The best part of yesterday
January 30, 2009Before we moved here, we decided that we were going to be big tippers because the service industry workers here don’t make very big salaries and we want to spread the wealth around. (When the standard tip is about $0.55, it’s not hard to be a big tipper.) I usually leave the decision of how much to tip to Paul and sometimes he is a VERY big tipper.
Paul’s favorite restaurant is Aroos Damascus, a Syrian restaurant a few blocks from our apartment. We have eaten there together about four times. Now, the waiters see Paul coming and herd him into their sections. There is a main waiter who takes the order and oversees the section and there are assistant waiters who bring the dishes, food, bread, etc. Our assistant waiter brought out the usual plates, silverware, bottle of water and plastic cups. Our head waiter saw this and told him to bring out glass glasses. No plastic for us. I looked around at the other tables to see if glass glasses were the new policy. No, everyone else had plastic cups.
It was a moist night (there was dew on our car when we got back to it – weird) and I was having trouble with the salt shaker because it had gathered moisture and the salt wasn’t coming out. I tried to solve this problem inconspicuously, but that was impossible, so the waiter saw what was happening and brought me salt from another table (which had the same problem unfortunately).
The bread is pocket bread baked fresh on the premises and the bread they were bringing us was almost too hot to eat. It was literally right out of the oven. At one point, our bread waiter collected the “old” bread from our basket and put in fresh hot bread even though the “old” bread had been there about 3 minutes.
They clucked over us and saw to our every need. When Paul’s meat entre arrived, the head waiter set it down with a flourish and said “Special, for my friend!”
A little good will goes a long way, especially in the Arab culture. Diplomats could learn from this.
We basked in the v.i.p. treatment then tipped big and went home.
Living the Travel Channel 
It should be noted that that the vast majority of the waiters, clerks, salespeople, attendants are very, very friendly and helpful BEFORE one even gets a chance to tip them, so it’s a pleasure to do so when the time comes!
Good for you two! Isn’t it fun?
Dolly Levi would love you two!!!