I was quite young and very Canadian when I arrived in St. Vincent, and my first morning in the country was confusing; the noise in the streets on market day, the sights of unfamiliar produce and the smells of dead fish and meat made me feel somewhat dizzy, and the tropical heat didn’t help. I had time to spare before the Friendship Rose departed for Bequia and wanted to explore Kingstown, but my overwhelmed senses told me it would be wiser to get out of the broiling sun. My grumbling stomach led me to a restaurant I had noticed across from the court house, and I entered the blessedly dim establishment in search of food and drink.
I sat down at a table and studied the large menu on the wall. After a morning of unfamiliar sights, I was relieved to see that the restaurant offered food I was used to! Pork chops, steak, fish or chicken and chips and hamburgers were listed in bold print on the menu, foods that practically made me salivate as I tried to decide what to have for lunch. It took a while for me to realize that there was no table service, I had to order and pay at the counter, and happily joined the line of customers waiting to be served.
By the time I got to the head of the slow-moving line I was famished, and told the man behind the counter that I would like the chicken and chips.
“No chicken”.
No problem, if there was no chicken, I’d have the fish and chips.
“No fish”.
I worked my way rather desperately through the entire menu on that wall to no avail and, mindful of the restless customers behind me in line I finally blurted,
“What DO you have?”
“Beef lunch”, he replied, so the beef lunch is what I ordered. If I had spent less time studying the menu and more time observing the customers, perhaps I would have noticed that beef lunch was the obvious (and ONLY) choice that day!
When I finally I got my food I was grateful – by then I probably would have eaten anything! The beef tasted fine, and once my taste buds got used to the mauby so did my cold beverage. However, what on EARTH was the huge menu on the wall all about? Why would a restaurant offer food they obviously didn’t serve? It didn’t make any sense to someone fresh out of Canada, that’s for sure, and I wondered if the restaurants on Bequia would have similar menus.
A few years later I owned my own restaurant on Bequia, and although I ran it for almost 40 years I never lost my Canadian belief that anything listed on a menu should be available to customers. I would literally lose sleep if a single item offered at Mac’s was missing; I truly hated telling people we were out of something, and worked hard to prevent it from happening. This wasn’t easy to accomplish but I did my best.
46 years later I still chuckle to myself when I go to certain favourite restaurants where the menu often bears little reality to what I will end up with for lunch. I eat whatever they DO have and am grateful!