Caused a scene in a cafe today. Now wondering if we were unreasonable

[pennytoffees]

I'll start off by saying I'm welsh, born and bred and speak the language as does my entire family.

We visited (my mother and I) a local cafe today and had such an awful experience. We haven't been there in years but don't remember it being that bad. We don't sound welsh and spoke to them in English so they obviously assumed that we were tourists. They were very cold towards us.

Anyway, we placed our order and another staff member brought the food over to us. We asked for some sauces to which she replied "go and ask her" and then pointed to the woman at the till. There was a queue and we didn't want the food to go cold so asked her if she could get us some. She gave me a filthy look but reluctantly handed them over. I just want to add that at no point did she say that the sauces cost extra so we just presumed that they were free like most cafes/restaurants. It turns out that they weren't (to be honest I think it's pretty greedy charging customers for sachets of sauce when they've spent £14 on a meal and I don't know any other local businesses that do it but thats another argument). We would have paid with no issues had she explained that to us.

The main issue is that she came over to a couple sat behind us and started talking about us in Welsh thinking that we didn't understand. Funnily enough they asked for some sauces and she gave them for free but when we asked it was an issue. The only difference is they were clearly locals. At this point we'd had enough so I asked to speak with the manager and she asked me "why, is there a problem?". I said "yes but I'm not discussing it with you". Anyway, he came over and I explained what had happened. She was on the other side of the counter and came over and said "I'm sorry, I wasn't talking about you". She wasn't close enough to hear us talking so obviously knew what she had done wrong and was just trying to cover her tracks.

He apologised and we left it at that, didn't even finish our food as we felt so uncomfortable. To be honest I don't think he knew what to do but after reading the reviews online, it's clearly a regular occurrence and he doesn't care how his staff behaves or treats customers. It was embarrassing as everyone was looking at us. We don't like confrontation or causing trouble but felt we had to confront her. I believe we would have been treated differently had they known we were welsh. I was actually embarrassed to be welsh to be honest. They forget it's the tourists keeping them in business.

AIBU? Would you have confronted her or just walked away?

Ah thanks. Had not heard of this place.

I love wales hate shitty customer service.

Holiday in, aberystwyth, Ceredigion and gwynedd. Didn’t encounter any rude Welsh people. Had a lovely lady in New Quay before translate a gift item for me I was buying for a Welsh speaker, ice cream place there is amazing to!

Going back to wales this year. Think you just got shit staff in a shit cafe.

Yes, I was shocked - I would normally give a 10% tip (and in fairness, there was nothing wrong with the service) but I just rounded to the nearest £1 after that.

I’ve mentioned upthread but I’m Scottish and a POC and went to Anglesey, Llandudno and Conwy (excuse the spellings if wrong) and everyone I came across was nice and friendly. I was traveling with my white English partner.

I have no idea if that experience is common though, I’ve only been once for a long weekend.

It’s Llyn not Lynn. That you can’t be bothered to spell it properly or look it up speaks volumes.

Only Ever say in another language what you would be prepared to say in English. You never know who can understand.

I speak another language and was once in a lift with three other people. Two of them were speaking said language and were talking about the other woman in the lift, how she looked, what they would like to do to her you get the sleazy drift.

What they (or I in fact) didn’t know, was that she was also fluent in this language, so as she got out on the next floor she gave them a mouthful of abuse and then left. When the lift door closed they then carried on the conversation saying how crap it was that they’d been caught out, at which point I interjected in their language and said what a coincidence it must be to be in a lift with not one, but two different people who were able to understand and reply to whatever they were saying, and perhaps they’d better rethink in future.

How horrible, i couldnt imagine doing that

She did apologise for her spelling. You've shown yourself up here.

In exactly the same way people are racist towards other nationalities or races. I used to live there and witnessed it happening often. I witnessed Welsh people saying they hate all English people, saying they wouldn’t be friends with an English person etc.

No she didn’t another poster apologised for misspelling Llandudno.

It's very bad etiquette to criticise spelling though.

Indeed. It's not actually prejudice when it's experience.

Place names are easily looked up though. And if you’re moaning about Welsh people being rude and unfriendly (which it does sound like the people in the cafe were), it’s not a good look to not spell the place names properly. These things do matter.

But is it a compliment?

Dsis and her husband lived near Llandudno for a few years (both English), and it was very mixed. They met some absolutely lovely Welsh people while living there, but did say that some places they visited that were slightly more off the beaten track switched from speaking English to Welsh when they walked in. But to be honest, quite a lot of places across the UK have that "you're not from around here?" vibe to them.

The rudest woman I ever encountered was a B&B owner in Cornwall. She was so unpleasant to all the guests.

I thought this would be in North Wales.

I studied in north wales and my parents moved to Anglesey for a few years. The Welsh were often anti English. I had a Welsh friend who was bilingual and had the same problem in shops as you Op but he would address them in Welsh and watch their faces drop.
I've started learning Welsh now and wish I had when I lived there but I was an arse who was very angry to have moved there to start with and I wasn't going to trouble my teenage self with what I saw as an ugly language. Luckily I grew up and wish I'd made the most of my time there now.
Next time you should definitely dress them down in Welsh. Loudly.

You are entirely in the right here but personally I would have finished my meal. She thought she could hide her rudeness about you by speaking in Welsh, let that be a warning to her. She could have delivered the news about the sauces in a pleasant way and all would have been fine.

Sorry you experienced that. The people who justify xenophobia or pretend it doesn't happen are part of the problem.

I have been lucky enough to travel quite extensively around the world.

I have never been treated with contempt by any other nationality.

Judging by the attitude here about the entirety of Wales, North Wales in particular and the distain about Welsh people daring to speak their own language under any circumstances, the hypocrisy of suggesting that it’s all a Welsh problem when it comes to xenophobia is almost laughable.

I think you were really restrained, considering how rude and ignorant they were...

I would probably have called her out in Welsh when you heard her talking about you to the other customers.

Whether you are Welsh or not should not be relevant though. Anyone in the hospitality sector should be adult and professional enough to welcome and treat customers equally and with respect.

Leave a review online and never go back.

The amount of posters who assume that first language Welsh people actually switch into Welsh just because they’ve walked in the door of a shop is mind boggling. How arrogant to assume they wouldn’t just be carrying on speaking Welsh. A lot of English people just don’t seem to be able to fathom that many Welsh speakers actually speak Welsh all the time to each other