Through Story of Life As A Stewardess
3 Disheartening Moments Of A Housekeeper In The Restaurant
Disclaimer*: Names changed to hide the identity of persons. The restaurant was a cool place with fabulous bosses and great learning curves. However, the shortcomings were from individuals with negative mindset that made an enjoyable place to work, unbearable. It wasn’t my bosses’ fault.
“I don’t know what’s with my luck today that I’m told to clean up this place…” — Jake*
I heard those words from one of the service crew in the fine dining restaurant.
Jake was told to climb and wipe the cabinets at my workstation. He felt unfortunate. He felt good luck wasn’t with him for that day.
People like Jake usually signed up for the role ‘Server’, ‘Captain’, or ‘Supervisor’. So, their hands shouldn’t get dirty.
Not all of the servers, captains, or supervisors were like Jake though. However, I met plenty of them in the F&B industry.
And at the time I wrote this, I left the permanent part time housekeeping or stewarding role in the French restaurant. I cried buckets for I had poured my heart and soul into my home-chapel.
So, today I would share with you 3 disheartening moments of being a housekeeper and stewardess in the Food & Beverages industry.
Let’s read.
1 — People judged you as if you were a school dropout…
When I started at the restaurant, I was the only part-time housekeeper who swept never ending fallen leaves. Anyone who drove past would have seen a brown woman did so. Me.
When I held the broom way before the manager bought a blower, I had seen how people judged me instantly or immediately.
One of the full timers asked me, one day, “Sister, if you’re that smart, why are you doing these (cleaning) job?”
I was sweeping leaves. A freelance part timer younger than me overheard and said to me looking disgusted, “The guy looked down on you from the way he said that already, Lissa…”
She was partially right.
There was a huge and heavy glamourous air within the front of house people. Pride. Power. That was how it began. This mellowed along the months down the road.
We had learning curves, right? So, all of us would learn something. Hopefully.
Initially, the full-timers didn’t speak a word or interact with part-timers very much. Not until they needed to instruct the part timers to do something for them.
Even when people in the service sat at one side of the restaurant during staff meal, most of the time they sat among their own kinds.
If you saw any part timers seated among them, I guarantee you the girl was young, sexy, hot, or pretty. Other than a girl, you might see young guys after their National Service or studying for their 1st virgin bachelor’s degree seated together.
2–There were people who took you as their servant, maid, or a nanny…
The part timers were ever changing in the beginning. They didn’t stay long. Most of them enrolled as part time servers.
One day, a front of house staff threw his own gloves onto the ground when he walked past me. I was picking up rubbish at the carpark.
Imagine you were picking up litters at public carpark instructed by your bosses, and someone else threw something right there in your presence?
When I saw what the guy did, I felt an anger surged within me.
I was new and knew not of his name. I would have told him off that even a servant and beggar knew what respecting human beings meant.
Well, I threw away his gloves. Perhaps it was for riding a bike or bicycle. I wouldn’t know. However, he came to me during staff meal and asked if I had picked up his gloves.
I clearly remember I replied to the fella nicely…
“Not that I remember. If I had seen it, I would have picked up the gloves and throw it away. Anything I see lying around, I throw them away. That’s my job. A cleaner in all of you, Servers’ mind?”
I smiled too.
3 — Manipulative mindset of colleagues
I met a housekeeper who cautioned me that when a person touched any particular task, that task would automatically become his/her job. Thus, I was cautioned not to help with the Server’s job scope.
Because everyone would consider that I would be doing it. So, they needn’t do. It became my fixed duty to fulfill it whenever I worked. And if I’m not around, the task would be her duty.
One day, when she seen the rapport between me and some full timers grew better, she began looking for things to do — not to be left out.
And occasionally on other days she told me not to help the servers’ duties again, but she helped them.
But it didn’t last. Whenever the full timers asked for help with the sweet wrapping, she gently responded okay. However, the moment everyone walked out, she started to grumble wondering for reason everyone seemed to wait for both of us to clear the job.
I was annoyed of the pretense.
Well, perhaps people like Jake felt insulted being told to do cleaner’s job. With high education, people felt they shouldn’t do any downgrading roles.
Housekeeping and stewarding roles demanded a lot of physical health and energy. It also needed an active team who wouldn’t try to outsmart one another to take up easy lighter loads and left others to fulfill the rest.
So, if you really thought of doing housekeeping job, I advise you to think 3 -times more.
F&B Industry hadn’t been very attractive to Singaporeans not because people did not want to become a Server.
People would not like housekeeping duties.
And even the educated foreigners such as my Malaysian friends would not want to be housekeepers. Most of them confessed it to me.
It was disheartening to witness what I had experienced on the ground. However, it was obvious who came for job’s sake, who came for social status to climb the rank, and who came for being a service to one another.
If your heart treated the place as part of your living space, you would do the same as you done for your home. Because you knew you would be spending a lot of time at the restaurant, so why wouldn’t you make it comfortable for your sake, if not alongside for the others?
Good night.
N. A.
