138 CultureShock! China
know you better or to further improve their English. They will
then take you to a restaurant and order a number of dishes.
When the bill is presented, it is an extremely high amount
and the owner or manager of the restaurant insists that you
ate the food and must pay it. Usually, the person who brought
you to the restaurant is involved in a scam with the owner
or manager and gets a percentage of the money that they
take from you. If you elect to put yourself in the situation
of accompanying a stranger to eat, be sharp about taking a
role in selecting the restaurant and pay close attention to the
dishes being ordered and the cost of each dish.
The second scam involves overcharging and the wait staff
blocking exit from the restaurant until you pay. If you find
yourself in either of these situations, sit down and request
that the owner or manager of the restaurant call the police
to sort things out. Request that the police send someone that
speaks your language to sort out the situation.WHEN IN CHINA, DO AS THE CHINESE?
Table etiquette in China is vastly different from the West.
Slurping, belching and spitting out the bits you don’t want to
eat are all acceptable table manners. Slurping and belching
are a show of satisfaction with the meal.
Because they do not use knives, the Chinese are very
adept at putting whole pieces of food in their mouth, bones
and all, and to dissect the part you can eat from what you
can’t, depositing the non-eatable back on their plate or the
table. When eating chicken, ribs or shellfish, it is common
for Chinese to end up with a mountain of bones or shells in
front of them.
At a better restaurant, the wait staff will continually clear
your dirty plates, replacing them with clean ones. In a
home-style restaurant, this may not happen unless you ask
for new plates.
At the end of the meal, most Chinese use toothpicks to
clean their teeth. The proper way to do this is to discreetly
cover your mouth with a slightly cupped left hand while the
right hand holds the toothpick, so that the use of the toothpick
inside the mouth is not visible.