Übercool, page 2

With page two of the strip, I tried to show the vulnerability of a waiter with food in a sea of hungry drunken people. It is our job to feed all the people present, however, many catch on as to where the kitchen is located and surround the area. Whether it’s a doorway or partition, they wait like wolves. Rarely there is an alternate route to the main rooms. When there is nowhere to go but out the “trap door”, sometimes, we’ll go in pairs, one distracts the immediate throng of people, while the other one raises the tray above everyone’s heads and dashes through quickly.

Sometimes, this works. Sometimes not. People will heckle you; yell out, “Hey, WAIT! Over here!” People will grab your arm to keep you from passing. We’re not talking a gentle touching of the arm for attention. I mean a grab on the shoulder, or arm, hands diving in to grab whatever food they can. I have never been to India, but I can only imagine it must be a similar experience attempting to leave a temple with throngs of lepers and/or the needy thrusting themselves for any ounce of generosity. I did have a similar experience with gypsies in Italy. However, in this case, at the übercool party, the masses were not disadvantaged, but a well-off superfluous drunk crowd.

I remember being filled with a kind of loathing, a sense of real despair, while contending with all the harassment. The waiters and bartenders were at the guests’ disposal. It didn’t matter that we all had other lives, hopes and artistic dreams. We were no longer people, but moving trays of food.

This is a situation that happens occasionally. When it does, it only lends one to ponder violently, “What am I doing with my life?!”