Solo Food Ordering

After spending a spending some time with my girlfriend and also her family during my first few days in Brazil, the moment came when I was going to have to try and get by alone, attempt to make purchases and so on.

So after finding a table in a local restaurant, I managed to order picanha, salad, fries and rice.  I was asked what I would like to drink, but was not able comprehend the question, (the owner was summonsed and offered assistance at this point).  So first meal out alone was pretty much what I had ordered and what I had expected, an encouraging result.

The next day saw me looking for a lighter bite to eat lunchtime, so I decided to try a "Subway" sandwich to take away.  Immediately thinking that this would pose a challenge or two, partly because I so rarely visited Subway in my native UK, along with the sheer number of choices involved when ordering a Subway, coupled with the obvious language barrier, the difference between the ordered food and the delivered product could be substantial, perhaps even hilarious.

Having managed to select the bread, the main filling and size of sub, the main fun came when trying to convey my preferences for the salads and dressings etc.  In essence, I wanted pretty much all the salad items bar the chilli peppers.  At this point in time my language skills were woefully inadequate to articulate this, so sweeping hand gestures over across the salad bar followed by "Sim" and then pointing to the chilli pepper and saying "nao", did not seem to be understood.  It was fortuitous that the customer behind me in the line spoke English and stepped into the breach and helped out - special thank you to him, whoever he was.

Burger King the following day also went without a hitch, with exception of being issued with a ticket to collect your food, the process was remarkably similar to the UK, including the outrageous staff doing nothing to staff working ratio and down to the preposterous delay from ordering my fast food to receiving it.

Presumably, food ordering can only get better from here on in, but hey, what does this gringo know, only time will tell...