After a couple of years ago, the owner of a pizzeria in Milna on the island of Brač thought of charging for setting the table and cutting the pizza, in my cute little concrete village by the sea they went one step further, and from this summer they also charge for sharing pizza. I can't help but notice that giant question mark above your head, so I'll try to clarify: in a local restaurant in my little concrete village, a pizza costs fourteen euros, but if you want to share the same pizza of the same size with someone, then it costs eighteen euros.
That helium-filled question mark is still hovering over your head, it seems even bigger than a moment ago, so I'll say it again: yes, sharing a pizza costs four euros, and if, say, you want to order something for the three of you along with your two portions of fried Filipino calamari children, so decide that for three little ones, one classic Dalmatian pizza made of industrial gouda and gray ham paus decorated with a piece of preserved mushroom is enough, then you will pay fourteen plus four plus four, just a moment to calculate, so one hundred and twenty two euros.
How about a hundred and twenty two?! Yes, excuse me, twenty two. How come twenty-two, you don't give up, when the menu says fourteen? Here, in fine print at the bottom of the menu, down here, I quote: "We charge a couver of four euros for additional people who share a pizza! Für weitere Personen die sich eine Pizza teilen, berechnen wir Couver vier Euro! We charge Couver four Euros for additional people sharing a pizza! For other people who share pizza, we charge Couver four euros! Za dodatko osoby dzielące się pizzą pobieramy Couver czterech euro!”
The helium question mark above your head is now even bigger: what does it mean, what does it look like, will the restaurant's Gestapo be watching the guests and making sure that some communist illegal doesn't infiltrate the terrace and order pizza and distribute it to everyone according to their needs? Oh yes: in a small, pleasant concrete village by the sea, you and your lover will sit down in a local restaurant, you will order a pizza and some draft beer, your lover will only say thank you, and the nice waiter on guard from the end of the terrace will make sure that in an attack of romantic tenderness - you know how it is, Dalmatia, the sunset, the sea, the waves, Mladen Grdović - you don't stumble and you don't shove a triangle of your pizza into your lover's mouth, that is, a pizza he didn't order.
"How come thirty-three euros when a pizza costs fourteen?", you will ask when the bill arrives, and the nice waiter will show you the annex to the contract at the bottom of the plasticized menu, which clearly, legibly and in fine print says that "sharing a pizza costs four euros". and provide a printed screenshot - "the cost of the security camera is charged ten euros" - on which you can nicely see how you extend the triangle of the pizza in question across the table, and your lover opens his mouth like Jaws 3.
That's still twenty-eight euros, where did thirty-three come from?, you won't give in, and the waiter with visible boredom on his face will point at the bottom of the menu to item 27, paragraph 2 and 3, in which it is written in small letters that "it is forbidden to enter plastic question marks and exclamation marks filled with helium" and that "every violation of the ban is charged five euros".
Yes, gentlemen, fine print at the bottom of the menu. The infamous fine print, which cost hundreds of thousands of people their houses, apartments, life savings and life as such, has spread from bank credit contracts to the menus of Dalmatian taverns and the exclusive fine dining offers of Adriatic Kurace Palace hotels. What you once skimmed over, just as laconically signing a mortgage loan for two hundred thousand Swiss francs or ordering a mixed pizza for twelve European euros, today you carefully study with glasses on the tip of your nose and a thick textbook of Ph.D. Marko Verović's "Fundamentals of commercial and contract law" next to the plate.
Well, only after half an hour, at point 89 of the general menu, do you understand why the nice waiter next to you is so relaxed: "A catering establishment is generally considered a place for the preparation, serving and consumption of food and/or drinks, and every minute spent not consuming food and/or or drinks are charged five euros." And already tomorrow, the two of you will walk into a restaurant in a small, pleasant concrete village by the sea, together with another couple, sit down, make yourself comfortable and take the menus, "oh, this time we don't have those plastic question marks", you will be cheerfully greeted by a nice waiter, then routinely write down the order, "so, one pizza with prawns for you, just gemišt for the young gentleman, and for you?", he will turn to another couple, a large man and his lady. "Ah, don't pay attention to them, they only want mineral", you will explain, "these are Čedo and Jadranka, our lawyers."
This is how romantic dinners in beautiful concrete villages by the sea will look like tomorrow, they will be skirmishes like in tense American lawyer series and court dramas. And when the two of you enter that famous pizzeria in Milna on Brač together with Miro, Đina, Kreša, Tihana, Jakov and Lucia, and the four of you order just one pizza, the nice waiter with a giant helium question mark above his head will understand that it is with the entire law firm Leko & partners came to you for pizza.
So, let the nice waiter, cutting the pizza into eight pieces, explain to your lawyers what exactly those small letters at the bottom of the menu mean, "setting the table two euros", especially what "cutting a pizza half a euro per piece" means: cutting eight pieces of pizza eight times half a euro equals four euros, or simply cutting a slice of pizza one for half a euro? And the law office Leko & partners will finally, after a brief consultation, suggest that you simply thank the waiter, set the table and cut the pizza yourself.
You will have a great time that evening with your new friends, until finally, along with the bill for the law firm Leko & partners, the bill for the pizza arrives, and you feel exactly how a nice, big plastic question mark filled with helium has popped up above your head: on the bill Namely, "a twelve-euro pizza, two-euro table setting, half-a-euro pizza cutting per piece" will all be stopped.
This is because that thing - screwing up the guest - is the very essence and meaning of Dalmatian hospitality. Elsewhere, maybe, I'm not saying, catering establishments are considered places for the preparation, serving and consumption of food and/or drinks, but in Dalmatia catering establishments generally serve only and exclusively to screw the guest. He's not even the only one: screwing up the guest is the basic activity of Dalmatian merchants, hoteliers, renters, concessionaires, guides, skippers, craftsmen, winemakers, olive growers and family farmers, the entire vast industry which, for lack of a better Croatian word, is called tourism.
You, of course, will not be fooled, you are already stubbornly stuck, it's not a matter of money, but of principle, and three months later your expensive legal team will triumphantly submit to the court a video from the security cameras of the vending machine club across the street from the pizzeria, which clearly shows see how you yourself set the table, cut the pizza and distribute the slices to the lawyers. And the owner of the pizzeria will simply explain that he never disputed it, and that nowhere in the menu does it say that there is a separate charge for setting the table and cutting the pizza by the pizzeria staff: it only says that "there is a charge for setting the table and cutting the pizza", and he, Your Honor, is not interested in who will set the table, nor who will cut the pizza.
“I rest my case.”
Well, you pay expensive lawyers and take them to pizza in Milno. As you can see, the person who screwed up the Dalmatian restaurateur was not born yet.
Bonus video:
