Hospitality

For 10 years of my life, I have worked, in some way or another, in the food industry. Five years ago on my first day of teaching English in Seoul, I kept asking myself what I was doing in a classroom full of rich Korean primary students when studying, writing, and coffee serving constituted my true expertise. Now those classroom desks have turned back into dinner tables as I find myself working at a five star restaurant four nights a week.

I've returned to Australia, this time with permanent residency in sight, and am therefore in a bit of a transitional phase between overseas traveling and life resettlement. In an effort to hold onto to as much of those sweet Korean savings from all my years of English teaching, I sought out a some casual work for which I am extremely qualified, waitressing.

When young and poor, waitressing can be quite satisfying (particularly in North America where politeness and efficiency directly translate into earned tip money). However, now that I'm nearly 30 and have a bit of cash in the bank, waitressing, though certainly socially enjoyable at times, can occasionally seem trivial at best and down right nasty at worst.

I struggle to tell the beginning of this story, as I am human, and like all humans do not wish to make myself look bad. But this story begins with 29 year-old me, 10 years experienced me, casual waitress me spilling two glasses of wine (one red, one white) all over the khaki pants of a 20 year-old American fella visiting Cairns with his folks. Fortunately, the spillage was restricted to the young fella leaving his parents and younger sister dry for their Five Star Aussie Dinner. My young victim reassured me that his ruined pants were of no consequence as he bought them at Target years ago and cared less if they ever returned to their natural color. His mother, despite her dryness, was not as amicable. She looked to him in horror, and then at me in disgust.

We moved the family to the neighboring empty table, brought out soda water and napkins for the spill, re-served their wines, and treated them to house coffees and desserts. I, however, continued to feel guilt-ridden. Although the family was not seated in my section, I repeatedly made my way over to them, trying to be as pleasant as possible, making conversation to ease the air of my messy mistake.

Through all this conversation, I revealed that I'd previously lived in South Korea, to which they revealed that the plastic surgeon father thought the South Koreans he met in his profession were unhappy and unpleasant (though I doubt most folks, regardless of nationality, looking to change the way they feel by reconstructing their faces find real happiness in anything). They then talked about their safari to Africa as being the only trip superior to their current holiday in Australia. To which, I explained that I'd really like to do some volunteer work one day, possibly in Kenya with a Maasai community. And at this point, the mother asked for my age. When I told her I was nearly 30 she asked me "And so, what does your family think of how you haven't started real life yet?"

I nearly choked on my surprise. Then genuinely smiled from my small chuckle of disgust, and said, "This is my real life. And I'm really happy." At that her wine- stained son said, "Yeah mom, happy. She's happy."

These sorts of nasty moments make working in a customer-oriented profession, like hospitality, quite painful. However, I do find a great deal of satisfaction knowing that my life decisions make this sort of an encounter unique. Imagine living in a world where everyone thought and spoke like this woman! Certainly that world exists and I'm happy to have found a way around it.