Unlucky 13

All good things come to an end.

It wasn't long ago that I was eulogising Club 13 as one of the best music bars in town, one of the best pool bars in town, one of my very favourite hangouts. I have been a semi-regular there now for two years or so - since shortly after it opened.

There has always been one black mark against it. It doesn't really make any concession to non-Chinese speakers. Now, I don't have any objection to that in itself. It's not, after all, a bar aimed primarily at foreigners; most of the foreigners who do come in are students keen to practise their Chinese; and it's not that difficult to order a drink in Chinese. However, 9 times out of 10, a failure to employ staff with even rudimentary English is allied to ruthless penny-pinching and a complete disregard of any kind of service ethic. And such, I fear, is the case at Club 13. Few of the staff speak more than a few words of English. Few of them seem to stay there for more than a few weeks (unless they are being constantly rotated to different days of the week??). And the service is often pretty fucking abysmal.

But that's China. Almost every bar and restaurant is like that. You learn to put up with it if a place has enough other redeeming features.

It has been a particular worry to me for some time (a year or so, at least) that Club 13 has been trying to charge for its pool table. You just don't do that; it's silly; it's penny-pinching; it's unworkable. Remember how angry I got about the disgraceful Ball House a few weeks back? Even worse than the purported 15 kuai per hour table charge is the 100 kuai deposit on the balls. The only warning of this is a tiny notice (written in Chinese only) on a blackboard slate perched on one of the nearby tables. The staff always seem to have been very half-hearted about enforcing this. It is a policy, as the saying goes, "more honoured in the breach than the observance". I've rarely even been asked to pay this charge; and when I have been, I've simply refused.... and played anyway. As does everyone else.

Ah, but this week..... The Chairman went to get the balls from the bar. And The Chairman is meek, compliant, weak, a blunderer. He was asked to pay the table deposit, and agreed. I tried to remonstrate with the staff as soon as I realised what had happened, but once they'd got the money we were in a very weak bargaining position. This time, it looked like we'd have to pay for the table. Oh well, not the end of the world. Only 15 kuai an hour (about $2), after all.

However, we only played for just under an hour-and-a-half, and they were trying to demand a 30 kuai table fee. Now, guys, if you want to be like that, maybe we'll just keep playing till 10.05. Be reasonable.

This is where the whole idea of table charges in bars falls apart. In a pool hall, OK - two people share a table for an extended period of time. It's easy enough to monitor, it's reasonable enough to impose a charge. In a bar, pool is a more broadly social pastime. You don't want to hog the table if other people are waiting for a game. There's usually a board for writing up a waiting-list of people wanting to play. In serious pool bars, there's almost always a winner-stays-on-the-table convention. So, unless one person wants to treat everybody else to an hour or so of play (I suppose in China, that could happen - they're big on the idea of one person picking up the dinner tab for everyone), it's impossible to tell who owes what. Having a deposit on the balls is even more problematical: is each new player expected to hand a 100 note to the player vacating the table for him?? And 100 kuai really is a huge amount: I'm pretty sure a set of balls doesn't cost that much. And I also find it pretty fucking rude - what, you don't trust me? I've been in your bar 20 or 30 times playing pool, and you still think I might try to run off with a complete set of balls?!

And then - guess what? They didn't want to give us our deposit back. The waiter we'd given the money to claimed he didn't have the money and couldn't give it to us. He asked the girl behind the bar to give us the money, but she claimed she couldn't, claimed she didn't know where the money was. (It's right there, in that open cash tray behind the bar, 12" away from me!) They'd already been dicking The Chairman around for quite a few minutes before I intervened. Then they dicked me around for quite a few minutes more. We were, at this stage, still asking quite politely why we couldn't get our money back. But the girl behind the bar, the one in charge of the money, decided that she'd rather pout and scowl and be doing something terribly important with her mobile phone (and it wasn't even as if she were making a call or writing a message; she was just gazing dumbly at the screen, maybe playing one of those inane games on it, or reading her day's text message spam) rather than pay any attention to us.

Now, these idiots had already hit nearly all of my hot buttons in quick succession, but that was just the final straw. That girl was the most senior member of staff on duty (just about the only visible member of staff on duty - the various waiters mostly lounge around indolently, looking like customers; or else disappear into the shadows altogether), the owner/manager's obvious representative, the one in charge of the money. There is no way someone in that position should EVER be paying more attention to their mobile phone than to customers who are trying to talk to them. That is SO FAR BEYOND RUDE...... words fail me!!!

I went completely fucking ballistic on her. I'm not proud of myself. I rather wish it hadn't happened. I would never dream of making such a scene anywhere else, in any other country I have ever visited. It is a learned behaviour. Even when I am furious (and I was), I vent my fury in a controlled way, to a directed purpose. And you know what? It works. I find it deeply unfortunate, but this is the culture here: this is how the Chinese complain; and sometimes, alas, it seems to be the only behaviour that recalcitrant staff will recognise and respond to. If you shout and scream and stamp your foot and throw in a few choice swear words and attract the attention of other customers...... they'll give in and give you what you want. They'll sulk and back-sass, but they'll give you what you want. I really do wish it wasn't so bloody difficult.

"PUT THAT FUCKING PHONE DOWN AND GIVE US THE GODDAMNED MONEY - RIGHT NOW!" Job done. But I don't feel good about it. And it had taken nearly 15 minutes.

Alas, Club 13 is now on my 'Hate List'.

Maybe I'll give it a reprieve in a few months, after my summer break. After all, it's still a good music venue. It has good bands. A good pool table. The booze is cheap.

Insanely bad service we must simply learn to tolerate.

Will I be allowed back? Oh yes, I expect so. There's not really any concept of 'barring' people here. And I doubt they'll even recognise me; they didn't seem to recognise me from my numerous previous visits (the Chinese do tend to be bad at discriminating between foreign faces; they often claim that "all foreigners look alike"). In fact, I think all the staff that night (except for the super-annoying girl behind the bar) were new. And they'll probably all have been replaced within a month or so (including the super-annoying girl, with any luck).

It is a sorry occasion, though, when one of your best-loved haunts turns so emphatically, so catastrophically to SHIT.... just as you're about to go on your summer holiday. Ah, China....