Reactions to some stuff ...

Sorry I haven’t been keeping u with these journal posts, but here are a couple reactions to a few events in my like involving Asian American culture.
A couple weeks ago I went out to eat at this Chinese restaurant, Han Gong on Taraval Street, with a group of friends. I was actually a little surprised that the service was excellent and the food was really good. I mean usually there are no problems with the food at the other Chinese restaurants that I have eaten at, but the service is usually just alright. This time, the waiter was very nice and accommodating. We felt kind of bad because we ordered one of the set meals, but wanted to change a couple of the dishes. For example, we asked to change the steamed oysters to the honey walnut prawns because only two out of the seven of us liked oysters. At the other places that I eat at, the people would have been a little mad if we wanted to change some things and be a kind of snotty about it, but this guy was really nice and said “sure no problem whatever you like.” Then at the end of the meal, a friend actually made a pie for dessert, so we needed some clean plates to eat it and the waiter kindly brought us some. Usually the workers don’t like it when their patrons stay for a long time, but this restaurant didn’t care that we were there for almost three hours and were very nice the whole time. Comparing this place with others, this one definitely takes the cake on service, taste, and quality. I was amazed that this place was so nice and I am definitely going to come back in the future to have another great meal.
On another note, I got really angry at this Chinese American customer I rang up at my work last week. So here’s what happened: I was working the cashier on a Saturday night at Aéropostale and then this mother and daughter are next in line, I greet them and ask for their e-mail to send them coupons. The daughter said sure and was going to spell it out, but then her mother asked how much their sweatshirt was going to be first, and I told her $29.99. She thought it was going to be fifty percent off, which would have been $19.95, and she wanted me to adjust the price because our sign at the door say “50% off tops”. But I had to tell her that underneath it states ‘Selected styles’ and that the price point above the sweatshirt also says it’s $29.99 not 50% off (like other tops do). Then she said fine, and still decides to get it. When I ask her daughter for her e-mail again, she begins to spell it out, but then her mom says “No!” really forcefully. And what pissed me off was, the mother then begins to speak I Cantonese saying: “No don’t give it to her because she didn’t give you the 50% off. If she gave it to you then you’d give her anything; phone number, e-mail, whatever. But she didn’t so don’t give it.” This made me really angry because she assumed that since I don’t look Chinese I couldn’t possibly understand her and that it’s okay to speak badly of someone in another language. Well I understood every word and I really wanted to nicely call her out on it, but I didn’t. I was going to say to her daughter that I understood her and that I don’t make the prices and I can’t just overwrite the system and change it to the price YOU want. Also what is a little ironic is that she probably thinks that not giving her e-mail hurts me or the store, but it actually just means they won’t be able to save money with the coupons they could get. People are always trying to bargain in our store and don’t read the signs. I can’t believe people are so stingy and get so touchy on a mistake that they made by not reading the signs. I really hate it when people make assumptions based on looks and speak meanly in another language in front of you.