the mcdonalds affair, the strange case of the strange bank teller, brothers burger blues
Today was quite interesting.
Hence this writeup is a bit long.
I ran a few errands for family earlier today. I skipped breakfast so I got painfully hungry at around 9 and slid into the nearest McDonald's branch.
As I was ordering, I noticed that the staff seemed to be tense and confused. The guy taking my order seemed distracted as well, asking his co-workers "is s/he all right?" periodically while i was still talking, which bordered on pissing me off.
I didn't let it get to me, and I got my late breakfast without hassle.
To keep cool, I must have convinced myself that the staff was going through something I had no hand in and therefore nothing to do with. Maybe a manager blew his/her top so early in the day. Or maybe someone at the cashier screwed up big-time and everyone was paralyzed.
But as I was biting into my sausage mcmuffin, i saw a male McDo staffer rush to open one of the establishment's doors, and another male staffer stride out cradling a female staffer in his arms. They were all in complete uniform, visors and everything, even the girl. The other staffers and the customers looked on warily.
In the arms of the guy who carried her, the female staffer looked unconscious... and so very small. Even a while after the two male staffers and their charge had gone, I couldn't finish my mcmuffin. It was a worrisome sight, a girl that small collapsing.
One of the other patrons, a middle-aged woman sitting by herself, said to the patrons seated at the other table: "Kids these days are so frail. It's because they don't eat enough vegetables. In my day, kids were forced to eat vegetables, that's how they grew up strong. They didn't faint like that, in my day."
She must have failed to notice that the guy who carried out the girl was himself very young. He must have been the same age as the girl, maybe younger - around 19 or 20. He was tall and lean, and apparently strong and healthy enough to carry another human being in his arms from one place to another.
But I thought about it anyway. Kids today do seem frail. I was delicate as a fucking flower when I was little, and I know a surprising number of people who remember spending almost their entire childhoods in sickbeds and school infirmaries.
Still, I've always thought that's just how kids are. I wonder if it was ever really any different, or if it was just one lucky lady who happened to grow up in a neighborhood where there were plenty of vegetables and healthy children to go around.
Going back to the incident: I wondered, How could a sick girl have gotten behind a fastfood counter? Wasn't there a policy about sick people being around food? Then again, she might not have had anything easily detectible - perhaps she fainted because of a sudden stressful occurrence. Or maybe her heart just gave.
(In spite of all the media buzz, that she could have been infected with A[H1N1] never once occurred to me while I was at McDo. I didn't hear such things from any of the other patrons either, who went on with their meals as I eventually did: as if nothing had happened.
(It did occur to me long after I was gone from McDo. I was already having lunch at the office and recounting the experience for the sake of breaking the sad silence, when I thought: O nga no. What if she had flu, or anything equally contagious?)
But that wasn't all that occupied my mind. I hate admitting that I was too hungry to notice, but that was the truth. I don't like being too much of anything - hungry or tired or sad, or whatever else - to pay attention or at least respect to the things going on around me. That is never an excuse.
I would like to go back to that McDonald's outfit with the right smile and the right tone of voice to inquire after that girl, and her co-workers who had worried about her and helped her. But I doubt I'll be in the condition to do that. And I doubt I can pass that way again anytime soon.
***
On my nth visit to a distant bank, a teller I didn't recognize greeted me with "Mataas ba ang grado ng salamin mo, o natural ka lang na tantalizing eyes?" [Do your glasses have a high grade, or do you just have naturally tantalizing eyes?]
It was hilarious. But I obviously wasn't primed for a comeback at the time. "I don't hear that often," was all I could answer. What else do you say to a new face that says such things out of the blue?
***
More things happened. I almost picked a fight with a cranky teller at a Western Union branch, I saw my aunt off at the airport on a deliciously stormy afternoon and few meaningful words were exchanged so now I am slightly paranoid, et cetera, et cetera, and now I am ready to drop. But I can't before I talk about my Brothers Burger experience.
As gourmets in Manila probably know, today marks the 10th anniversary of Brothers Burger, a local burger grill. There aren't many popular food shops in the Philippines that serve burgers that aren't the cut-and-dried-or-rather-fried patty sort, and Brothers Burger with its almost-fastfood appeal has found a good niche for attracting the A and B crowd. Even if their burgers are pricey, they are tasty enough to spread the word about, and people like saving up for BB (as it will henceforth be known) purchases on special dates.
