This story takes place at a Middle Eastern café in Central Ohio. The café is a favorite date night destination for my wife and me. We dine there several times each year. It’s small and cozy. The décor is (not surprisingly) Middle Eastern with arched supports, ornate pillars, oriental rugs and braziers.
The staff is warm and friendly. Most hail from the Middle East and Balkans. The waiters tend to be males and there’s always a stunning hostess to greet patrons as they enter.
The menu specializes in Turkish foods, kabobs in particular. When we go, we usually order a beef kabob along with a shrimp plate in cream sauce. The trick is to take the steak off the kabob and then pour the shrimp’s cream sauce over the beef. Fantastic! Then wash it all down with a Turkish coffee.
What:
This story focuses on a winter’s evening dinner at the café.
My mother-in-law (see previous post) was over kid watching and my wife and I were out for dinner and movie.
We decided on the café since it was also close to the theatre. So we set out in our trusty, old, and paid off 1998 Honda Civic (I hate car payments! I’ll drive that thing till the wheels come off). A few minutes later we arrived at the mall where the café is, found a parking spot, and fast walked out of the cold to front door.
Inside a tall blonde dressed in a white jump suit greeted us. Every time we go there’s a new hostess up front. Apparently all picked from Turkish supermodels. Almost like they’re running a human trafficking ring for high priced call girls.
There was a table open along the wall and we were seated immediately.
[Quick aside – the café is adjacent to a Mongolian Barbecue joint. The line for the Mongolian All-You-Can-Stuff-in-Your-Face Barbecue is always out the door. I’ve never understood this. For literally as little as two clamshells more you can walk next door, sit down without waiting, and be served a meal that puts Mongol meat to shame.]
We knew what we wanted and as soon as our waiter came for our drinks we placed our order. Our waiter was one of the long-timers and I suspect a part owner. An older gentlemen with a heavy Balkan accent.
With the order placed, we settled in and started discussing the night’s agenda. Probably a cheesy action/sci-fi movie followed by some drinks. Yeah, my wife actually likes those flicks. One of the reasons I married her! Then it happened.
The mob walked in.
Specifically, three gentlemen came through the front door. Two older men. One in a full length black leather coat with slicked back salt and pepper hair offset with a Mephisto goatee. The other a little heavier set with a full length brown leather coat. The third guy was huge. A young guy, probably late 20’s, around 6’1” or 6’2” and well over 300 pounds of not-so-handsome. Admittedly a lot of it was fat but still an imposing figure.
The guy in the black coat was obviously in charge – no doubts. The other old guy hung on his elbow and whispered to him while the ‘kid’ stood to one side intently studying his i-phone.
As soon as our waiter (owner) caught site of them, he rushed over and grabbed the head mofioso’s hand and kissed the guy on both cheeks. He doesn’t even look at the other two. He’s now profusely shaking the guys hand and walking them to a table. The owner walks them over a sits them down at the table right next to us.
The night just got a little more interesting…
My wife is actually sitting on the same wall bench that ‘Mephistopholes’ has his butt planted on. She’s about two and a half feet away. She has also not picked up on this turn of events. Sometimes she can be a bit oblivious to her immediate surroundings (not unlike her mother) but thank god not to the same degree.
(I actively work on her situational awareness. Stay alert, Stay alive! … There have been times, well Ok one time, when driving on vacation, late at night, the van loaded with kids, when she pulled off the freeway for gas. One gas station on the right, well lit, well travelled and another on the left. Dark and empty except for the hookers coming to and from the no-tell-motel next to it and some guys exchanging cash for small items by the pumps. But the one on the left is selling gas for 2 cents cheaper. One guess which station she pulled into.)
But back to the story…the owner sits them next to us. Mephistopholes right by my wife. His lackey sitting next to him. And across the table, blocking them off from the rest of the café the 300 pound mountain gorilla. The owner stands by their table and proceeds to chew the ear off Mephisto for the next 20 minutes straight. The guy is waiting half the tables in the café but ignores them completely. Thank god we’d got our order in.
