Just when you thought you had seen it all in the Qantas lounge...

[kangarooflyer88]

no issues in international. crock on.

This is Australia after all, and whilst the people here are polite and friendly they aren't sticklers for things like etiquette or cleanliness, saying this as someone who has travelled quite a bit around the world and notice how different cultures value things differently. For instance, you aren't going to see a Japanese traveller at Haneda dressing anything like what I've seen at Australian airports. They also won't take half an hour to board a narrow body (they can normally board 2 777s on domestic service in that time).

I don't particularly care whether people use tongs. We don't use them at home.

Whether or not you wear thongs at home is your business, but when you're out in public there should be some minimal amount of civility in dress ware.

-RooFlyer88

 

[RichardMEL]

This is Australia after all, and whilst the people here are polite and friendly they aren't sticklers for things like etiquette or cleanliness, saying this as someone who has travelled quite a bit around the world and notice how different cultures value things differently.

Generalisation much? we're not all bogans. It's like saying all Canadians apologise endelessly, eh or Americans are all loud and obnoxious....

Whether or not you wear thongs at home is your business, but when you're out in public there should be some minimal amount of civility in dress ware.

-RooFlyer88

er..

"thongs"

"tongs"


I'd like to see where someone might wear some tongs... but that's probably for a very different kind of discussion group!

 

[mrsterryn]

This is Australia after all, and whilst the people here are polite and friendly they aren't sticklers for things like etiquette or cleanliness.

Whether or not you wear thongs at home is your business, but when you're out in public there should be some minimal amount of civility in dress ware.

-RooFlyer88

Not quite sure how crocs mean lack of cleanliness? My question was quite genuine about foot attire. My mother back in the day would never contemplate travelling to England without her Ferragamo shoes and burberry coat. I don't know that it is necessary to do that nowadays unless one wants to .
Re Japan ....I think my foot attire there was probable sketches .
Ahhh I may be a Bogan Afterall I do have Disney croc things

 

[Vic]

HESTA

Representing a lot of the health care workers.

If you had to clean up the "cough" healthcare workers look after... well a buffet is child's play...

Edit: Etiquette is about cultural norms. Norms don't need stickers.
How about the Etiquette last week to remove my shoes before going into a Hindu temple. My socks were filthy afterwards... But at least the little old lady got her 3 rupee for looking after my shoes...

 

[Pushka]

If you had to clean up the "cough" healthcare workers look after... well a buffet is child's play...

Edit: Etiquette is about cultural norms. Norms don't need stickers.
How about the Etiquette last week to remove my shoes before going into a Hindu temple. My socks were filthy afterwards... But at least the little old lady got her 3 rupee for looking after my shoes...

I know. I've been a patient in the old Royal Adelaide Hospital and the bathrooms were and SIL was Intensive care nurse and in ER. There is not enough money in the world to pay these people the salary they deserve. And then there is the violence.

Back on topic. Ummmmmm

 

[JohnK]

Definitely have seen examples of poor food handling by some people in lounges just grabbing stuff (fortunately rare, but I have seen it) and I cringe and avoid whatever they touched - the tongs are there for a reason, people!! Unfortunately not everyone seems to understand this. Again, a small minority to be clear.

So if someone has touched food and you haven't seen them touch it then it's OK?

I've seen atrocious food handling at buffets in SE Asia. Picking up food and putting it back, grabbing bread with fingers from middle of stack, pushed out of the way, people spitting on floor in front of buffet.

Use of tongs should be compulsory. If you can't use tongs then use a fork. If you can't use either then ask staff to help.

 

[RichardMEL]

So if someone has touched food and you haven't seen them touch it then it's OK?

I thought of that as I was posting actually and yeah, if I don't see it doesn't mean it hasn't happened. Absolutely.

While I have specific individual concerns regarding such things that are more important to me personally than most (due to being immune compromised) so I tend to avoid the whole thing in general but I try to not push my individual concerns onto others specially when commenting in threads. I think this is one of those situations where we probably tend to presume proper etiquette by users.. which of course is probably foolish, but there's the fact that for the vast majority of people it would all be fine. There's probably just the thought that we don't know the personal hygeine of anyone else using the buffet - and that's not an intended slur on anyone - just a fact of life living with other humans - and if we have concerns then we also have choices.

 

[Sprucegoose]

Sitting in the Melbourne QF domestic lounge and there is a middle-aged lady walking around the lounge in her PJ's and slippers!

I have seen a couple dashing to a gate all Pj'd up - quite bizarre.

There was a guy disembarking QF36 this week in the full Martin Grant Sartorial splendour....

 

[offshore171]

This obsession with tongs again...

I can very easily pick up and take some food items using my hand without touching any other food item on the serving plate.

We all can, but that's not why the tongs are there.

In a buffet context, the tongs are a distancing tool. They keep your hands, shirt cuffs, dropped skin cells etc further away from the container of communal food items

Like a sneeze guard, but for the hands.

