In the world of restaurants, as in the real world, technology slowly creeps into our lives bringing with it a loss of innocence and hopefully enough advantages to make it worthwhile. One of the advantages not to be overlooked are the new ways it provides to terrorize and torment those around us. An example of this occurred when I worked as a manager in El Torito.
In diners, servers still use a simple pen and check pad to write down their food orders, send them to the kitchen, and finally present them as a bill to the customer. Every other restaurant I've ever worked for, however, used some form of computer system with which to perform these tasks. As the server enters an order into the computer the appropriate items are printed into the kitchen on a dupe. One of the valuable features these systems usually offered is the ability to include modifiers on an order so that a server can indicate any special instructions to the cooks without having to run in and try to get their attention. Keys that printed 'Medium Rare' or 'No Butter' or a generic 'Wait For Instructions' were made available in the original set up of the computer. In El Torito I discovered that I could add to or edit these preprogrammed suite of available phrases.
El Torito was a split level restaurant situated on the ground floor of the Empire State Building. Upstairs, on street level, was a cantina with a little one man kitchen offering a limited selection from the main menu, mostly appetizers. Atef was the soft spoken, young, Egyptian man who worked up there five days a week. He was a good, solid worker who knew enough English to understand what he needed to do and always did what he was asked. Joe worked the bar.
One time I was feeling a bit mischevious and I programmed a new modifier key on the computer that would print the words "Fuck You, Atef!' whenever it was pressed. I showed it to Joe. On his first food order Joe pressed this new key. Atef was clearly upset when he saw it. He came out from behind the kitchen and showed the dupe to Joe who, of course, acted totally bewildered. He assured Atef that he knew nothing of this and that there must be something wrong with the computer. On the next order Joe again sent the disturbing message to Atef who responded by running downstairs to the main kitchen to see if the computer was defaming any of the other cooks. Since the bar's orders only printed in the upstairs kitchen noone else knew what Atef was talking about. Joe, knowing that a computer technician was already scheduled to come by for some unrelated maintainence comforted Atef by telling him that he had called in a repair man. Throughout the lunch rush, every time Joe placed an order, he pressed the new modifier I had created.
When I saw Atef he was very disturbed. He wanted me to explain to him why the computer was suddenly so angry with him and asked if he could be transferred down to work in the main kitchen. I never suspected that Atef would be so fooled by this little gag.
Eventually the repair man came and performed his scheduled maintanence. When he left, Joe told Atef that the computer was fixed. He didn't use the new modifier key again for the rest of the day. Atef relaxed, feeling much more comfortable now that the computer no longer hated him. He was satisfied that the computer had suffered some form of breakdown but fortunately it's health was now restored. Just as Atef was about to leave for the day Joe sent in an order and pressed the "Fuck You" key 30 times. Atef left work visibly shaken.
The next morning Atef was reluctant to man his post but I assured him it would be okay. I replaced the insulting phrase with the kinder more supportive, "You're a Good Guy, Atef!". After Joe used it on the first few orders I explained to Atef what I had done and I apologized for upsetting him so much.