaving in a manner not suitable at any family-friendly restaurant, let alone the Ritz tearoom, where all men are expected to be in coat and tie and ladies in their smartest afternoon dress.
This child was not only screaming, he was climbing over his chair and pulling the hair of the lady behind him, messing with the delicately adorned Christmas tree, and I repeat, screaming at the top of his lungs repeatedly through the meal. The parents made no effort to remove him from the tearoom, there were no visible disciplinary measures taken other than “shushing,” which did not have any affect whatsoever. I felt for this kid, who was receiving his fair share of ugly looks thanks to his lack of parenting and need for attention.
I glared down the waiters, who appeared unfazed as the toddler continued to scream in the middle of the tearoom. Surely they will do something! Any place with a strict dress code should know that this is far more offensive than any jeans or trainers would be to one’s fellow diners, who are paying a high price for the privilege of being there. All the other patrons were visibly shocked and irritated as well – and the poor lady who was most affected deserved a medal for her patience (or perhaps should have been the one to say something on all of our behalf?). I don’t care if little Prince William is sitting in that chair, it was intolerably inconsiderate.
Shame on his parents for taking him to an expensive restaurant and expecting him to behave, and shame on the Ritz for not doing anything about the situation. Looking back, shame on us for not fighting them on the bill. I can’t believe we paid £100 to sit at TGI Fridays!
Tagged as:
babies & children,
holiday,
hotel
When our son was about 18 months old, my wife and I thought we might try taking him out to a restaurant. He was a generally quiet, well-behaved kid, even at that age, and we made sure we brought lots of quiet activities and even some Cheerios and other toddler snacks for the wait.
We picked a pizza restaurant that is considered one of the best in the city, but also family-friendly. We arrived around 5:00 so we could be served before the evening rush, and it wasn’t busy at the time. We sat down, received our menus and asked for just ice water to start (in hindsight, maybe that was our mistake – we didn’t order drinks).
We ordered a pizza and waited.
Not long after ordering, a larger party arrived and sat nearby. They ordered wine for the adults and soft drinks for the kids. We waited some more.
The other table ordered their food. We waited. Our son got a little cranky so we gave him some Cheerios.
After awhile we gave him something else. We were out of things for him to do other than sing “Old MacDonald” to him, which probably wouldn’t have gone over too well with the other patrons.
The other table received their food. We waited some more, but only until we could snag our waiter, who was now quite a bit busier, since nearly an hour had passed and many more people had come in.
Our son was now behaving the way you would expect an 18-month-old to behave after sitting in a high chair for nearly an hour watching other people eat.
We got our waiter’s attention and explained that we had not received our food, even though we ordered before the other party had even arrived. We said something about our pizza being cooked in the “slow” oven.
After a little while longer, our son was being more than a little disruptive. We don’t blame him, but we also knew that others didn’t come to this restaurant to sit beside a cranky toddler. So we packed up our baby paraphernalia and started walking toward the host’s station.
On our way we were intercepted by an older woman who may or may not have been the owner or manager. We explained the situation and she called our waiter over. When he gave her the explanation about the “slow” oven, she exclaimed loudly, “What slow oven? We don’t have any slow ovens!”
I don’t know which of the two was right, but we were starving so we asked for the pizza to go, drove the half-hour drive home and “enjoyed” it at room temperature.
That was in 2001 and we haven’t been back since.
G. Ottawa, Canada
Tagged as:
babies & children,
owner/manager,
server
My co-workers and I had gone to eat a quick lunch at a “family-friendly” steak/chicken restaurant while attending a conference in Arizona. Now, when I say “family-friendly” I mean kids can order kid style meals there and maybe get a balloon, but otherwise it was an sort of an adult atmosphere. This wasn’t one of those kid-romping pizza and game palaces we have seen advertised on TV.
All was fine, until a fidgety child decided it was a good idea to start running around and crawling under everyone else’s tables. I understand how it is to be a fidgety kid – I had a son of my own – but he has a reasonable idea about how to behave in public. This kid was just outrageous, running all over, barely missing a collision with a waiter with a tray full of food and drinks.
The parent of this kid didn’t even bat an eyelash until my co-worker got fed up with the child crawling under OUR table, and “accidentally” lightly kicked him in the rear! Oh, you’ d have thought hell broke loose with the way we were dressed down by the parent! The argument basically went like this:
MOM: “You hit my kid!!”
FRIEND: “It was an accident – he was under my table and I didn’t see him there.”
MOM: “Well, I knew he was there. I could see him. He wasn’t hurting anybody!”
FRIEND: “Your kid was under my table! He shouldn’t have been there! This is a public restaurant and he could get hurt, just like he did! Why didn’t you control him? He’s misbehaving!”
MOM: “This is my son and I don’t want to hold back his creativity! He has a right to be here too”.
FRIEND: “Not if he’s being a nuisance to the other people here!”
The mom finally relented and pulled the reins in on her son, but it was too late and the treat of having lunch out with co-workers had been ruined. All this, and the manager, to whom we complained, refused to step in. His comment was that he hadn’t seen what was going on and flat wasn’t going to deal with it. We were already finished with our meal so we paid the tab and left… and subsequently sent in a complaint to the restaurant’s main office.
Since when are children allowed to run amok in restaurants where there are forks and knives being flashed about, and since when were parents not held accountable for their children’s’ antics?
Tagged as:
babies & children,
owner/manager
