Adios El Molino

All the signs pointed to the likelihood that my eventual departure from Restaurante El Molino would be under a sizeable cloud.

And it was to be so.

In the end, it all stemmed from just one incident. For a few days prior to ‘The Incident’, three young Norwegian boys had been coming in every day for lunch.

They were really very young, probably between 10 and 12 years old, but in they would eagerly trot, pesetas clutched in sweaty little hands, before sitting down at their favourite table and ordering some sustenance.

And what utterly delightful young men they were; polite and well-educated, but their visits traumatized Vicente. Why?

You might well ask.

Well, they always paid their bill in coins, rather than with banknotes, and having to count out these coins raised the great man to heights of rage so dizzy they had remained un-witnessed until that point, even by yours truly.

He would turn progressively more purple, the problem vein throbbing with unbridled intensity, ocular orbs expanding to the size of ping-pong balls: rather alarming for anybody unfortunate enough to find themselves in the vicinity.

The ultimate of last straws was the simple banality of one of the boys spilling a small amount of salt on the table; at which point, and with a roar of fury, Vicente lumbered from his lair behind the bar, and clouted the first lad he reached around the head.

I was struck dumb with disbelief, and as the poor recipients of this terrifying behaviour hurriedly paid up and made their getaway, I found myself incapable of anything other than an attempt to control the rampaging beast that was my boss.

Later that afternoon, one of the boys’ fathers arrived to make a (very polite under the circumstances) complaint. Vicente refused to show his face – staying stubbornly wedged in his hidey-hole behind the bar – and so I was forced to apologise to the concerned parent of behalf the restaurant.

But as I returned from my grovelling duties, the raging man-mountain appeared once again from behind the beer pumps, shaking his sizeable fist in the air and liberally showering me with all the offensive names he could dredge up.

Not being overly keen on receiving the same treatment as the unfortunate child, I turned tail and fled – the customers looking on in amazement as a wailing English waitress hurtled out of the restaurant, hotly pursued by an apoplectic giant, bellowing obscenities in Spanish.

It could have been a glorious moment for ‘You’ve Been Framed’ but sadly, my fifteen minutes of fame were witnessed only by tables of perplexed tourists and Fatima; the large Senegalese lady who sat by the entrance beading hair.

Upon his return from choosing cheap mouldy lettuce from Alcúdia market, I filled Tomeo in on the latest – and worrying – developments; daftly imagining he would be shocked enough at the potential damage to the restaurant’s reputation to demand an explanation from his mentally unstable partner.

Huge was my surprise when he instead turned round and told me that if Vicente had hit a customer, the customer has undoubtedly deserved it.

Right.

And that under no circumstance should I have apologised to the father.

Ooookay.

Rather I should have denied everything and accused the boy of lying.

In a blinding flash of clarity I understood that I still had an awful lot to learn about this big, wide world, whilst at the same time realising that I absolutely didn’t want the bonkers bunch at El Molino to be my teachers.

So I just walked out of the restaurant…

…and into the paradisiacal alternative.

After almost six months of blistered feet and thread veins brought on by standing up for over twelve hours a day, seven days a week, I could sit, or indeed lie, down for as long as I wanted without having to answer to anyone.

I could slake my thirst with bottled water, as opposed to revolting tap water heavily doused with lime cordial (have you ever tasted the tap water in Mallorca??) – the restaurant budget seemingly not stretching to the rehydration of its staff.

If fact I could do pretty much everything I wanted.

So, for a while at least, I pretty much did…