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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to think this woman was unacceptably rude

183 replies

pamelat · 07/06/2011 20:14

On holiday last week with DH and DC.

DH tells me of the following encounter .

DD (3.4) helping herself (he was lifting her up) to the buffet food. She wasn't messing about but is slower than an adult, she was helping herself with a large serving spoon to something or the other.

Woman comes up, removes the server from her hands (no word muttered) helps herself to the food and then puts the serving utensil back down and walks off Shock

She wasn't British (German I think) but surely with or without language barriers this is utterly unacceptable.

DH says both he and DD were too shocked to say anything.

It wasnt as though there was a large queue, it was a help yourself buffet and no one else around.

Surely she could have waited!!

OP posts:
grumpypants · 08/06/2011 08:53

i'm standing by my original assertion. hardened in my resove by your indulgent claim that dd wanted carrot because it's pretty. FGS.

CareyFakes · 08/06/2011 08:53

YABU...I dislike children, especially when I'm in a hurry or hungry

LadyClariceCannockMonty · 08/06/2011 08:54

She was massively rude but I don't think it's fair to hold people up when your child is being slow. Especially if she just wants some food because it's pretty.

I'd have kept a lookout for other people approaching and, when they did, said to DD 'Let's let this lady serve herself and then we'll get ours' and moved out of the way.

exhausted2011 · 08/06/2011 08:55

IME, Russians don't queue, was she Russian?
OP, yanbu, I would have hit the stupid woman over the head with the carrotty spoon

bluebobbin · 08/06/2011 08:58

Hmm.

I have never let either of mine serve themselves in this sort of situation (they are 5 and 3) because they are too slow. It doesn't matter who is waiting (even if it's just one person), I think you should be as quick as you can with something communal. I still wouldn't let my children serve themselves from a buffet.

I think the woman was rude to snatch from your DD, but I think your DH was rude first in allowing a toddler to hold someone up. He should have served the food himself IMO.

allhailtheaubergine · 08/06/2011 09:01

I can't imagine a breakfast buffet with only one bowl of grated carrot. All the breakfast buffets I have ever been to have everything repeated a couple of times.

Hullygully · 08/06/2011 09:05

Rude. Of course it's rude ffs.

Cretaceous · 08/06/2011 09:16

Perhaps your DD was waving the serving tongs about, and the woman thought she was offering her the implement...

differentnameforthis · 08/06/2011 09:50

If there were people waiting I would have helped dd or told the waiting people to help themselves first.

I wouldn't expect them to wait while my daughter serves herself at 3.

FunnysInTheGarden · 08/06/2011 10:09

Rude and ignorant. OP YANBU, I would have been furious.

CogitoErgoSometimes · 08/06/2011 10:20

This story reminds me of a scene the other day at our local small Sainsbury/petrol station combo. The queue was out of the door and tempers were fraying. Reason for the queue & fraying tempers was that a man was letting his young son laboriously fill out a lottery ticket at the front. The child kept cocking the thing up and having to go back and get another one... Rather than a polite 'we're going to be a while here, why don't you go in front?', the stupid man kept this pantomime going for ages.

Letting kids do things for themselves all well and good but not when others are in a hurry.

saidthespiderwithahorridsmile · 08/06/2011 10:21

3.4 isn't a toddler

I work with 3-5yo children and they all serve themselves fruit and veg every day, perfectly competently

The woman was unbelievably rude and selfish. Almost as unbelievable as some of the posters on here saying that it was OK to snatch because the snatcher was an adult and children should defer to adults Hmm

What utter bilge. The woman has no manners. If I were HER mother, I would be ashamed.

Bucharest · 08/06/2011 10:47

Where has anyone said it was OK to snatch?

saidthespiderwithahorridsmile · 08/06/2011 10:57

um

third post on the thread?

and tbh the posts saying the dh was being "indulgent" allowing his daughter to serve herself at a buffet while an adult was waiting - they're just as bad. It's shocking how may MNers think that they don't need to use their basic manners when dealing with a child. She was using the buffet appropriately under supervision, not playing with the food.

A1980 · 08/06/2011 10:58

"Apparently DD just said "silly woman" once she had got over the shock"

Your DD is 3.4 and yet she has vocabularly like that? Where does a 3 yo learn such delightful phrases, from their parents of course.

I trust in a few years time your DD will be as rude as that woman if that's what she's learning at your knee.

saidthespiderwithahorridsmile · 08/06/2011 11:01

"silly" and "woman" are not oversly sophisticated words for an average 3.4yo to have in her vocabilary

And I doubt she learned "silly woman" as a set phrase. More likely she used her intelligence to describe the woman who snatched a spoon off her while she was using it. Good for her.

LyingWitchInTheWardrobe2726 · 08/06/2011 11:02

saidthespiderwithahorridsmile... No, she wasn't using the buffet appropriately. Serving herself with food not to eat, but because it's pretty is entirely inappropriate, and she was being enabled by her father. Hmm

Indulge your children at home so that they inconvenience only you, not others.

LyingWitchInTheWardrobe2726 · 08/06/2011 11:03

... and I would certainly not let my child speak like that about an adult. It's not on. Shock

saidthespiderwithahorridsmile · 08/06/2011 11:08

LOL, yes I am sure every single adult who took food from the buffet ate every single scrap of it and nobody made silly or wrong choices and ended up not wanting something they had taken

that is why we never waste food in this country

pull the other one

jeckadeck · 08/06/2011 11:08

She was definitely unacceptably aggressive about it. And if there was no queue there was certainly no need although the fact that you were inconveniencing her suggests its not quite as cut and dried as that. But I do think its a bit self-indulgent to allow your toddler to serve herself. She can learn those skills at home.

pozzled · 08/06/2011 11:09

OP, YANBU. The woman was incredibly rude. And I don't think your DH was in any way wrong to let your daughter serve herself.

If it was a small buffet, or there were a few people waiting, or the woman had asked politely if she could get to the carrot- then yes, he should have allowed her to go first. Or if she had been stood behind your daughter, waiting obviously, even if just for a few seconds. But the picture I'm seeing in my mind is very different. The woman wasn't just rude to your DD, she treated her as though she wasn't even there.

That said, it was just one woman. Not the kind of thing that's worth bearing a grudge over for several years.

Insomnia11 · 08/06/2011 11:18

I would have spooned some carrot onto the plate of the little girl for her or at least asked her if she wanted any help. Maybe pre-child I would have thought silently "Oh get on with it I'm hungry" but certainly wouldn't have barged her out of the way.

People complain about the young having no manners but I often find people 50+ to be the rudest!

A1980 · 08/06/2011 12:10

THEY WERE ON HOLIDAY!!!!

Did I say that clearly enough? I have travelled to enough countries where no one queues and behaviour that would be determined as appallingly rude here is entirely acceptable and the norm in those countries. It is likely that what this woman did would not be considered rude in her own country. Neither the OP nor the woman were in the UK when it happened so why are you applying UK social conventions to this situation?

The OP is precious beyond belief over this matter when she should get a massive grip.

Hullygully · 08/06/2011 12:21

I have travelled all over the world in a myriad of different social settings. No one has ever ever taken a spoon from my hand, nor have I ever seen a spoon taken from anyone else's hand, adult or child. It is nothing to do with culture. It is just rude. FFS.

PeachesandStrawberry · 08/06/2011 12:23

Oh dear!!!!

What is going on? The woman was rude. The OP has said that there was no queue. Yet people are still saying the OP was BU.

Learn to read People!!!!