The Fawlty Pergola

Nope – not something I’ve built otherwise it’d be different spelling, wouldn’t it? It’s actually a bar/brasserie Guy and I go to which, in a nation of bad service, really takes the biscuit. In fact, if they gave out a ‘really bad service’ medal in France, they’d have to stop the competition because there’d be none – the Pergola would win by a country mile – every year! I’m sure they are styling themselves on the famous Fawlty Towers, a clip of which is URL’d below.

When we stopped at the Pergola a week or so, Guy asked why, when I’d said we’d never go back again, we were heading through its tatty entrance once more. I answered that I just wanted to see if it really was that bad. It was – and more!

The sun was very hot that Wednesday so we headed for two tables right at the far end of the pergola section where you get some shade under the rickety structure, but no sooner had we sat down than the waitress came up and said, without a hint of empathy, or anything else which a customer might mistake as common courtesy, that the tables were reserved. The words that went through my mind were along the lines of, ‘well what’s wrong with putting a ‘reserved’ sign on the tables then or is that too much like thinking outside the box’. But I didn’t – my French isn’t good enough so we shuffled off into a table right in the sun.

Now the Pergola, because of its location and probably its prices, attracts the builders, the council gardeners and the various other tradesmen in the area so it’s not really a place to take your mum for a nice lunch, but when you get them, their double (foot long) frankfurters in a baguette are just to die for and so we sat there waiting for Miss Congeniality to take our order. And we sat and sat and sat. Now usually at this stage, I storm off making a bit of a scene but this time, Guy and I had plenty of time so in a bit of research for this blog posting, I remained seated and just continued to look at my watch. I reckon it was about 15 minutes before Miss C decided we deserved to be recognized as customers. Maybe she decided to come over after she’d seen me crawling along the floor and drinking noisily out of the water bowl of the dog at the next table to try and impart a message that I was thirsty and might like a drink!

And so she stood there. A face that could have stopped in its tracks, one of the 20 ton gravel lorries which come down the hill opposite the Pergola. It’s not as if she’s an old battleaxe, she’s actually quite pretty but if a smile had ever crossed her face then they should have declared a national holiday because in all the times we’ve been going there, in this masochistic ritual of ours, I’ve never ever seen her so much as attempt to smile.

The paper place mats were thrown down and the cutlery was dumped on the table. This was promising. And then she went off again, returning with water glasses. And then, real progress, she asked us what we’d like to order.

I said, ‘two frankfurters, a plate of frites, a coca-cola and a small carafe of wine.’ And then she looked at Guy and said, ‘and what’ll you have?’ I had to explain to her that that was our joint order. Off she went as if we’d insulted her intelligence and again we waited and waited and waited. No wine – no coca-cola. Eventually after about 10 minutes, she appeared with the drinks, dumped them on the table and disappeared before I could point out that I didn’t have a wine glass. No matter, I’d drink it out of the bright green water glass and make a show of what I was doing to see if she’d notice. Not a bit of it – it never even registered.

Guy had finished his coke and I’d nearly finished my wine before the frankfurters arrived. No frites though – what a surprise! In the 6 or so times we’ve been there, we’ve always ordered a plate of frites (between us) and …… we’ve never received them – never. It’s become something of a joke now so we told the other waiter, not expecting anything to happen and of course, it didn’t! So we munched our way through the chien-chaud (hot dogs) and had just finished the last bite when, yup – the frites arrived. I made a play of giving him my empty hot-dog plate as a sort of gesture of frustration but it didn’t even register. Maybe I’m too subtle for the French?

We paid the bill and left. No tip of course. Maybe that’s the problem – it’s self perpetuating. They give us bad service – we don’t tip. The next time they remember we didn’t leave a tip so we get bad service. Should I break this cycle of mutual intransigence and leave a tip? No chance!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8FypR17bDbw