The Customer is Always Wrong

The Customer is Always Wrong
         It's an issue that every retail worker or waiter at a restaurant has to deal with: customers. Customers are either the rudest people on the planet or the nicest people you've met, there's no in-between. After dealing with a rude customer, all you want to do is quit your job and give them the middle finger; however, everyone needs money and you'd be quitting your job every night of work if that were the case. So you just wonder, "what did I do to deserve this crappy treatment?"
         Because I work in a restaurant, I experience rude customers all the time. Some of the worst kinds of customers are those that send everything back to the kitchen. They come up with different excuses to send it back, like, "This steak is supposed to be medium rare but it looks like it's medium rare plus". So I reply in a happy and calm voice, "Oh I'm so sorry, I'll let the chef know. It shouldn't take too long". What I really wanted to say was, "How could you possibly tell the difference between medium rare and medium rare plus? Just eat the damn steak and quit bothering me", but that might get me fired.
         The motto is, "The customer is always right", but that is not true at all. The customers don't work in the restaurant or the retail store so how could they know more about your job than you do? There's a simple answer to that question: they don't. They love to think and act like they do, but in reality, they are just there to buy stuff, they don't pay attention to how things are run in the store. Because of this, the new motto should be, "The customer is always wrong, but you should act like they're right". That seems a bit more fitting.
         One of the funniest things to happen since I began working in a restaurant is when an old jerk burned himself. I know, it doesn't seem like something to laugh at, but if you knew the guy then you'd think it was funny too. So, I gave this old man his pasta and he didn't say thank you (one of my pet peeves). Then, he rudely demanded that I give him more oil for his pasta, which was a strange request but whatever. I came back with the oil a couple of minutes later and he acted like I had been gone for an hour. He started yelling, "It's about damn time", and "Where the hell have you been?", and I was shocked. I just apologized because you know, the customer is always right, and then I told him that the oil was very hot and be careful with it. I went back and talked with my coworker that was waiting on his table and he said that the old guy was a dick the entire night. He kept sending food back, complaining about his drinks, and other annoying customer stuff. So I tried to avoid that guy for the rest of the night. That was impossible because apparently he spilled the very hot oil on his lap and started freaking out. His wife acted like he was dying because he spilled a little oil on his pants. He claimed that I didn't tell him it was hot and that it was all my fault, so the owner of the restaurant got mad at me. I explained what happened, and I had the backup of my coworkers to tell him that this guy was a horrible person and that he's lying. I didn't get in trouble for it and our manager offered him free drinks because you know, the customer is always right. And the funny thing is, he accepted a free drink and then complained about his free drink. This guy was a real class act.
         Stories like those make you realize that people are strange and rude. Anyone who has a job where you have to work with customers knows this. Nobody is rude all the time, of course, but for some reason, restaurants, stores, and other retail places bring out the worst of people. It is easier to see who is genuinely nice when you work at these places. Sometimes, the rude people can really get under my skin. I think about what I did wrong and what I did to deserve this, but there's never anything that I did wrong, the customer is always wrong.

Self-Evaluation

         The most challenging thing about this essay was putting together the right story to tell for the purpose of the essay. I was thinking about all of the bad experiences I have had in the restaurant industry and I could not choose a story. I thought to myself, "Do I go for the story that shows a customer being blatantly disrespectful?", or "Do I tell a story of a customer that was being ignorant?". I chose the latter because I felt like it could be expanded upon in three pages and I could tie in more humor.
         The most rewarding part of this essay was being able to tell a story and be creative with it. It was more fun to write than a typical research paper or something like that, so it was easier to write. I also thought that my ideas flowed easier while writing this because I am just putting my memory on to paper. Adding in the humor was easy with this because the story is already comical itself. So the narrative plus the humor made this an easy paper to write.
         The professional model essay helped me think of ways to make a story about customer service funny and interesting. David Sedaris' essay was about airline customer service and mine was about restaurant customer service, so they weren't too different. I felt like my essay resembled his, but not too much.
         I diverged from the model by only telling a story about one person. Sedaris used many different small examples of rude people. I did this because I felt like one person was good enough to prove my point. I didn't need to give small stories about different people that give the same main idea. I felt like if I elaborated on one person then it would be a better essay and more interesting and funny to read. Also, David Sedaris used a lot of slang in the essay to make it funny, but I did not feel like that was necessary so I did not use that method from the model.