Thursday, March 04, 2004

Finishing a Day That Started Badly (And Needing to Listen to My Instincts)

So after the school incident (read blog below) I had some more bad luck...

I was invited to dinner with Adrien and some friends of her friend. They had dinner reservations at "a really good restaurant" at 8:30. I had agreed to go sometime last week but when we were leaving her apartment, I was thinking that I just shouldn´t go because I would have to borrow money from her (since I had walked out of the house with barely any plata (money)) and I should just go home and eat dinner for free. I didn´t even know the people and really had no reason to go. But then again, I didn´t really have anything else to do....so I went.

But before going, we had to go take the Metro to go meet most of the friends at their hostel (one was already with us- he had met us at her apartment). So that cost 310 pesos. Of course when we arrived, they weren´t ready so we had to wait. We had to take the Metro in order to get to the restaurant- another 310 pesos, plus we got there late.

Everyone ordered pisco sours (the drink of Chile) but I didn´t feel like drinking something so acidic, so I asked for suggestions from the waiter. He told me that their was a drink that was very good and tried to describe it to me. It sounded good, so I tried it )price- 1500). The first sip was ok, but then every sip got worse and worse, but I drank it because I was so thirsty.

The waiter ended up being a retard. The girl sitting next to me asked about a chicken dish with vegetables and he said that the pollo con tausi was good. So I ordered it, especially because it was one of the lower-priced options (3500). It sucked. It was like ten tiny pieces of chicken in a bad sauce which was a cross between oriental and thai. And the vegetables? Tiny slivers of onion, which I don´t even like. Definitely not what I was expecting.

When the bill came, he charged us for wine that no one ordered and the drinks that everyone did order were priced at 2800! I asked him why and he said because he gave us ones that were bigger than normal. No one asked for bigger than normal, but he said he told us. He definitely didn´t tell me, and I ordered something way different than the rest. I was not happy. But I was speaking Spanish and didn´t know how to diplomatically argue. So we had to pay.

I should have just gone home and eaten a free dinner that I am sure would have been much better (my host mom cooks very well). Total cost- 6920 (including metro) plus tip= about 7300. Since one doolar equals about 580 pesos, that would be about $11.93, which is huge here. I can usually eat a great meal (drink included) for about 2000 pesos, roughly $3.50.

Oh and that is not all.

When I left to take the bus home (280 pesos), I got on on the wrong street and ended up going in the wrong direction. I had done this before and the bus just turned around started the loop over. Nope, not this time. At the end of the route, it stopped for the night. So I found myself in the ghetto past midnight.

I did have some luck though, because about 60 meters away was the bus station for another line that I was able to take back home. But I had to wait for the bus to come, get washed and re-fueled, and for the new bus driver to come. So after another 280 pesos and another 45 minutes, I arrived all the way on the other side of the city at about 1:15, with 30 pesos in my pocket and a debt to Adrien for a horrible dinner.

Lessons Learned:
1. I need to listen to my instincts.

2. I shouldn´t pay for dinner with people I don´t know when I have the option of a great dinner and good company at home.

3. I need to check to make sure the bus is going where I want it to go. (my host brother told me I was lucky becuase the same type of thing happened to some of his friends on different occasions and they were robbed when they got off the bus at the end of the route...but I only had 310 pesos on me at the time, so they wouldn´t have gotten much.)

posted by Rebecca @ 3/04/2004 06:39:00 PM