Archive for May 31st, 2012
$5,000 tip
A hard-working waiter has been rewarded with a record sized tip from a couple of regulars at his restaurant. (He knows their identity, but has promised to protect their anonymity.)
Greg Rubar, who works at D’Amico’s Italian Market Café in Rice Village, Houston, and who has been travelling to work for several weeks by cabs, buses, or borrowed vans, to hold on to his job, after his car had been lost to flooding, was amazed last Saturday to receive a gift of $5,000 (in $100 bills) from the altruistic couple, who said they wanted him to use it to buy a replacement vehicle.
The shy waiter – who has subsequently been embarrassed by all the attention that the tip has brought him – initially reacted by bursting into tears in response to his customers’ generosity. He then tried to return the money, but his benefactors refused. He now plans to put it to good use, and buy the best car he can with it, in recognition of their philanthropic gesture.
The incident emphasises the excellent relationship that the 42-year-old (who has a young family dependent on him) has with his customers, after 16 years on the job: he has been waiting on this particular couple for about half of that time. He has described the anonymous donors simply as “really nice people”. And his boss says “it couldn’t have happened to a nicer person”.
