Well, we went out for dinner and a relatively nice restraunt. It was "paid for" by part of the cost of our trip but just like most foreign countries, ordering water doesn't mean you're getting tap water.
It's bottled water with our without "bubbles".
Well, I should have known better seeing that I've experienced this before but I didn't really think about it. When it came time to order drinks, everybody wanted water and of course they brought out bottled water. Fast forward to the bill.......the meal plus 1 soft drink was paid for however they included all the bottled water they poured, generously I might add, on the bill and only told us at the end that bottled water wasn't free!
Have you ever tried to get 13 people to pay their fair share of a bill? No offense but I was the only male at the table, if you know what I'm getting at. Anyway, with all of us being educators and wanting to speak up there was nothing but chaos and the poor waitress was stressed out to say the least. It was pretty embarrassing. After 10 minutes of craziness we just split what was owed evenly and left. I'm sure they were talking about the crazy Americans when we were gone.
Moral of the story....when traveling abroad, make sure you request tap water if you don't want to pay for it.
Heading for the Land of the Zulus tomorrow to visit a school and have a cultural African experience.
I have to say as a former waiter, there is nothing more frustrating than watching a table of people argue about how to split a bill, or how much each person has to pay, or who has to pay...you get my point!
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