Finally, the owner takes his leave. After which, every single waiter in the café comes over. One guy at a time. Introduces himself to the head grease ball and then proceeds to give a five minute oration on where they’re from back in the motherland and brief life history.
This is great. Dinner AND a show.
While the waiters are paying their respects, food starts to show up at their table. Food is arriving even though they haven’t ordered. And the food that’s coming is NOT on the menu.
My wife looks over and sees a bread platter that’s not on the menu. Then she gives me an aneurism when she pokes Mephisto on the shoulder and says, “Hey what’s that dish?”
All conversation at their table stops. The gorilla looks up from his i-phone for the first time that night and stares at my wife. The owner catches sight and scurries over. He inserts himself between my wife and the un-holy trinity next to us.
And I’ve got to give the owner credit. He covered nicely.
All smiles, he went on for a few minutes about the traditional bread plate. Had a sample brought to our table and told my wife to flag him down the next time we were in and he’d fix us up.
With things smoothed over, the waiter introductions continued. I’ve now completely tuned out my wife and am listening 100 percent to our neighbor’s conversations. From one of the waiter’s treatises I figure out our gangsters are Armenian mob. Armenia is a small exceptionally poor country just to the East of Turkey. It’s bordered on the North by Georgia, the East by Azerbaijan, the South by Iran and of course Turkey on the West.
The Armenian mob is rather well known in law enforcement circles. At one point in my career I took part in multiple raids on Armenian residences in Glendale, CA (heavily Armenian) …. but that’s another story.
So back to ours. Finally, the waiters finish paying their respects and dinner at both tables proceeds. The gorilla never looks up from his phone or his plate. And never says a word. Not one word. He just sits there. While Mephistopholes and his chief lieutenant, Beelzebub, confer in low tones.
Fortunately, they’re right next to us. I can hear everything.
But the conversation is mostly in Armenian. It’s actually flowing in and out of English and Armenian. Even within the same sentence. Part of the sentence in English and part Armenian.
However…Uncle Sam (at great expense) rammed Russian down my throat for six hours a day, five days a week, for one year straight….with hours of homework at night. It was so much Russian I started having dreams in Russian. Nightmares to be accurate. One recurring nightmare to be precise. Which was, I’d be sitting in my Russian classroom all alone except for my teacher. Just me and my Russian born defector turned U.S government slave driver, er teacher. He would fire off a Russian grammar question at me and just when I thought of the answer, he’d yell “Too Late!” then fire another question at me. In the waking world, my Russian teacher was quite a character. He had a favorite saying which I now routinely use on my kids. Whenever anyone would complain about the pace he would pause, look up at the ceiling and say in a heavy accent, “Mmmm how you Amerikans say? Ah yes, this is not for you to like … it’s for you to do.” It was an intense school and full of stress. If you failed out then you were, as the Navy liked to phrase it, “Haze gray and underway”. That’s not a good thing. But it did teach me Russian and Russian is pretty damn close to Armenian.
I could follow most of what they were saying. Not all of it but most of it. The two head guys were talking intently about sports cars and expensive real-estate properties. Nothing juicy. No chopped up bodies or anything like that. Just their mortgage fraud schemes and what cars they were going to buy with the profits.
While they were talking I had leaned over and discretely clued in my wife as to the nature of our neighbors. Our own conversation then came back to movies and the usual fare. My wife had actually had a brief exchange with Mephisto about the bread and I’m sure they heard us talking in our distinct American mid-west dialect. They pegged us for run-of-the-mill white folk out for a night’s diversion.
We finished our dinner and paid our bill. Then we got up and started walking for the door.
But I couldn’t resist. Just as I was passing the mountain gorilla, I turned and to the two headmen I said, in perfect unaccented Russian, “Have a good evening gentlemen.”
Their conversation stopped. The two chiefs looked up and their eyes were the size of saucers. Even Mr. 300+ turned around from his i-phone and stared.
We covered the remaining distance to the door at a half-trot. Once outside, my wife turned to me and said, “You know, that was pretty stupid. Let’s get out of here.”
Yep it was pretty dumb. But damn it felt good!
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