 

[SYD]

I have seen a couple dashing to a gate all Pj'd up - quite bizarre.

There was a guy disembarking QF36 this week in the full Martin Grant Sartorial splendourView attachment 316494....

Seatbelt sign went on after changing into PJs and then never went off….?

 

[Sprucegoose]

Seatbelt sign went on after changing into PJs and then never went off….?

quite possibly !!

 

[marks]

Sasha Boren Cohen did it best.

'I've come to find Mr Slipper. The Slipper! Slippery Pete! What is his number? I need to hire him'

Peter Slipper may have been sidelined from the prestigious speaker's position in parliament, but there is a job...

www.canberratimes.com.au

 

[JohnK]

While I have specific individual concerns regarding such things that are more important to me personally than most (due to being immune compromised) so I tend to avoid the whole thing in general but I try to not push my individual concerns onto others specially when commenting in threads.

I'm not sure I agree that it's pushing individual concerns onto others.

I cannot see how anyone would see that it's acceptable to use fingers/hands to grab food at the buffet. Unless of course that person is totally uncultured at which point they should not be allowed out and about.

I know management in a lot of these places try to do the right thing but there's only so many staff and can't always see what is going on.

I remember at one hotel it was quite common to see males circling the buffet holding plate and eating with their fingers as they were walking around the buffet. Not a good sight. Now that may be acceptable in their culture but it's definitely not acceptable in western society.

Complain to management and they reluctantly address the issue and post signs all over the place but at the same time expect me to understand the culture where these people came from. Actually no I do not want to understand.

 

[Quickstatus]

minimal amount of civility in dress ware

People have very different notions of "minimal' and "civility".
I Just watch the entertainment knowing that there is no way that I will be the centre of attention.

grabbing bread with fingers from middle of stack

Have seen that in QFJLounge and QFPub. Makes sense as its fresher in the middle.
Have also seen people drink from a glass then immediately refill from the water stand touching the spout with used glass.

 

[Pushka]

People have very different notions of "minimal' and "civility".
I Just watch the entertainment knowing that there is no way that I will be the centre of attention.

Have seen that in QFJLounge and QFPub. Makes sense as its fresher in the middle.
Have also seen people drink from a glass then immediately refill from the water stand touching the spout with used glass.

Maybe we've all become a bit more attune, obsessed? with such stuff because of Covid. I remember watching a cooking show during one of the early lockdowns. The sight of the cook, he wasn't a chef despite what he thought he was, and the manner in which he was eating and poking around in the food, in Covid times when the message was wash wash spray spray disinfect etc etc, truly repulsed me.

 

[offshore171]

what he thought he was, and the manner in which he was eating and poking around in the food, in Covid times when the message was wash wash spray spray disinfect etc etc, truly repulsed me.

I did a few years working in hospitality back when I was a uni student.

Our bistro had a number of bains-marie, which contained a range of stews, pasta dishes and the like. Each of these had a large ladle for self serving a portion onto your plate.

One of the semi regular customers was an older lady who used to come in on occasion.

She would taste test nearly every dish, directly off the serving ladle, and then put the ladle back into the stew or whatever in the bains-marie. If one of us caught her she would feign ignorance and say she didn't speak english.

I had these visions that we would one day find her false teeth in the stew at the end of the night (fortunately this never came to pass!)

Yikes!

 

[Quickstatus]

Maybe we've all become a bit more attune, obsessed? with such stuff because of Covid.

I think it was alive prior to Rona - the dress code thing and food handling. Maybe amplified by Rona and some are attuned not all. Hence the entertainment.

 

[dajop]

A tongue-in-cheek thought for those picking up bread rolls using tongs. Do you wash/sanitise your hands after using the tongs, but before picking up the bread roll with your hands? What about all the people who've had their dirty hands on the tongs, potentially transferred to your hands when you touched the tongs.

 

[Mr H]

I don't care what people wear. I dress down when I travel but that involves an un-ironed (and perhaps not clean) collared shirt, cargo trousers, socks and scruffy walking shoes. It ticks the boxes for a dress code, but I don't think it's quite what the dress-code snobs had in mind.

I don't care about use of tongs. I take the view that what doesn't kill us makes us stronger. I touch the same surfaces as others, I seldom wash my hands and I assume others do the same. I would not be fussed if someone handles my food unless their hands were visibly dirty. With family and friends, we handle each others' food and eat from the same pot, etc. I'm not sure why I would think people I don't know would be a greater health risk than the people I do.

My Australian family all have this Australian obsession with washing, double dipping, covering skin, cleanliness, etc. and they are the ones who are always going sick. Gosh I'm glad I'm not them.

 

[Quickstatus]

I seldom wash my hands

Hand washing is good. Maybe try it?

I would not be fussed if someone handles my food unless their hands were visibly dirty

Dirty can be microscopic.