Service at restaurants is much different overseas

By Emily Morgan
The Mirror

I was told by my mother before leaving for my semester in Greece that culture shock comes in many different forms and that I should not be surprised at the things that surprise me. Much to my dismay, I found out on my second day in Athens that even the restaurants are totally different.

The food in some ways is not that different unless you order dolmades [yummy] or some other traditional Greek dish. Most of the food you can recognize, but the experience is one that has never been duplicated in my travels throughout America.

Sometimes there are whole streets full of nothing but little cafés. As you walk down, you wonder how anyone ever gets seated. There are hardly any servers to be seen, but there are rows and rows of tables that are empty. Finally you figure you will sit and catch a server's eye, but they know that you have sat down. Oh, they know. You are supposed to just sit down. No waiting to be seated, no mess of a long line at busy times, no calling ahead for reservations, and no being pushed out the door because the restaurant needs to turn over the tables.

There is more than enough seating, and if this café is full, just choose a table across the street or down the way. After a few minutes of attempting to decrypt the menu, a server comes up to you and sets down a bottle of water and asks if you want anything to drink.

The Mythos is the cheapest beer that I have seen, but oftentimes a frappe is the drink of choice for me. It's a Greek specialty of instant coffee shaken with ice to make a wonderfully cool and refreshing drink. Take my advice: order it glykós and ?? ?a?? [double sweet and with milk].

Then the server will ignore you for a while. Then the server will bring your drinks and take your food orders and go back to ignoring you. For those of us used to getting food on the run, it's perplexing

Don't servers want tips from us? The answer is a resounding 'no'. Gratuity is included in the check at about 10% for most food and 19% for liquor, so if you leave a tip it is very small. Now, I have had very good service even if I have been a little bit. Eventually you learn that you have to stick up your hand and make eye contact to get yourself another bottle of water or more napkins.

Water is definitely not free, and there are no refills. That sort of thing you get used to. The food is usually very good, and you're expected to enjoy it. Real Greeks don't eat dinner until 9:00 or 9:30 at night, making me a wuss to want to eat at 6:30. The group takes a long time at cafés because it is so relaxing.

When we were in Athens it was the best thing in the middle of the afternoon to sit at a café and cool down with a frappe. Now that we've settled in Volos for the time being, we have come to another realization...they only speak English in Athens. Not that no one speaks English in Volos, but a lot fewer of the people in cafés do. I'm muddling through by pointing and smiling. Luckily for me "frappe" is the Greek word for a wonderful Greek drink.

**Emily Morgan is a junior studying abroad at the Drury Center in Volos, Greece.**