Saturday, February 2, 2008

From Behind The Counter - A whole new perspective

(Courtesy : phdcomics.com)

Scenario 1:

You walk into a restaurant. Loads of things on the menu.. Huge queue!!!! You stand in line, hoping to decide till you get to the counter.. You don't.. The cashier seems impatient as you carefully order what you want, and customize it to your tastes.. As you wait with your friend for your food, you complain about the service, about how rude the cashier is and so on...............

Scenario 2:

You are a graduate student in a foreign land, taking care of your monthly expenses by working as a cashier at an eatery in college. You have an important submission in the evening!!! There is a bug in your code, which has kept you up all night - and is still unsolved. You stand at the desk staring at that happy-go-lucky undergrad who can't figure out whether he wants chicken or steak in his quesadilla........

That, my dear, is life hitting you with perspective..

It would be unfair to say though, that my experience as a cashier has been all bad.. You do come across some interesting characters.. Take for example, this red-headed guy who would always order the same thing in the very same words even "A number 7 with no lettuce on the taco". He'd be there every morning before the counters opened, be one of the first to order, and then eat his "number 7 with no lettuce on the taco" while watching a movie on his laptop.

Then there was this shrivelled old man, who always bought a hot dog with cole slaw from the convenience store and walked by. Never said a word. He, for some reason, has become the epitome of loneliness for me.

And then there were the people I worked with.. In spite of all their troubles and worries, they managed to smile and crack jokes the whole time.. Hats off to them..

3 comments:

Vineet Rajan said...

:) u said it. at times we take so many thing for granted and we never realise it till we get on the other side. we complain so many time about bad service. but then again, its there job to be to cheerful. maybe some bit of effort should go into it. dont you think?

Loving Life said...

True.. All I am saying is that we can cut them some slack.. They're human too :)

Vineet Rajan said...

Reading this post all over again; makes it even more interesting when I look at where you are now!