In Vienna, the waiter is King
Like Atlas, with the weight of the world on his shoulders, wait staff in Vienna take their job very, very seriously.
Vienna: the capital of Austria, home of the Hasburg dynasty, old architecture and tardy, poker faced, sarcastic wait staff.
In one of Europe’s oldest cities, with a long and rich cultural history, and a reputation as one of the world’s centres of art and learning, the wait staff rule supreme. Long waits for service, being ignored and a general attitude of low level irritation that you want to be a customer seems to be the norm.
Ancient architecture = posh attitude
One travel brochure (The Free Map For Young and Clever People) proclaims that in Vienna, “The waiter is king. Don’t be surprised if the waiters are unfriendly - not the guest is king, he is. Treat him as your superior and he will reward you.” The brochure also claims that “waiters NEVER smile” and that for tipping “5-10% of the bill is the amount the king expects from his subjects.”
The advice in The Free Map for Young And Clever People is ridiculously honest and self-deprecating.
To begin with you are annoyed and maybe offended by this behaviour. But, after a few experiences you realise that it’s not actually you personally the waiter hates, it’s everybody – perhaps it’s a persona they all adopt as part of their profession or as a survival tactic against drunk and obnoxious tourists who don’t speak German.
My personal experiences of this phenomenon were being told I had ordered children’s beer when choosing a 330ml sized glass (normal serving size in my country) instead of a ½ litre. My bad. Another was overhearing the same waiter yell at a patron asking them if they wanted to see a menu. Theoretically, this sounds like he was being helpful and doing his job. However, in person, his tone, body language and glare revealed the true nature of his passive aggressive overture. What he actually said nonverbally was “buy something to eat or f**K off”.
When your office is this plush you might be forgiven for developing an arrogant attitude.
A further experience was when buying a Kaserkrainer (vienesse hotdog) from a street vendor in the early hours of the morning. The vendor must have been earning significantly less than the barman and really needed the customers, but felt the need to finish his entire cigarette before deining to serve us. He then spent less time than it took to smoke it heating a sausage on the grill, before wrapping it and throwing it on the counter for me to collect. The patience we were expected to show while waiting was not reciprocal. While we fumbled uncoordinated and inebriated for the correct change, his bloodshot eyes glared with annoyance. How dare we bother him to prepare his advertised victuals and deign to give him a few euros for his disgruntled efforts.
This attitude is strange considering that you want to spend your money at the establishment where said wait staff are employed. You might think they would be welcoming of a tourist who wants to donate them money. You may highlight the link between your custom and their wages – but you would be wrong. The waiter just has no f**ks to give about you and your desires to eat or drink or be treated like a human being.
“Let them eat cake” - Marie Antionette was a Hasburg and probably developed the attitude that cost her life while growing up in Vienna.
Sometimes this apathy worked in our favour. For example, when the bus driver was in danger of having to do something untoward, such as turn in his seat, converse with you and maybe issue you a ticket. Instead, it was easier for him to just lift his eyes, wave his hand dismissively towards the general direction of the back of the bus and grunt something. We interpreted this as there would be no charge, but it may have meant - “I just don’t give a s**t.” I doubt he would have come to our defence if an undercover ticket check had taken place.
Advice for ‘Acting like a local' — “Be Grumpy”
The Free Map for Young and Clever People makes an effort to explain why the Viennesse hate on life. Under the heading ‘Act like a Local’ it was suggested that you “be grumpy”. Supposedly, it is “mandatory” for “original Vienesse to complain if the bus is one minute late or the weather is too hot/cold/wet/sunny. This “mentality” (general bad attitude) was justified as being part of the rich Vienesse culture and is based on hundreds of years of historical precedent and practice.
Back in the day (16-18th Centuries), Vienna was the home of the Hasburg Dynasty and the centre of several empires. As such it was a center of commerce, education, construction etc, and developed a large bureaucracy which served the monarchy and employed half the population of the city. Everybody knows that a high standard of living, steady employment and job security suck, so it is understandable that these unlucky civil servants developed a negative attitude.
Members of the Hasburg dynasty pretty much ruled most of Europe in the 16th - 18th centuries
According to the Free Map for Young and Clever People this explains why wait staff, and more generally everyone (especially if they had an ancestor who worked for the government) has the historical right to be grumpy, rude or generally a dick.
Other historical facts from the Free Map include how after WWII “all the Nazis miraculously disappear and the population suffers a collective loss of memory as far as the last 7 years are concerned.”
This appeal to history is obviously a bullsh**t excuse to act like a jerk. More likely, people being people, they could not leave their work at work and the hierarchal structure of a feudal bureaucracy permeated into their attitudes and behaviour outside of their jobs. Add a mix of simian tribalism or pack behaviour and next thing everyone is looking down their noses at anyone else their social standing allows them to – and treating them accordingly.
What is mystifying is that in contemporary Vienna, a city where the Arts and Humanities are cultivated, this is a standard of behaviour that some aspire to. Or perhaps it’s as simple as:
“If you don’t like a person, it’s because they remind you of something you don’t like about yourself.” — Sigmund Freud, father of modern psychology and resident of Vienna, before being forced to fleeing prior to WWII.
