And the award for the most spectacularly terrible and embarrassing restaurant experience of my life goes to Georges.
It goes something like this:
Six colleagues and I walked into Georges with a booking. That's three Americans, two Germans, a Brit, and a French. Beginning of a bad joke, I know, I know.
First, the hostess seemed to have misplaced our reservation, so after some back and forth, we settled on a table inside rather than on the vast patio (which did, indeed, have empty tables that could accommodate us, and were never filled throughout the evening.)
Typical model-first-server-second-quality service... skipping people while pouring wine, walking away half way through taking the order... no big deal.
When our food arrived, six of us were delighted to tuck in. But unfortunately our French colleague was not so lucky to receive his food.
After 5 minutes of waiting, he asked the waitress, who, without acknowledging any mistake, said it was coming. The rest of us started eating.
Another 10 minutes went by without food for our colleague, so we flagged down another waitress who claimed there had been an "accident" with his order, and that it would come right out.
Finally, after about 10 MORE minutes - long after the rest of us as FINISHED our meals - our colleague's food came out with nary an apology. He did calmly express a bit of disappointment, and that he wished the waitress would make up for it in some way. She acknowledged that she would handle it. He ate awkwardly, alone, at the head of the table while the rest of us stared at our clean plates, putting a bit of a sour note on the evening.
When the bill came (I was paying), I noted that the waitress had not removed our colleague's cod. Our colleague, one of two who spoke French fluently enough to sort it out, called the waitress over to the table and asked about it. That's when she claimed that she removed several of the beers we drank to even out the cost, and walked away.
We added up the beverages, and realized she hadn't removed a single thing. She was summoned again.
This time she claimed that if she were to adjust the bill for us - ideally removing the cod that came after the end of the meal - that the cost would have to come out of her own pocket. A strange guilt trip, to be sure, but we asked to speak to her manager to sort it out.
Nearly 15 minutes went by, and the restaurant was emptying out. We noted our server huddling with another employee and pointing at our table. Eventually, the other employee walked over to clear away some stuff rom the table, and our French colleagued asked if he was the manager. His response was inconclusive: "There are several managers on the floor. How can I help?"
My colleague explained the situation, and the conversation got rather heated, as the gentleman was clearly unwilling to make any adjustment to the bill. Eventually I spoke up and told him the establishment should be embarrassed; if we're spending over 500 euros on a meal, we should expect them to do the honourable thing after such a mistake
The man walked away with the bill. Ten minutes went by. He returned to announce he had removed two beers from the bill. If it wasn't meant as an insult, I'd be shocked. The argument (in French) got heated again, as my colleague asked three times to speak to his boss, who the gentleman claimed didn't exist.
Finally, a threat: "You can speak to the director, but I'm warning you, she will put those two beers back onto the bill and leave you with nothing."
He walked away to supposedly summon the director, but another 10 minutes went by and no one came back. The restaurant was emptying, and it was after 11pm. We decided to stand up as a group and walk towards the exit, hoping to summon some sort of response to our problem with the bill.
We, indeed, got a response. We were quickly surrounded by staff members that seemed to appear out of nowhere, and a woman (the one who seated us) walked over and claimed she was the director. Our colleague explained the entire episode to her, and, after some quasi-insults from her about how cute it was that he brought his American colleagues to the restaurant, she removed the cod from the bill.
I paid the tab, and we left... but not before our waitress kindly wished us a good night. When that happened, another waitress told her off for being kind to us, right in front of us. And THAT'S the kind of place Georges is.
As far as I can tell, what happened was our waitress wanted to save face and not admit to us or her managers that she forgot to put in our colleague's food. Twice. So, she asked another staffer to pretend to be a manager, and all together avoided telling the actual management about the situation. When she was forced to, she lied and made it seem like we requested the food later, which isn't true.
All in all, it was an incredibly awkward, embarrassing, and uncomfortable evening. read more