HOW do restaurant workers deal with Saudi families abroad? To some of these people, a Saudi is a source of extra income as he is dealt with in a specific manner, especially when he is with his family and children. Specifying where they will sit is not the customer's choice as much as it is a maneuver by the waiter who will persuade them to sit in a certain place. The Saudi customer usually has to pay an extra fee. Another opportunity is in the way the customer is shown the menu in English. He is embarrassed before his family because he cannot understand all the items on the menu. He begins to accept dishes the waiter suggests to him. They are then supplemented by new and sometimes similar dishes. The waiter exploits any slight discussion or dialogue between the husband and wife. He considers any question about the name of any dish as akin to placing an order for it. Everyone knows that the sheikh has requested the bill. The story is on every lip in the whole restaurant to the extent that the “customer sheikh” is embarrassed before his wife, children and other customers. He pays the whole amount without scrutinizing the details of the bill. Our culture in restaurants ought to change. At the beginning of the 1990s, those who were modern in our society were keen to carry the trays in fast food restaurants after eating. This was a custom and etiquette that others did not excel in except those who traveled abroad. The owners of fast food restaurants tried to exploit us during that era. How we wish they succeeded in instilling the concept of self-service in our culture by benefiting from the customer so that he gets rid of the leftovers from his meal, cleans the table after eating and places the plastic tray in its allocated place so that another customer can use it. But we were quick to understand this “conspiracy” and we returned to square one. How I wish we were not so alert so that we are not treated as a “customer sheikh” everywhere. Today restaurant owners employ one worker or more. They pay them in order to clean the table after the customer finishes eating. There are cultural traditions in East Asia that force the customer to carry the food from the kitchen, clean the table after eating, get rid of the food leftovers and return the utensils and cutlery to their proper place. There are other restaurants that provide meals at a certain price including service charges and at a lower price excluding service charges. It is the customer who determines his bill in the restaurant. Either it is the bill of an ordinary customer like other people or it is the bill of the “customer sheikh”.
