Travel Story

The Dinner Party (China)

I was teaching for a training center in China. All of the Chinese employees were rather quiet, reserved and, for the most part, didn’t speak much unless spoken to first. The fellow foreigners on the other hand, were a group of raucous bastards ready to drop anchor and smash beers and get wild at a moments notice.

Our shared foreign office in the school was a secluded little corner of complete lunacy hiding behind a thin wooden door from the parents, students, and other employees who all shared the same innocent thought that we were a group of sane individuals with nothing more than hamburgers and lesson plans on our minds. I always wondered how the groups would mix socially given the opportunity. To my delight, I was lucky enough to witness just that at our companies first dinner party. Oh boy, it was a tale to be told.

After our typical day of singing baby shark and slapping flashcards at the training center, when we were told that our company was having a big dinner for all the employees and teachers. The owner of the center was expected to be hosting the dinner that night and we were required to attend. However, the food and drinks would all be paid for, courtesy of the big man who writes the checks.

We were told that he was very excited to meet the foreign teacher team. I felt a bit of disappointment when I heard this. Not because I myself felt disappointed, I just knew the poor bastard certainly wasn’t ready for the crazy drunk couple from England who would inevitably crash that dinner like a fucking teenage house party.

Inside the restaurant we had a private room with a long, rectangular window that looked out to a garden area blooming with exotic flowers all over the place. The light was dimmed on the speckled chandelier that hung over us at the long, oval table.There were at least forty people sitting sat it. Teachers, accountants, payroll, you name it. The whole company was there. A massive, red cloth covered the face of the table and the staff members were bringing various dishes every few minutes. Seafood, bbq meat, wiggly looking things I couldn’t even identify, and basically anything else you could imagine. If it was edible, it was on that table.

The English couple were sitting near the head of the table close by the owner and were visibly smashing beers quicker than they could order them. The owner had a great big whopper of a wine bottle sitting in a chilled bucket in front of him and I could see the English woman eyeing it down like a kid in a candy shop. The owner eventually stood up and started walking around the big, long table greeting each employee personally and introducing himself. People were joking and giving him cheers with their beer cups. This went on pleasantly for about thirty minutes or so. 

By the time he was back around to the head of the table he stopped pretty suddenly and picked up his wine bottle which was now laid sideways on top of the table empty. 

“Who drank this?” He shouted. “This was a special bottle to show my gratitude for my employees.” 

A silence swept through the room.

“It was four thousand yuan!” 

The English woman stood up, gave a big ‘WoooooHoooo,” then puked on his shoes and fell over.