BB launched a massive promotion for its 10th anniversary gimmick: over 50% off on two bestselling items, which are the Pounder and the Big Brothers burger. There was even a four-page full-color foldout celebrating BB's 10th anniversary in the Inquirer, the most widely-read broadsheet in the country.
The whole of Metro Manila slavered. This isn't the first time BB has pulled off a cut-price tactic, but from what I hear the previous attempts were more or less a success.
Alas, it didn't seem to be the case this time. This time, their media investments paid off and tons of people fell in line for their famous burgers. Those who came in early enough, came away with bags and bags of burgers and huge smiles on their faces; the rest were not so lucky.
I can only recount what happened in the branch I visited. First, they ran out of meat, so they had to cut off the line and tell the ones who came late "Sorry, we're all out." They should have made it clearer, really, that more patties were coming, but it appears they were so overwhelmed with the crowd that they decided it was just better to say "Sorry we're all out" instead of "Come back later, we'll have more."
- Which turned out to be a good idea, because some people ordered burgers by the fricking dozen, and the BB staff turned itself on its head trying to handle the workload. As a result of people ordering more burgers than they could carry individually, orders were backlogged, and people generally didn't get their orders within the 1 hour promised.
(BB should have imposed a quota, I think - maybe something like a maximum of 3 burgers per person. That way, more people get to sample their burgers, and they don't get backlogged as badly. Maybe next time?)
I actually came too late to make the cutoff. I was told I couldn't avail of the promo burgers anymore. But I stayed in line because I wanted to buy the new Wagyu burger for my dad. It was going to be a late Father's Day gift, so I didn't mind that the Wagyu wasn't part of the promo and that it was 100 pesos more expensive than the most expensive burger on their regular menu for crying out loud. My father had been curious about Wagyu for ages and by God, he deserved a taste.
When I got to the cashier, I was informed that I could still get the promo burgers after all, because some people ahead of me in line had left upon hearing that the patties were dwindling in number. Yatta! I cheerfully asked for 1 Wagyu burger and 2 Pounders (which, as the name implies, contain 1 pound of pure beef patty per burger. Truly a glorious invention.) and left to have dinner when they said I had to wait an hour for my order.
After exactly an hour, I came back. There was the start of an angry mob milling around the counter. One pudgy young woman in office wear was mouthing off about consumer rights, poor service, and being made to wait for over two hours. In the end she turbo-walked away with four (or five) large bags of burgers, presumably for her officemates.
The pretty and normally pleasant staffers were starting to get flustered, and the nagging from the customers was making them cranky. Apparently, a LOT of people hadn't received their orders yet.
The cooking staff was overloaded. It was not their fault; BB burgers take time to prepare, that's part of what makes them taste so good. The chefs can only handle so much at a time.
But after a while, I decided I didn't want to wait any longer and lose my temper just like everyone else. So I came up to the counter and asked anyone behind it who would answer, "Miss, is my order ready?" One of the three attendants took my receipt and gave it back to me with a sheepish smile. "It's not here yet, Ma'am," she said.
What did that mean? "How much longer? Where am I in the queue?" "Sorry, but it's not here yet," she just repeated. At which point, I felt despair sinking in.
I asked, as quietly as I could, "Is it possible to get a refund?" The attendant I was talking to looked shocked at first, then dejected. I felt the other customers shutting up and staring at me, listening intently to our exchange. What, was I the first person to ask for a refund?
"We can refund the Pounders," the attendant explained with some reluctance, "but I'm afraid we can't refund the Wagyu." Which was the most expensive one so I asked, "How come?"
"Well, you see, the Wagyu burger is prepared by a long and complicated process, and we can't just stop it or it'll go bad..."
She was grasping at straws. I still don't understand why they needed the Wagyu order so badly. I asked outright if they'd already prepared it; she replied with a blank stare.
"If you haven't prepared it yet, why can't we just cancel the order, so I can get my money back and you can give my Pounders away to the other people in line?"
"Sorry, ma'am, we can't just cancel the Wagyu order," she said, and she was pleading now.
"Okay, well," I suggested, "can I just come back for it some other time? I'll just cancel the orders for the Pounders and return for the Wagyu, say, tomorrow. I'll keep the receipt so we have proof that it's been paid for."
The poor thing looked very lost at that. She seized the first opportunity she got to abandon our convo. I called her attention back and said "Miss, I'm really sorry about this, but I still go home to the provinces and I can't spare the time. I'm very sorry, but please prioritize my order. If I can't get a refund on the Wagyu, I can wait for it, if you start on it now."
