My Apologies to the Chinese Mafia

I was a little hungry this afternoon so I called for Chinese carry-out. Over the phone I gave the guy my usual order and he said his usual "Ten minute!" I wait a few minutes and then I'm off to get my sodium enriched goodies. Well, I wasn't at all prepared at what happened when I arrived at the Chinese restaurant. Note: I'm not mentioning the name of the Chinese restaurant to protect me and the others who could be harmed in any way [mostly kidding].

First when I pulled into the parking lot I knew things were going to be different. There were 5 Chinese gentleman in tuxedos standing and talking to each other outside of the Chinese restaurant. As I approached the restaurant one of the tuxedoed men slowly walked in my direction and stopped and proceeded to stare at me. I passed by him, but I didn't quit make it to the front door. A Chinese woman, who was wearing what looked like a prom dress, then bursts out of the restaurant door shouting at one of the dapper men outside. When she was done yelling I grabbed the door handle and was attempting to open the door to go inside. The man to which she was yelling, in the mean time, had jogged to the door and got in front of me and turned and said to me "This place is closed. We are having a private party." Man, this really burned me up! I mean no one gets between me and my shrimp fried rice and eggroll, especially a guy who weighed about a buck twenty. I held my composure, but I sternly said, "I have a carry-out order!" He then said, "Oh, I'll go see if it's ready, what is your name?" I told him and he closed the door in front of me. Unfriggin-believable.

So now I'm standing outside of this Chinese restaurant with 5 tuxedoed Chinese men looking at me as if I had delayed something very important to them. I avoided eye contact as much as possible because I think I watch too many movies and that is what they say to do. Anyway, I'm standing there for about a minute and finally the guy comes out of the restaurant and says, "It's ready". I thought that the weirdness was going to end. Boy, was I wrong!

As I opened the second door, which opened into the small foyer, I couldn't believe was I was friggin' seeing. There were about a dozen people in this tiny area all dressed up and getting their pictures taken. It turned out it was a wedding reception and I was suddenly thrown in the middle of it, literally. In order to make my way to the counter to get my food, I would have to walk between the photographer and his well-dressed subjects. I was thinking "You have got to be kidding me", am I on Candid Camera or maybe getting Punk'd? I wish.

My knowledge of the Chinese language or their culture doesn't exist so I had no idea what to do. I mean, if I walked in front of the photographer would I have caused an international incident? So being diplomatic, I stood there for about 30 seconds waiting before anyone realized that I was even there. The woman working at the restaurant waved me over. As I walked over to her, which was only fifteen feet, I could feel the daggers the people in the room's eyes were throwing my way. The woman behind the counter seemed to be pretty fed up that this was going on in her restaurant. I paid, grabbed the paper bag with my grub and then turned around. I then had deja vu. I was once again trying to get to the other side of this room, which meant to have to walk in between these people again. And again about 30 seconds go by and a woman in a pink dress said "Oh, you can go". As soon as I heard that I made a bee line for that door. I kept my head down and got the heck out of there. I quickly passed the tuxedoed men for the last time and got to my car without incident.

The whole thing felt like a deleted scene in "The Godfather" where some schmo crashes the big wedding and "the boys" don't like it at all and they take care of the problem. I'm not so sure that if I had said something to any of the those men that they wouldn't have given me more than a fortune cookie. I hope that they weren't packing and that they don't have itchy trigger fingers because while I was getting my food I saw that there was another carry-out order waiting to be picked up. I'm hoping that I don't read something in the paper about an incident tomorrow.

I'll order pizza next time.