Not much has changed at Habesha since I last visited, which was probably at least a year ago since I've been traveling, the service is consistently terrible, and I prefer to eat at restaurants that value their staff and customers. While I hadn't given up patronizing them entirely, I typically chose other Ethiopian restaurants over them.
This evening I made an exception for a friend's return to Nairobi. She loves the cuisine and Habesha is the only Ethiopian restaurant in the immediate neighborhood open in the evenings with any ambiance for a group meal. However, if I had expected, or even dimly hoped for, a change in management style at my old haunt I was sadly disappointed pretty much immediately upon arrival. A chilly night, we requested to sit near the fire pit. The servers refused because the open table sat eight and they claimed it was reserved for larger groups of 10-12. The other empty table was for management. Because, obviously, non-paying customers should be the most comfortable. To make their argument more ridiculous, after we offered to move tables if a larger party came in and being refused, not one large party arrived during the entire two hours we sat there. It was a Wednesday night after all, it's not like we were asking to prevent a large group from being seated on a busy weekend night. I'm so glad that the 10-12 top of imaginary diners were warm and comfortable during their non-existent dinner while we shivered a table over, just out of the reach of the fiery warmth. For the record, if management thought about the comfort of their actual customers and not those that may or may not appear, they would most likely have made more sales. We would have stayed for at least another round of drinks after dinner, but left quickly, ready to escape the chill.
This evening I made an exception for a friend's return to Nairobi. She loves the cuisine and Habesha is the only Ethiopian restaurant in the immediate neighborhood open in the evenings with any ambiance for a group meal. However, if I had expected, or even dimly hoped for, a change in management style at my old haunt I was sadly disappointed pretty much immediately upon arrival. A chilly night, we requested to sit near the fire pit. The servers refused because the open table sat eight and they claimed it was reserved for larger groups of 10-12. The other empty table was for management. Because, obviously, non-paying customers should be the most comfortable. To make their argument more ridiculous, after we offered to move tables if a larger party came in and being refused, not one large party arrived during the entire two hours we sat there. It was a Wednesday night after all, it's not like we were asking to prevent a large group from being seated on a busy weekend night. I'm so glad that the 10-12 top of imaginary diners were warm and comfortable during their non-existent dinner while we shivered a table over, just out of the reach of the fiery warmth. For the record, if management thought about the comfort of their actual customers and not those that may or may not appear, they would most likely have made more sales. We would have stayed for at least another round of drinks after dinner, but left quickly, ready to escape the chill.
