Socket to me: Salud, Kro’s, or Goose & Duck for best outlet?
Socket to me...
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So, I just bought a new cord for my computer and one of the prongs is round and that generally makes it harder to find an outlet at restaurants, cafes, and bars. Just how hard is it? Less a matter of hardware and more a matter of the staff making an effort…
Goose and Duck: The waitress looked at my plug, then at the nearest outlet. No fit. She looked at the outlets on either side of that initial outlet. No fit. Her verdict: They had no outlets that could fit my plug. I then walked around the bar and within one minute found an extension cord with two outlets that fit. (The waitress otherwise did a good job.)
Kro’s Nest: Pretty much the same process. A waiter looked at my plug, then at a few outlets, and told me they had none that fit. I looked around and could not find any, either. Then I mentioned that on my last visit, there was an extension cord. He said he didn’t know where it was. I kept mentioning the extension cord and he eventually reached beneath the counter, felt around, and brought out a box that contained several adapters, including one that fit my plug. (The staff otherwise made its usual near-minimal effort.)
Salud: I wanted to quickly check my email and saw that none of the outlets nearby would fit my plug. The guy behind the bar — Ah Hui — and I looked around to no avail. Then he checked near the DJ booth and found a socket that worked. I had to move my computer near the door so the cord would reach the outlet, but it didn’t matter since I only needed to use it for a few minutes.
The result: The staff at all three places could have found an outlet that fit, but only one guy–and the one at the place where people are least likely to pull out a laptop–made that little bit of extra effort to do so. And that’s usually all it takes: A little bit of extra effort.
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Come on – you are really looking for someone in China to go ‘the extra mile’?
The eternal question continues: Is it more awesome or a pain in the ass to live in a country with no tipping?
@ doc o,
It’s more awesome. There is plenty of good service in Beijing, including by that guy at Salud. I usually get service at places such as 2F, at Blue Frog (we’ll see if that continue in the post-Lee era), etc.
Cheers, Boyce
maybe we should take up a collection and get you one of those nifty pocket adapters of your own. A seemingly wise investment for a guy who virtually lives online in the local establishments.
Why would you buy a plug with a round prong for a computer you will use primarily in China? Sorry, buying the wrong plug and then getting on the case of restaurant staff is not fair.
chinawhite has you there Boycey. Seems like a very good investment.
@ The Village Grouch,
I didn’t buy a plug with a round prong. I bought one with a flat prong, it didn’t work, I took it back to the computer shop, and the staff replaced it with a plug with a round prong.
As for “getting on the case of the restaurant staff”, I don’t get your point. All three places I went to had the ability to handle a request for a round prong, and Kro’s even has a box with different adapters, but only one made any effort to help.
Cheers, Boyce
I’ll second TVG: *any* plug with *any* of its prongs that can be described as “round” is wrong in *almost all* Chinese sockets.
Either two flats (both vertical), or three flats (two angled, one vertical).
The fact that you could use *the wrong plug* in *any* restaurant says volumes about the Chinese flexibility towards electric standards, and a desire to cater to foreigners who expect their foreign plugs to “just work” (but would laugh at Chinese expecting the same thing in their home countries).
And, in my book, that “desire” to help out poor ignerent furriners is *great* service.
@Shannon,
Having the equipment to handle a round plug and having staff able and/or willing to provide that equipment to a customer are two different things. I’m talking about the latter. The inability or unwillingness to provide equipment that is readily available is a service issue.
Re your comment:
“The fact that you could use *the wrong plug* in *any* restaurant says volumes about the Chinese flexibility towards electric standards, and a desire to cater to foreigners who expect their foreign plugs to “just work”.”
Every extension cord I have bought in Beijing has been able to handle a plug with a round prong. If a Beijing restaurant happens to buy one for its general use and it so happen I can also use it to plug in my computer, it hardly proves a “desire to cater to foreigners”, at least not on the part of the restaurants. In any case, the issue, again, is not the availability of equipment but of the staff providing it to the customers.
Cheers, Boyce
“Every extension cord I have bought in Beijing has been able to handle a plug with a round prong.”
Then maybe you should carry one with you when you go to restaurants / bars?
If you want to go direct-to-socket, then buy a China-standard plug!
Put it another way: there are 18 million tourists a year to Canada, and 27 million a year to China. Those numbers are within the same order of magnitude.
Is there a *single* bar in Toronto that even *has* universal sockets for its customers if they should want to plug their laptops in?!?
Is there *a single bar or restaurant in Canada* that does this?
And yet 2 out of 3 random places in Beijing were able to help you out with your non-standard plug…
@ Shannon,
I think you are off on a tangent and missing my point. Here it is in simple terms:
1) I went to three places and I had a plug that had a round prong.
2) All of them had the ability to facilitate this but, as described in the post above, in two cases I had to push the issue to get the outlet.
3) Those two cases are examples of poor service.
If these places were unable to facilitate the prong — fine. In fact, in the FIRST PARAGRAPH I note that it’s harder to find such outlets. But they were able to and the hassle to get them to do so is the issue.
As for whether there is a bar in Toronto or in Canada with universal sockets, I don’t know. Allow me to dip into my personal savings and fund a study. Or, better yet, I’ll just stick to my point: It there *are* bars in Canada with universal sockets, and someone asks to use one, and the staff says they don’t have one, then that’s poor service.
Cheers, Boyce
PS I don’t expect bars to have outlets to handle round plugs – I simply didn’t bring mine on those visits.