At the very least, she seemed relieved and grateful that I wasn't nagging or making snide comments about the service. She asked me nicely to wait while she talked to the kitchen staff. I thanked her and stepped back from the counter, so other frustrated customers can step forward and harrass her.
I really had to admire the BB serving staff. None of the girls backed down under pressure. But I could believe that they had never experienced that sort of massive stress on the job before. If I were in their position I would have excused myself from the counter and broken something in the storage room, making sure that the most irate customers were around to hear. Clearly I am not built to work in the service sector.
My attendant came up to me shortly and said "Ma'am, we're working on the Wagyu. 10 minutes." She also promised that the Pounders were on the way as well, so I didn't need them refunded.
It didn't take 10 minutes, it took more like 20 (regular cooking time for BB's fancy burgers, which was a clear sign that they hadn't actually started working on the Wagyu before I asked if they could), and in all I was waiting for my order for over 2 bloody hours, too - but I got my burgers and got the hell out of there before I could hear another "HOW COME SHE GOT HERS FIRST, SHE WAS BEHIND ME IN THE LINE" escape another set of hungry lips.
So that's the story of how I got my burgers faster than everyone else - I ordered the most expensive thing on their menu. And then I asked for a refund, which may or may not have helped.
I can't help but think that some of the customers who came today were exploiting a basic management error without being aware of how much trouble they were causing. And I can't help but blame greed for some of it. These were easily people who could afford BB burgers at their regular prices, and probably did at every opportunity - and there they were sounding off about bad service and customer protection laws, when they were the ones ordering 20 damn burgers at a time and holding up production.
I mean, who needs 20 burgers? If they were only aware of how overloaded the kitchen staff was, they could I dunno - have some of their orders canceled, or cancel their orders entirely, and find food elsewhere, instead of mouthing off.
Of course, BB management was to blame also - to advertise the affair aggressively and then fail to deliver, that's just not good.
I am afraid the Wagyu we got might have been a little undercooked, and it was partly due to my rushing - my father said it wasn't, it was cooked just right... but did say he expected better. I'm just sad because the whole day should have made for awesome publicity for BB, and a happy affair for its patrons, if only it had been better handled.
Hence this writeup is a bit long.
I ran a few errands for family earlier today. I skipped breakfast so I got painfully hungry at around 9 and slid into the nearest McDonald's branch.
As I was ordering, I noticed that the staff seemed to be tense and confused. The guy taking my order seemed distracted as well, asking his co-workers "is s/he all right?" periodically while i was still talking, which bordered on pissing me off.
I didn't let it get to me, and I got my late breakfast without hassle.
To keep cool, I must have convinced myself that the staff was going through something I had no hand in and therefore nothing to do with. Maybe a manager blew his/her top so early in the day. Or maybe someone at the cashier screwed up big-time and everyone was paralyzed.
But as I was biting into my sausage mcmuffin, i saw a male McDo staffer rush to open one of the establishment's doors, and another male staffer stride out cradling a female staffer in his arms. They were all in complete uniform, visors and everything, even the girl. The other staffers and the customers looked on warily.
In the arms of the guy who carried her, the female staffer looked unconscious... and so very small. Even a while after the two male staffers and their charge had gone, I couldn't finish my mcmuffin. It was a worrisome sight, a girl that small collapsing.
One of the other patrons, a middle-aged woman sitting by herself, said to the patrons seated at the other table: "Kids these days are so frail. It's because they don't eat enough vegetables. In my day, kids were forced to eat vegetables, that's how they grew up strong. They didn't faint like that, in my day."
She must have failed to notice that the guy who carried out the girl was himself very young. He must have been the same age as the girl, maybe younger - around 19 or 20. He was tall and lean, and apparently strong and healthy enough to carry another human being in his arms from one place to another.
But I thought about it anyway. Kids today do seem frail. I was delicate as a fucking flower when I was little, and I know a surprising number of people who remember spending almost their entire childhoods in sickbeds and school infirmaries.
Still, I've always thought that's just how kids are. I wonder if it was ever really any different, or if it was just one lucky lady who happened to grow up in a neighborhood where there were plenty of vegetables and healthy children to go around.
Going back to the incident: I wondered, How could a sick girl have gotten behind a fastfood counter? Wasn't there a policy about sick people being around food? Then again, she might not have had anything easily detectible - perhaps she fainted because of a sudden stressful occurrence. Or maybe her heart just gave.
