Doctor models new hat for short people. Still has to stand up to be noticed.
Few moments in New Zealand life are more uncomfortable, than the arrival of the bill at the end of a group meal.
Kiwis are inherently programmed to try to make everything in life as ‘fair’ as possible. So the thought of simply dividing the tab, evenly, by the number of people present, fills the average Kiwi with the sort of confusion and terror normally reserved for an All Blacks v France Rugby World Cup match.
Which makes squaring up the tab in New Zealand, one of the most difficult, most convoluted group agreements to reach, since the David Bain jury. Both of them.
History
The common practise, in most western countries, is to treat group dining out as a sort of competitive sport. The winner being the person, or couple, who achieves the highest return on investment. The best way to do this, is by greedily scoffing more food and drink than anyone else, then, when the bill arrives, suggest loudly, “Shall we just split this evenly between us then?”, knowing full well that anyone who so much as raises an eyebrow will appear, to everyone else, a tight fisted bastard.
Scientists believe that, possibly due to low selenium levels in the soil, Kiwis have by comparison evolved with an underdeveloped Non Stingyus gland, which is, in layman’s terms, the part of the brain responsible for ‘getting the rounds in‘.
Evidence of this medical condition can be seen in the great many New Zealanders, living in Britain, who choose to co-habit, 5 to a room, in squalid 2-up houses in the Zone 5 (and beyond) suburban wastelands of outer London.
The alternative (known among academics as ‘Mixing with the Locals‘) can be simply too confusing, too upsetting, to bother with – never quite knowing whose turn it is to get the next expensive round of drinks. Especially when the whole point of living in conditions not seen since the Irish slums of Victorian London, is to scrimp together enough pounds for a deposit on an overpriced house back home.
And it is this withered Non Stingyus gland which is the root cause of Kiwi behavior when dining in groups of more than 4, of dividing up, and paying for, a restaurant bill meticulously, based on ‘who ordered what’.
So precise, is this custom, that it often requires a calculator. It is also both physically, and mathematically, impossible to perform without a protracted length of passive-aggressive negotiation, along the lines of ‘well Sue is driving, so she shouldn’t really pay for drinks’ or ‘I’m a gluten intolerant vegan, and the meat dishes are always more expensive’.
Quite why anybody would go to dinner with a gluten intolerant vegan remains a global mystery. The New Zealand method of ‘splitting the bill’, however, is a firmly local quirk.
Advice
Visiting foreigners, or recent immigrants, who find themselves in this awkward situation, are advised to simply relax, let someone else stress over the sums, and join the queue of 12 other people at the till, insisting on paying their share of the tab with that other very-Kiwi phenomenon, Eftpos.
And on the plus side, it’s also a clever way of glossing over the equally uncomfortable issue of whether to leave a tip or not. Which is no bad thing, as it is universally established that most waiters are c**ts.
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A competitive sport, just brilliant and so true. After some time in London we have banished this trait and happily seek to maximise our return, possibly because we now have some cash and just throw the credit card at the bill and accept the 12%+ tip along with everyone else. it is funny though to see some fresh of the boat kiwis worrying about what to order and what they had, although the current exchange rate should ease the pain of a trip/move to London
i’m an immigrant married to a very stingy kiwi and this cracked me up. i tend to subscribe to the view that among friends, there’s no need to be too financially detailed as it will all even out in the big picture. i have noticed that attitude making my hubby sweat. once he has a few drinks, however, he’ll treat everyone.
thanks for the comic relief…
I LIKE splitting the bill by what I actually ate, it keeps the gluttons in check. Otherwise you have to judge the group you’re with, and have several menu selections at the ready in case someone starts taking the p*ss with lobster (or venison, or cocktails…) which completely takes the fun out of it.
And it ain’t bill-checkers who are the stingy c*nts, it’s the people who eat their dinner and then expect the rest of the table to pay for it! BLUDGERS!
Meticulous bill splitting is also extremely Swedish. Of course the restaurants don’t like it, and many have signs indicating “one bill per table please”.
If you go out with a Swede but for whatever reason don’t actually split the bill “correctly”, a debt of thanks (“tacksamhetsskuld”) arises, never to be forgotten. It will be repaid, possibly many years later, with the comment “you paid last time”.
Even offering something as simple as “my shout” in a small group will cause some consternation as everyone tries to figure out whether they’ll manage to drink enough to even out the bill by the end of the evening.
I apprecieate this posting because only last night I got super screwed at a group dinner. It was a birthday gathering. My entire meal and drinks came to $30 but ended up having to put over $70 when they just wanted to split it evenly. If I complained I would have been dampening the birthday girls spirits so I just shut up and put money in.
Oh, I forgot:
If we (Germans) actually decide to split the bill evenly, we usually have one person around the table take the lead, collect everybodies share and pay the waiter in one sum … makes live so much easier (for the waiter)
Splitting the bill (evenly) seems to be a very British / Kiwi thing.
My experience in most countries (not only the US) actually is to have the waiter go round the table and collect seperately from everybody (unless the meals were really shared like you’d sometimes do in a Chinese restaurant). And I don’t think most waiters actually mind. Rather than having to wait until a group has sorted out how to split the bill, they would usually also get a higher (collective) tip out of it.
The worst experience a waiter could have is what I have seen recently (in the UK):
A group of about 12 business people, some from the UK, some from Germany (including myself), some from the US, shared dinner in an Indian restaurant.
