My job and love for traveling has coincided well and it has blessed me with the opportunity to travel domestically and to some foreign countries. Hence I have been exposed quite a fair bit and one of the things that amazes me are our bad habits in public. We Malaysians, regardless of race, go around touting how friendly we are, how well we treat our guest, blah, blah into bullshit kingdom!
We have all kinds of bad habits and most of the times we display them in public places like hotels, shopping areas and restaurants. I am not talking about the hawker centers or side stall but restaurants that are supposed to be tourist spots who at that time was doing brisk business with tourist. So despite the poor service, people are still flocking to these places. What's up with that? Is it that our tour operators don't care about the kind of experience that the customer's are getting? Or is it that we have come to have such low expectations when it comes to service?
My latest experience took us to Melaka where we queued up for more than 20mins at a Chicken Ball Rice restaurant called Formosa. When we finally got a table, the server took her sweet time coming over to take our order. That was fine. We ordered and then waited another 20mins for food. Now correct me if I am wrong but isn't chicken rice already prepared?? Everything is already "pre-made" so what was the waiting for? That was not the punch line.
Our dishes came, but our rice didn't. When we asked our server, she went to the counter, looked at our order and said we didn't order the rice! Isn't the shop called Chicken Rice Ball Restaurant? Isn't that their speciality? Even then, who the heck eats chicken rice without the rice??? No one eats just the chicken doused in soya sauce and sesame oil!! That's a sure fire way to get your diabetes up! She then sulkily went to get our rice. No apologies, no attempt to move faster to get our rice. Just sulking to show what painful arses we are for making her work.
I am sure we see these types of bad service in a lot of places and I don't want to just point out Melaka as the bad example because we also had a very good experience for a cafe on Jonker Street called 1511. It was quaint like all shops and serves western and local. The waiter was very friendly is getting us a big table and he was so patient in explaining the menu as it was SO obvious that we were first timers. When the food came, he knew who ordered what and proceeded to explain how to enjoy it.
I don't think we need to be idolized and worshipped when we go out eating or shopping or were at a hotel. I think it is reasonable to expect people to be nice to you and take the trouble to ensure you have a damn good experience at their shops.
Another bad habit I think is the way we call out to the waiters or sales assistant. Do you realize that we always call out "HALLO" and it has come to a point that we call it out rudely? It's not even "hello" but "HALLO!". In CAPITALS!! What is wrong in calling out "Excuse Me"? It's the same when counter staff calls us. In the western countries they will say "I can help the next person in line". Here it is "HALLO!" or"NEXT!".
We have another bad habit queueing up as well, whether it is at the cashier, ticket counter or just going to the toilet. We will rush and form queues in front of each counter, cashier, urinal, etc. Can't we use the round robin way where everyone queues in one line and each goes to the next counter that is open. Unfortunately I see this at airports as well. For some reason, it isn't like that in Western countries. They all line up round robin and will take the next counter that is open, hence it is fair and efficient.
It's the same in driving as well. At an intersection, everyone allows the car in front to go first so each takes a turn allowing the other side to pass. When I first drove in the US, I didn't realize that everyone was giving way and did my KL thing where I just drove off without waiting for the other car to go first. I was honked and shouted at!! But I deserved it!
We are very quick to criticize the west when it comes to their lifestyle and I do admit, there are many flaws but who are we to judge and criticize? Can't we just take the good habits and leave the others out?
In Hong Kong, if people going up the escalators are not walking up, they will stand to the right to allow those in a hurry to walk up. My son found that so interesting that he has adopted it back home. Even a 9 year old then could tell what is right and we couldn't. Instead we are good at locking people up, calling other races names and doing all this shit in the name of God. Sigh!
Well, let's hope those who read this will pass this on and try to build some good habits so that others may follow. Hopefully these are baby steps we can take. One at a time.
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