(In spite of all the media buzz, that she could have been infected with A[H1N1] never once occurred to me while I was at McDo. I didn't hear such things from any of the other patrons either, who went on with their meals as I eventually did: as if nothing had happened.
(It did occur to me long after I was gone from McDo. I was already having lunch at the office and recounting the experience for the sake of breaking the sad silence, when I thought: O nga no. What if she had flu, or anything equally contagious?)
But that wasn't all that occupied my mind. I hate admitting that I was too hungry to notice, but that was the truth. I don't like being too much of anything - hungry or tired or sad, or whatever else - to pay attention or at least respect to the things going on around me. That is never an excuse.
I would like to go back to that McDonald's outfit with the right smile and the right tone of voice to inquire after that girl, and her co-workers who had worried about her and helped her. But I doubt I'll be in the condition to do that. And I doubt I can pass that way again anytime soon.
***
On my nth visit to a distant bank, a teller I didn't recognize greeted me with "Mataas ba ang grado ng salamin mo, o natural ka lang na tantalizing eyes?" [Do your glasses have a high grade, or do you just have naturally tantalizing eyes?]
It was hilarious. But I obviously wasn't primed for a comeback at the time. "I don't hear that often," was all I could answer. What else do you say to a new face that says such things out of the blue?
***
More things happened. I almost picked a fight with a cranky teller at a Western Union branch, I saw my aunt off at the airport on a deliciously stormy afternoon and few meaningful words were exchanged so now I am slightly paranoid, et cetera, et cetera, and now I am ready to drop. But I can't before I talk about my Brothers Burger experience.
As gourmets in Manila probably know, today marks the 10th anniversary of Brothers Burger, a local burger grill. There aren't many popular food shops in the Philippines that serve burgers that aren't the cut-and-dried-or-rather-fried patty sort, and Brothers Burger with its almost-fastfood appeal has found a good niche for attracting the A and B crowd. Even if their burgers are pricey, they are tasty enough to spread the word about, and people like saving up for BB (as it will henceforth be known) purchases on special dates.
BB launched a massive promotion for its 10th anniversary gimmick: over 50% off on two bestselling items, which are the Pounder and the Big Brothers burger. There was even a four-page full-color foldout celebrating BB's 10th anniversary in the Inquirer, the most widely-read broadsheet in the country.
The whole of Metro Manila slavered. This isn't the first time BB has pulled off a cut-price tactic, but from what I hear the previous attempts were more or less a success.
Alas, it didn't seem to be the case this time. This time, their media investments paid off and tons of people fell in line for their famous burgers. Those who came in early enough, came away with bags and bags of burgers and huge smiles on their faces; the rest were not so lucky.
I can only recount what happened in the branch I visited. First, they ran out of meat, so they had to cut off the line and tell the ones who came late "Sorry, we're all out." They should have made it clearer, really, that more patties were coming, but it appears they were so overwhelmed with the crowd that they decided it was just better to say "Sorry we're all out" instead of "Come back later, we'll have more."
- Which turned out to be a good idea, because some people ordered burgers by the fricking dozen, and the BB staff turned itself on its head trying to handle the workload. As a result of people ordering more burgers than they could carry individually, orders were backlogged, and people generally didn't get their orders within the 1 hour promised.
(BB should have imposed a quota, I think - maybe something like a maximum of 3 burgers per person. That way, more people get to sample their burgers, and they don't get backlogged as badly. Maybe next time?)
I actually came too late to make the cutoff. I was told I couldn't avail of the promo burgers anymore. But I stayed in line because I wanted to buy the new Wagyu burger for my dad. It was going to be a late Father's Day gift, so I didn't mind that the Wagyu wasn't part of the promo and that it was 100 pesos more expensive than the most expensive burger on their regular menu for crying out loud. My father had been curious about Wagyu for ages and by God, he deserved a taste.
When I got to the cashier, I was informed that I could still get the promo burgers after all, because some people ahead of me in line had left upon hearing that the patties were dwindling in number. Yatta! I cheerfully asked for 1 Wagyu burger and 2 Pounders (which, as the name implies, contain 1 pound of pure beef patty per burger. Truly a glorious invention.) and left to have dinner when they said I had to wait an hour for my order.