We decided to follow the suggestion from the British to split the bill evenly (which was ok as we shared most of the side orders and the main courses were all roughly the same price). So far so good, the waiter got the same amount from everyone. However, this being a dinner of traveling business people, everyone payed by credit card and the waiter had to actually write 12 bills because the UK and US guys needed them to get reimbursed by their companies (it is different for business travelers from Germany (we do not get reimbursed based on what we spent) but that’s another story).
To summarize: Wait until the group has decided on splitting the bill, agreed on the tip, write 12 seperate bills, collect each bill seperately via credit card …
What’s even funnier is when the restaurant is really happy to accommodate it. At dinner last night we were told they could spilt however we wanted. It ended up going 12 ways… The line as everyone used EFTPOS took up most of the main room
O yes, another lovely sentiment!
This comment was originally posted onCupcakes and Mace
*Things I hate: Men who tell me to smile.*
You’ve hit the nail right on my wife’s head. Is that the right way of putting it?
Her other hated variation on the theme is..
“Cheer up love, it might not happen.”
To which the appropriate response is, “With you, I hope to god it never does.”
30 seconds later. Half way down the street. With no-one round to hear…
This comment was originally posted onCupcakes and Mace
I hate when men tell me to smile. Couldn’t have said it better than that post. Ick, it always creeps me out.
ickle and Lardee get cuter everytime. I can’t get enough!
This comment was originally posted onCupcakes and Mace
I hate guys who say ’smile’ so very much. Maybe I’m in a pissy mood, ever think of that?? My world doesn’t revolve around making your view prettier! *breathes* Pet peeve of mine.
This comment was originally posted onCupcakes and Mace
Both are so awesome aren’t they. I think Madonna’s book is awesome because it’s so scandalous. A big star like her, actually has sex and wants people to not only know about it, but SEE it?! Also back in the day when it was published I imagine it would have been even more scandalous.
This comment was originally posted onCupcakes and Mace
I love the Kiwianarama blog, because as you say it’s all true! Whether we like it or not.
This comment was originally posted onCupcakes and Mace
i have a copy of madonna’s sex book here at home! love it.
why cant i paint zippers on my face out of makeup? WHY!?!
This comment was originally posted onCupcakes and Mace
BAHAHAHAHA, the Lamebook post and the pregnancy question both made me laugh for a loooong time! I made the partner read the pregnancy question and he started playing ‘how is babby formed? how girl get pragnent’? in the background. I can’t breathe through all of this damn laughter!
This comment was originally posted onCupcakes and Mace
I love it! Never again do I have worry about who has eaten what – or people trying to make feel guilty if I had a side dish of boiled turnips
I have had friends back in the UK where we took turns to pay and it all worked our swimmingly till a new girfriend came on the scene who insisted on us splitting the bills by what we ate (she was as it happens a vegitarian amongst blatant carnivores!). We stopped going as we couldnt be bothered with the fuss.
I find the effort of accommodating vegetarians far outweighs any reward.
Indeed veges are often instigators of the ‘fair’ bill split, as are non-drinkers. And then there’s the vege-non-drinkers… oh that’s right, my partner’s one of em.
Very awesomesauce pick n mix this week!
I think kiwianarama will become a fav read mainly because it is all so true!
This comment was originally posted onCupcakes and Mace
Oh, that xkcd comic was lovely.
Remind me to never go out to dinnerwith a bunch of Kiwis! I went to dinner with a group in Canberra who ended up using the calculator function of their phone to work out how much everyone owed. While I sat there with a face that said ‘You’re stealing my life away minute by minute’ and half-yelled “JUST SPLIT THE FUCKING BILL EVENLY.”
This comment was originally posted onCupcakes and Mace
So true! I think that’s why we avoid using the Entertainment Book when we’re going out with other people, unless one person is paying.
This comment was originally posted onCupcakes and Mace
Throw in the Enterntainment Card and bill paying becomes even more fun in a large group…
This comment was originally posted onCupcakes and Mace
That facebook letter was THE BEST in douchebaggery I’ve read in a while. Of course, then I ruined it by reading some of the comments. He was just trying to be nice, my ass!
I liked the Chinese immigrant letter too; that was kind of an asinine question IMO (”should include your contributions to the West”?). What a way to answer it.
This comment was originally posted onCupcakes and Mace
Kiwis do take bill-splitting to a remarkable new level. In the US, there is an equally horrible practice called “separate checks”. However, in this case, the duress is placed upon the waiter (rather than the patron).
NZ restaurants that bring a bill to the table? Nearly every one I’ve been to you head over to the register and pay (via EFTPOS of course) yourself (although maybe this says something about where I eat…)
seems as if your culinary experiences have not extended past your name-sake… or to at least give you some credit, the lonestar. though i am guessing you only paid for the steak and chips that YOU ate, therefore putting you, along with the two other comments on this page neatly under the very undesirable category of stingy c*nt
Years ago when dining in Croatia with an ex-girlfriend and her kiwi friends, the friends insisted on “just splitting the bill evenly” despite the fact I had had a small garden salad and, I shit you not, she had had inhaled an entire lobster (she was somewhat portly). While the ex thought this was perfectly acceptable, my response was less glowing, leaving me with the label of stingy c*nt. I’m not one for calculating bills but that was taking the piss. True story.
On a total random basis we do the same here, I am quite sure that paying for what you ordered is actually common everywhere