What a &%^($@# dining experience!

Even though this is our first time there to celebrate my parents' 28th wedding anniversary, we all felt that it is one eatery that is unworthy of a 2nd visit. At all costs, please avoid the Ebisboshi Shotengai restaurant at level 4, The Illuma @ Bugis, if you cannot stand..

1. A seemingly innovative but nonetheless irritating and frustrating way of ordering your food.

Imagine this. You are given a menu which is only in English and Jap Romanji (Jap Hanyu Pinyin). Mum struggled with the words and takes 10 mins to decide what to eat.

There's a magic electronic pen that takes down your order, by tapping the pen's tip on a spot beside the dish you want. Upon a successful tap, the pen's built in speaker will blare out your order. You will then have to tap on a quantity, e.g. the digit '1' to indicate that you want 1 set, and then the word 'Enter'.

Aside from these 'buttons' on the menu, there's even a volume control, 'Cancel Order' and a 'Review' button to tap that spells out all your orders! Here's what I heard after tapping the 'Review' button:

Ebifrycurryrice(pauses 0.5 second)KatsumiyaCurryRice(zammbreak)
SakeSashimi(zammbreak)coffee(zammbreak)hotgreentea(zammbreak)
ChickenkKatsuCurryRice(zammbreak)KarrageCurryRice(zammbreak)
EbitenSoba(zammbreak)SpicyMiso.

Dear asked: "Isn't there any 'Slow Motion' button?"

KNN. Thanks to my goldfish memory, I had to listen to it over and over again. I nearly wanted to jot the orders into my mobile phone.

After spending 15 mins in all struggling with the pen as though as I am masturbating it, I finally tapped on 'Send' to confirm. That's all? I was left wondering for a moment whether to throw the pen at the waiter next, or if the pen was clever enough to send our orders to the kitchen. Maybe another magic pen in the kitchen scribbles our orders on a whiteboard?

After 3 seconds, the pen suddenly blurted out:

"Please call the waiter!"

Ah. That leaves me with a clue. A young little waitress responded to my beckoning and came over. She asked if I have tapped on 'Send'.

Yes, I replied curtly.

Oh, I'm sorry but somehow my system could not register your orders. Why not I take your orders again??

I should've listened to Dear to ask the waitress to take down our orders in the first place!

2. A fleet of couldn't-care-less trainee waiters/waitresses -

They can't be bothered to fill up your teacup when it's running low. They prefer to punch SMSes away in front of you than being attentive in their service. The best part is, after waiting half an hour for our YakiUdons, one waiter checked with the kitchen and told us "I'm sorry but we have a lot of orders queuing up".

When Alex asked how long more do we have to wait, he murkily replied "Around 30 more minutes."




To solve this problem, a Manager kindly asked if we would like to change our orders to something that is faster to prepare. And the food did came within 5 - 10 mins as promised. Not only that, he also asked out of goodwill if we would like some complimentary ice cream. But it never came anyway. Haha.


3. No proper communication between the staff -

After waiting for an agonizing 10 mins, my bro, parents and 大嫂 finally got their food. While they were eating, a waiter served up one of our previously cancelled dishes. We asked the poor bloke to check with the manager and cancel ALL the previous orders. Not surprisingly, another came by and served the cancelled YakiUdon. And another. WALAU~EH!!! Vomit blood like a volcano!

Fall off chair plus earthquake (due to volcano)

Not forgetting the promised complimentary ice-cream that never came and the cock-up bill that came with the cock-up orders. The only deeds that deserves to be commended was the waiver of the 10% service charge by that manager and 4x$10 dining vouchers. Now THAT is something justified.

In fact, the food is still ok, especially the ramen and Spicy Miso. The curry rice was mediocre. We all knew it wasn't the manager's fault, it's how the company trained their staff that marred their image. I was actually recommended by a Manager from their company to visit and give my support, so it's kind of a letdown given their service standards.

I believe this place has the potential to perform better, let's just hope that they can organize more training sessions for their staff. And please, remove that pen- ordering thingy!