Bad Service?

When my excolleagues - Mich and Ah Xiong, and I went for dinner and after-dinner drinks on Fri night, we have encountered the same 'treatment' in 2 different F&B outlet.

To digress a little. You must be wondering why for someone who has been putting weight recently, I have been so indulgent in food, especially after you hear about the food I had. However, before you chide me for the lack of discipline, I must stress first that this is not the focus of what I am going to say next, so please leave your shaking of head to the last paragraph.

Back to the 'treatment' which we have been subject to. My colleagues and I have quite a good appetite on Friday. We managed to finish either our food or the drink not long after they are served. We were initially hoping that after we have satisfied our stomachs, we can then focus on catching up with one another. Afterall, we have not seen one another for some time and we missed the chats we had when we were working in the same office.

Much to our chagrin, the waitresses at the restaurant kept hovering our tables and clearing away the plates and cups - a very explicit signal for us to leave. When I asked one of the waitress to add more water, she has actually given me a blank look. I have to repeat my request several times. Is this a sign of my poor command of Chinese or does she have a hearing problem? In the end, she even attempted to take the entire glass away, until the Manager spotted that there seemed some confusion and walked over to assist. We were not unreasonable. We left soon after when we saw many people queuing outside waiting to be seated.

We adjourned to a coffee outlet again thinking that we should now be able to chit chat leisurely. It was the same kind of scenario. After we finished our drinks and cake, the waitress kept clearing away the glasses and plate, disrupting our conversations. Then she attempted to get us to order more. When we declined, she even asked us if we would like to ask for the bill. Fine. We could always pay first but stay on for our chit chat. After we have paid, she again came over to clear the last glass which my colleague has just finished drinking. Alright. We were not ignorant of the blatant 'hint', so we left soon after.

Is it this difficult to find a place where you can enjoy a quiet chit chat with your friends without constantly being 'harassed' by 'over-enthusiastic' waitresses/ waiters?

Am I asking too much to be given some peace while I am enjoying both the food and the chit chat while the restaurants can leave the clearing up to after we leave?

I thought it is commonly understood protocol that a well-trained and professional waitress / waiter will not never intrude or impose on the customers, but rather be in the background but will be more than willing to help when a customer has a request. Is this too ideal a picture to be painted for our service level? Perhaps before we look at going the extra mile for services (GEMS), we should first try to get the basics right.

Notwithstanding these 'hiccups' for the night, we still have had a pretty enjoyable chat and we parted the night with promises of more meet ups.

P.S. The brownie at the coffee outlet was indeed delicious and mouth watering.