RANT - Thieving Restauranters, Singapore

I still can't believe that in thirty years of international travel, this was the first time I have been knowingly ripped off by a restaurant. 

The place was called Marina Bay Seafood, on Boat Quay in Singapore. The receipt showed the more telling company name behind the restaurant, the Fuqing Seafood Company.

I was surprised by the brazen nature of the place. After all, we were six guys out for the night. We sat down at this place, ready for a Singaporean feast, but not for a royal Fuqing. We ordered nothing special - no Lobster - mine was Pepper Beef. With a selection of similarly ordinary appetizers - satay, grilled vegetables, prawns, and so on - plus six Tiger Beers, we had a great time until the bill arrived.

As if to telegraph the rip-off, the restaurant had charged us fifty cents for each towelette we'd used.

At something over six hundred dollars - more than one hundred dollars each - for food that according to the menu should have cost barely half that sum - we were certain the restaurant ripped us off. After a brief questioning of the wait staff, learning that these were apparently market prices for the portion sizes we had been served - even though those sizes and prices had never been explained or knowingly ordered - we shrugged our shoulders and decided we'd each exact our revenge. 

That "revenge" consisted of warning off the other five hundred or so IBMers who were also at the sales conference, and blogging our disgust at this Fuqing rip-off.