Some jobs are not really what they seem to be and you only get to realize this when you see yourself doing them.
I remember when I took a bartender job at the year 2021. My perspective of the job was based on what I had seen in movies with bartenders in them. I saw it as the type that would just require me seating at the bar, taking a few orders which involved drinks only, and getting tips from customers. Well the last part did occur occasionally. But for the first two, not so much.
When I knew there might be a problem was when I asked my senior colleague—Austin—who was an existing bartender at the hotel what time they closed.
“We don’t really have a particular time o,” Austin replied. “Sometimes you can retire for the night, only to get awakened in the middle of the night to go and serve a guest.”
That was number one red flag. But I felt that shouldn’t be much of a big deal. That was just actually the least of the ”big deals” I was about to deal with.
When I resumed the work I got to realise that drinks were not the only orders from customers I was going to be taking. I was also going to be taking catfish orders which would require me killing the catfish and sending it to the kitchen to prepare for the customers. I was also going to be taken general food orders like rice, noodles, fries, and the rest. All these work for a “bartender.” Completely far from what I had pictured.
That was the first time on a job I heard of the word “shortage,” knew what it meant, and also experienced it.
I remember my first week at the job. I was serving a table that had a family—a father and three of his children; two boys and a girl. While serving the man’s table he was nice to me and we got along pretty well.
“So how long have you been working here?” the man asked me. “Actually I just started this week.” “No wonder. Your face seems new. So how are you finding the job” “So far it’s been good Sir.”
We were practically friends at that moment. He ordered four plates of chicken for himself and his children with drinks.
When it was time to pay up I calculated what I had thought to be the correct bill and gave it to the man. The man looked at the bill, paid it, and also tipped me on top. I was very grateful and happy, not knowing I had made a mistake in calculating his bill. Not that I didn’t sum the figures correctly. The mistake made was that before them I had sold chicken to other customers, but the I sold to them were the ones that they ordered together, just like the way someone would would fried rice and chicken. And the way we calculate it over there is separately; the price has its own price while the chicken has its own as well. So I mistook the price of the chicken with rice to be the same price with just chicken alone, which was what the man had ordered for him and his children. Not knowing that what the man ordered was actually more expensive than the price of the other chicken I had served a customer earlier.
I went back joyfully to the bar to hand over the payment of the man’s bill to my colleague. My colleague collected it, counted the money and paused for a while.
“How much is here?” he asked. I told him. “How come? How many plates of chicken did you serve them?” “Four.” “Then how come their bill is sums up to this amount?” I gave him what I thought to be the right calculation. “And who told you that’s the price of chicken?” I told him how I had sold a plate of rice and chicken to a customer previously. “No, that chicken is different from the one you served these people.”
That’s when I found out the real price and realise I had collected incomplete payment.
Luckily, the man and his family had not yet left the table. I quickly rushed over to him.
“I’m so sorry, Sir. I actually miscalculated.” I explained everything to the man, but that got the man upset. “Get lost,” he replied annoyed. “Do you take me for a fool or something?” I stood there motionless and embarrassed. “You gave me your bill and I paid you. I don’t have any business with you.”
And just like that, he stood up and exited the hotel with his children. That was the first time I experienced what shortage felt like. However, I was less worried about the shortage I had incurred. What made me feel bad was that I and the man were getting along just fine, but what I had returned back to tell him made him feel like I mistook him for a fool and wanted to cheat him. But that was not true.
I got to encounter more problems on the way, and majority of them were caused by having too much crowd troop into your bar. It has a way of making you lose your mind and if you’re not careful experience shortage.
The perfect job I had pictured was starting to look like a nightmare. On several occasions I came across people that really pissed me off; both intentionally and unintentionally. Soon, the excitement of going to work started dying off gradually.
I wish someone had told me it would be like this, I probably would’ve avoided such nightmare of a job. But unfortunately, no one did. I had to experience it by myself.
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