Communications are often problematic in Africa. By communications, I mean both telecommunications and verbal exchanges too. Tonight, we mooched over to the locally-run vegetarian restaurant to give them a second chance to make amends after this morning’s tea-with-ants breakfast incident.

Squiffy ordered the Mexican wrap and I ordered the vegetable korma curry. As usual, the waitress looked completely bemused at our request and scanned the menu to confirm that such items existed. She pointed to ‘Spicy Pears with a Blue Cheese Salad’ and I corrected her finger towards the vegetable korma. After correctly noting down our orders in longhand on her jotter pad, she disappeared into the kitchen to inform the chef. (We had observed exactly the same bemusement at breakfast upon ordering poached eggs. There was only one egg dish on the menu and it was poached. Still, we got scrambled eggs. No biggie. We counted less than twenty food items on the menu. Honestly, the staff are so unsure of their own menu it’s like it’s everybody’s first day here.)

Squiffy’s Mexican wrap arrived and, in fairness, it looked good. Unfortunately, I accidentally put her off the last few bites when I mentioned that there was no running water in the building and the bathtub was full of yellowing water, from which the chef must have been drawing his cooking supply (sorry Squiffy!).

Then the bill arrived, with both meals correctly handwritten on the slip, followed shortly by our waitress and a request for money. I indicated that my vegetable korma had not yet arrived. Almost without the slightest surprise, she again disappeared into the kitchen.

Fifteen minutes later a male waiter appeared, carrying a plate of food which he presented to me. A plate of Spicy Pears with Blue Cheese Salad. It looked nice, for sure, but was not what I had ordered.

“I’m sorry, I think that there’s been a mistake”, I started, “I ordered the vegetable korma curry.”
“Ahh, no”, said the confused waiter looking around the otherwise empty restaurant.
“But, this looks great so I’m happy to have the spicy pears, if there is no vegetable korma coming and this dish is not for anyone else.”

It couldn’t be for anyone else, the restaurant was empty. The waiter disappeared back into the kitchen, presumably to ask the chef whether he was aware of my previous order for vegetable korma. He returned, indicated that there were no other dishes being prepared and apologised for the mistake. I double- and triple-checked that the spicy pears had not been made for anyone else before beginning to eat them. In fairness to the chef, they were really nice and the blue cheese salad really complemented the flavour.

Half way through my new dinner, our original waitress appeared with a vegetable korma! She saw me tucking into the plate of spicy pears and–confused–asked me whether I still wanted the korma. When I said no, she began to raise her voice at me and questioned why I was eating the spicy pears when I hadn’t ordered them. I tried to explain the series of events but she didn’t believe me and was quite angry that I was (a) clearly eating somebody else’s food and (b) now not going to pay for the vegetable korma (the spicy pears dish was cheaper in the menu).

After the meal, we paid-up [for what we had eaten] and made an embarrassed exit whilst the waitress, hands-on-hips, turned her body to track our leaving movements.

T.I.A. — This Is Africa.