Wait, you can't leave until you pay!

One Sat. I helped to get a bunch of us expats together to go eat at the local Holiday Inn's Mexican Festival Buffet. We had some apprehension... Mexican food in China?! *que to rumbly tummy or digestives*. All in all about twenty of us ended up joining and the food was excellent, authentically made by two Mexican chefs who were prob in their late 50's or mid 60's. Not only did the two chefs cook, but they also got dressed up and sang with the femal singer, performing some mariachi and traditional Mexican songs. The funniest thing was that when they got to our table, and before I could put in my request of Volare, the singer/guitarist decided that they would sing La Cucaracha for us! How bizarre, a song of smoking marajuana and cockroaches (in this particular version it references men). Three of us, J and I being Canadian, and the third an American had a good laugh about it.

After stuffing ourselves and having a few shots of tequilla, we had the first departees of our dinner party. Five minutes after they left, one of the gals got a frantic call and I could make out that it seemed like a communication breakdown over the phone. Next thing I knew the phone was passed to me, since I spoke the best Mandarin, and I found myself talking to one of the Restaurant manager, which confused the heck out of me. Where was he? Our friends can't leave?! why?! After going over on what the problem was, I had ascertained what had happened and cleared things up on behalf of our friends that was being detained at the lobby. Immediately upon hanging up, not 5 seconds after, a waiter came by to follow up on the matter. It was comical.

What had happended was this:

The friends that left couldn't get anyone to give them a bill, they had a baby with them and really had to go, so they left money with a couple of friends. The manager saw them leave and since they hadn't paid him, he chased them down and detained them and since one side only spoke French/English and the manager only Mandarin, it wasn't getting much anywhere. So finally our friends made the call up and that's when I got involved. Then the waiter came by to settle their bill immediately. It was so weird, we were sitting all together as a group of friends, and did the manager think that they would get stiffed with the bill? Eventhough the rest of us were still there? Was it just because we were foreigners? Thinking we would run out on each other and stiff the rest? The moral of this story, if there is one really, is that make sure the service provider knows that your friends have your money to pay I guess. haha.