(low instrumental music)
(restaurant customers chattering)
I'm looking at you right now, I got my eyes on ya.
One of my eyes anyway, I got a bad one over here.
(laughing)
I got a bad one, I'm looking with one eye.
I'm related to Sammy Davis, you know.
My name is Goren Avery, I am a restaurant professional
waiter at the Highlands Bar & Grill at this time.
Been here for going on 32 years in November of this year.
They call me the ambassador of the Highlands now,
the ambassador, which means you just go around
and take care of business, you do what you gotta do
to make people happy.
Now what about your main course?
- [Customer] I'm gonna do the.
- [Goren Avery] You doing the snap rolls to start?
- [Customer] I'm going to try the rabbit two ways.
Okay, great choice, great choice.
I'm gonna let it go, I'm gonna let it go baby.
Got a little name called Red Dog,
red complexion, dog of a man.
That's how the name Red Dog came out.
I was a bad dog back in the day.
I was chasing women, having a good time drinking,
and going out with several different women.
And now I'm a good puppy.
Old puppy, I stay on the front porch,
and just bark very slowly.
Woof woof.
(laughing)
And stop trying to chase, you know?
'Cause it just got to the point now that
I slowed down a whole lot.
(low instrumental music)
In '71, I applied for a job
at the Hyatt Regency downtown.
Met a friend of mine by the name of Frank Sted at the Hyatt.
He was the food and beverage manager,
I was a captain at that time.
I had graduated from a waiter to a captain
cooking at your table, and that's all I did.
I went to each table and cooked
for the guest on the waiter's request.
So that was my main job, my main goal, to do that.
I came here in '82, started working here with Frank.
Back in the '70s and the early '80s,
it was really, really hard for a black waiter
and a black waitress to make money.
Because you know, you had people who'd just leave
a dollar or two on a $60-$70 tab.
You had people leaving five dollars on $100.
You had some people who would kinda get out of control,
they'd pop their fingers when they'd want something,
or they'd whistle across the room, you know?
They'd call you, "Hey boy, I need to get this
"hey boy, I need to get that".
That's just the way it was.
So if you wanted to make that money,
and you know that a lot of times people I think
they do it without even thinking about what they're saying.
Now, you got people that know how to act,
and know how to tip.
And this is all I do, this is a living for me.
(low instrumental music)
You know what, it's all about reading a table
before you get to the table, okay?
You don't want to just jump in
and interrupt them from talking.
You have to kinda hang out close enough so you can
get an opportunity to step in.
If they give me just a moment to get in there,
I'm gonna dash in.
You have to know when to step in and when not to step in.
Because people come here for business meetings,
and they come here to talk about things.
And a lot of times they don't want to be interrupted,
so you have to know when to back off.
And like I said, as soon as you get
that opportunity to get in there,
"Can I get you a Cartel or a glass of wine?
"Would you like to see the wine list?
"Would you like to hear the special drink of the day?"
And so you go ahead and get that going,
then when it's time for dinner,
and they're going to ask you some questions,
they're gonna wanna know,
"What do you recommend?"
(low instrumental music)
Say for instance you order a Beef Carpaccio, which is raw,
now I can almost tell when somebody orders that,
and don't realize it's raw, what I do is say,
"look, so you like Beef Carpaccio too, huh,
"you like that raw beef yourself?"
And they say, "what do you mean raw?"
I say, "yes, it is super raw."
So you have to kinda read, when they order,
you can tell in a way.
"Oh this says Beef Carpaccio,
"it doesn't say anything about raw."
So you can kinda tell when
they really don't know what they're ordering.
A lot of people are afraid to ask you about something,
because they feel like they know it all.
So that's when we have to kind of
be sharp enough to realize that
and I never have many complaints on things like that,
because I try to take care of it
before it gets to that point.
(low instrumental music)
What waiters really hate though is when a guest
has asked for the check and they have paid out
and you're really trying to turn that table
so you can get another table there.
But waiters really hate when a guest sit down
an hour and a half after they paid the check
and will not get up, and you cannot say a word.
You cannot say a word.
And sometimes people oversalt their food.
When they first get their food they look at it,
they start doing that with the salt shaker, okay?
And then they want to complain about it being too salty.
You cannot say anything,
but just try to get them what they want, take it away.
And so, people have special needs.
Some people just wanna complain.
And a lot of times I have people complain on me
because I may spend more time with this table
than I do with your table, because they're having more fun.
You are being too stiff over here,
so I cannot relate to that.
But you have to give all the tables some love, okay?
But then, like I said, some of the ones that you just
don't want to go back to because they're just not
in that same frame of mind that you're in.
Having fun, you're talking about the meal,
you're talking about the wine, and the spirits.
And they get mad, they call in and complain,
say, "this waiter sure did spend a lot of time
"with that table over there by the window,
"and he did not spend enough time with us."
So all this stuff you have to deal with,
you just have to kinda keep going,
keep smiling, do the right thing, just be a professional.
(low instrumental music)
The younger generation of waiters,
they wanna get fast money and get out, okay?
And it's not about that.
They don't wanna know about a wine,
what's the grape, where it's coming from,
and they don't wanna know anything about, okay,
how you prepare something from the beginning to the end.
They just wanna know, okay, this is good.
The grouper's good, it's all good,
whatever you order, it's just gonna be good.
What else you gonna get, what else you wanna drink?
They kinda, instead of just making it sound interesting,
they just kinda go through it quickly.
And I noticed that from other places now.
Not here, because we don't play that stuff.
(laughing)
You'd be in trouble, baby.
Myself, I go through the whole nine yards, ya know?
(low instrumental music)
Sometimes you're on your way to work and you say,
"ah, I don't wanna go today, I'm not in the mood."
But when you get here and start talking
to some of the guests that you know,
and some of the employees,
it's just all of a sudden you get this burst of energy.
You know, after I have me a cappuccino or two.
And so, it motivates you when people come in
and they have a good time.
They all kinda like enjoying themselves,
and you're having a good time talking
about the food and everything.
It gives you that boost of extra energy,
you're on stage in other words.
This is a performance that we do,
when the curtains pull open you just do your thing.
And when the curtains just close,
you can just take a deep breath and say,
"phew, that was a long day."
And like I said, I know when to back off,
I know when to approach,
and at the end when they say,
"Goren you did a great job, please don't go anywhere,
"try to stay as long as you can."
'Cause for the last several years I'm always
talking about retiring and doing what, nothing.
Just sitting around the house and being miserable,
but I can't stop until I get to the point
where I can't do it no more.
(low instrumental music)
I come from a family with eleven of us,
I always have to help my mom in the kitchen.
My mom doesn't talk a lot.