After exactly an hour, I came back. There was the start of an angry mob milling around the counter. One pudgy young woman in office wear was mouthing off about consumer rights, poor service, and being made to wait for over two hours. In the end she turbo-walked away with four (or five) large bags of burgers, presumably for her officemates.
The pretty and normally pleasant staffers were starting to get flustered, and the nagging from the customers was making them cranky. Apparently, a LOT of people hadn't received their orders yet.
The cooking staff was overloaded. It was not their fault; BB burgers take time to prepare, that's part of what makes them taste so good. The chefs can only handle so much at a time.
But after a while, I decided I didn't want to wait any longer and lose my temper just like everyone else. So I came up to the counter and asked anyone behind it who would answer, "Miss, is my order ready?" One of the three attendants took my receipt and gave it back to me with a sheepish smile. "It's not here yet, Ma'am," she said.
What did that mean? "How much longer? Where am I in the queue?" "Sorry, but it's not here yet," she just repeated. At which point, I felt despair sinking in.
I asked, as quietly as I could, "Is it possible to get a refund?" The attendant I was talking to looked shocked at first, then dejected. I felt the other customers shutting up and staring at me, listening intently to our exchange. What, was I the first person to ask for a refund?
"We can refund the Pounders," the attendant explained with some reluctance, "but I'm afraid we can't refund the Wagyu." Which was the most expensive one so I asked, "How come?"
"Well, you see, the Wagyu burger is prepared by a long and complicated process, and we can't just stop it or it'll go bad..."
She was grasping at straws. I still don't understand why they needed the Wagyu order so badly. I asked outright if they'd already prepared it; she replied with a blank stare.
"If you haven't prepared it yet, why can't we just cancel the order, so I can get my money back and you can give my Pounders away to the other people in line?"
"Sorry, ma'am, we can't just cancel the Wagyu order," she said, and she was pleading now.
"Okay, well," I suggested, "can I just come back for it some other time? I'll just cancel the orders for the Pounders and return for the Wagyu, say, tomorrow. I'll keep the receipt so we have proof that it's been paid for."
The poor thing looked very lost at that. She seized the first opportunity she got to abandon our convo. I called her attention back and said "Miss, I'm really sorry about this, but I still go home to the provinces and I can't spare the time. I'm very sorry, but please prioritize my order. If I can't get a refund on the Wagyu, I can wait for it, if you start on it now."
At the very least, she seemed relieved and grateful that I wasn't nagging or making snide comments about the service. She asked me nicely to wait while she talked to the kitchen staff. I thanked her and stepped back from the counter, so other frustrated customers can step forward and harrass her.
I really had to admire the BB serving staff. None of the girls backed down under pressure. But I could believe that they had never experienced that sort of massive stress on the job before. If I were in their position I would have excused myself from the counter and broken something in the storage room, making sure that the most irate customers were around to hear. Clearly I am not built to work in the service sector.
My attendant came up to me shortly and said "Ma'am, we're working on the Wagyu. 10 minutes." She also promised that the Pounders were on the way as well, so I didn't need them refunded.
It didn't take 10 minutes, it took more like 20 (regular cooking time for BB's fancy burgers, which was a clear sign that they hadn't actually started working on the Wagyu before I asked if they could), and in all I was waiting for my order for over 2 bloody hours, too - but I got my burgers and got the hell out of there before I could hear another "HOW COME SHE GOT HERS FIRST, SHE WAS BEHIND ME IN THE LINE" escape another set of hungry lips.
So that's the story of how I got my burgers faster than everyone else - I ordered the most expensive thing on their menu. And then I asked for a refund, which may or may not have helped.
I can't help but think that some of the customers who came today were exploiting a basic management error without being aware of how much trouble they were causing. And I can't help but blame greed for some of it. These were easily people who could afford BB burgers at their regular prices, and probably did at every opportunity - and there they were sounding off about bad service and customer protection laws, when they were the ones ordering 20 damn burgers at a time and holding up production.
I mean, who needs 20 burgers? If they were only aware of how overloaded the kitchen staff was, they could I dunno - have some of their orders canceled, or cancel their orders entirely, and find food elsewhere, instead of mouthing off.
Of course, BB management was to blame also - to advertise the affair aggressively and then fail to deliver, that's just not good.
I am afraid the Wagyu we got might have been a little undercooked, and it was partly due to my rushing - my father said it wasn't, it was cooked just right... but did say he expected better. I'm just sad because the whole day should have made for awesome publicity for BB, and a happy affair for its patrons, if only it had been better handled.