"I'd never waited tables in my life and I just went into restaurants, filled out applications. The first day I went out, there was a restaurant that asked if I could start training next week. I went home and told my boyfriend and he said, 'The Russian Tea Room. That's a good restaurant.'

I was seventeen years old, and I got the job the next week. That was in late August and by Christmas time I was making probably $1200 a week. I blew it all on drugs, alcohol and cocaine. It was 1977."

--Waiter in the Theater District

......

Here's Roger again going on about the quasi mental case that owns the restaurant where he works, just north of Houston street. The interesting thing is that Roger's owner is less an anomoly than the norm for a restaurant owner in Manhattan.

Don't you wish you could move to Manhattan and wait tables?

**********

The bartenders probably have the most power. I think because they are trusted with the money. That's one thing I'm glad I don't have to be responsible for because our owner is very paranoid. He's afraid that people are stealing from him all the time; he's worried that we're stealing alcohol on the job. And that's something none of us are doing. Every once in awhile, we'll pour ourselves a drink. It's nothing to be worried about.

Except for the guy who got arrested for stealing, but that was a fluke. But of course, now the owner is all paranoid again. "Who else is stealing from me?"

I've never met anyone like our owner. I've seen him throw things at people. He used to drink a lot more, I guess, but he doesn't drink anymore. But he used to drink and I guess he used to be drunk at work and threaten people's lives, and beat people up.

He's just...I don't know. If someone told me that this person existed, I wouldn't believe it. But having met him...It's crazy. Always interesting with our owner.

He's just get's so angry. And his way of dealing with things is, "Well, I'll just bash his fucking face in." Not that he always does it, but I once heard a story that his partner was stealing from him and he dragged the partner into the street and beat him up. Like beat him until he was inches from his life.

That was back in his drinking days, I guess. One of my first run-ins with him was when he walked into the restaurant and the beer guy was there trying to make a delivery and overcharged the restaurant. Our owner went up and unscrewed the bar tap and winged it at the guy. The guy kinda' jumped out of the way and then left.

That was my first run in with him, and I thought, "What am I getting into?"

So needless to say, everyone is a little afraid of him. He likes me and I think he's pretty happy with most of the servers at this point. He just told me tonight, "I think I'm in a pretty good place with my servers. I like everyone there. I trust everyone." So everything's pretty good.

So it's good when he's on your side, and if you ask, "Hey, can I leave a little early tonight?" He'll say, "Sure."

What you don't want is him not on your side. Then it's hell. Ya' know? If he's not on your side, chances are you won't even last very long. He'll just find some little reason and he'll be, "Get the fuck out of my bar." Ya' know?

A lot of times it doesn't even make sense. He'll fire...once you're there for like a month or two, you're pretty much in, unless you really mess something up. If you can kinda' gain his trust... but some people don't make it that long. His problem, I think, and the reason we don't have really amazing servers...We get people with really amazing experience and they come in and he'll be, "They look a little untrustworthy. Tell them not to come back tomorrow." Just by the way they look. He does that a lot.

So a lot of people who work there, either by some fluke...got the job while he was out of town, and when he came back they were there, or whatever...

8:24:35 AM     comment []