A customer tried to gain TikTok’s sympathy by posting a clip in which a restaurant server confronts the woman and her friend for bringing in an outside beverage. Turns out, almost everyone is on the server’s side.
The post comes from creator Phoebe Pine (@phoebe.pine4), who who had just sat down to dine at Pasadena, Texas’s Pelican Breakfast & Lunch (though she dubbed it Pelican Grill). The initial segment, clocking in at nearly four minutes, has received more than 109,700 views since being posted on Sunday.
The video shows Phoebe and a purple-haired companion in a booth at the restaurant, with Phoebe holding a plastic, to-go beverage cup from another establishment. It starts with the restaurant server kindly informing them that the door of the restaurant has signage indicating no outside food or drink is allowed.
Phoebe initially professes ignorance, but then the purple-haired friend begins to get visibly upset. “I wasn’t talking to you and you came over and told me to leave and I didn’t do anything,” she wails. The customer also tells the server, “You attacked me!”
@phoebe.pine4 Who was in wrong here? #badservice #managergonewild #phoebepine ♬ original sound – Phoebe Pine 4
About halfway through the video, Phoebe observes that the server “came at us with a lot of anger” and determines, “maybe we should go.”
Almost immediately after, the server asserts herself. “Every time you come here, you treat us like trash,” she says, which elicits a shocked “What?” from the customer with purple hair who predictably asks to talk to the manager. Then, the server threatens to call the police if the pair don’t leave.
The pair eventually exit the restaurant, recording as they do so, and capture a particularly unsavory exchange in which the purple haired woman and the server use a choice four-letter word to assess each other.
In a second video addressing one of the comments — “Why is a grown-ass woman crying over this?” – the creator’s clipped the end of the video for emphasis. In it, the purple haired customer yells as the server closes the door, “I was drinking a f*cking coffee!”
@phoebe.pine4 Replying to @sherribaby74 Shes serious about her coffee. #phoeberesponds #phoebepine ♬ original sound – Phoebe Pine 4
In the caption, the creator wondered, “Who was in the wrong here”. Viewers almost unanimously sided with the restaurant worker and not the rude customers.
“Y’all are the problem. fr,” one assured her.
“Pretty much every restaurant on the face of the planet does not allow you to bring outside food or drink lmao,” said a second, mocking the creator for busting out with “I didn’t see the sign.”
“Why are y’all recording in there anyway?” another wondered.
The creator responded with, “Mukbang, baby,” referring to what Urban Dictionary defines as “a trending livestreaming fad in South Korea wherein somebody prepares and/or eats on cam.” The creator also noted, “People like to watch others eat.”
In that same thread, one commenter wondered, “Why are y’all so f*cking entitled?”
Another picked up on a bit of drama that might have gone under the radar for first-time viewers and wondered if this was actually the first time this customer had been rude to her server.
“‘You attack me every time I come here’ and [then] proceeds to say this is only the second time they’ve been here lol,” pointed out one comment.
“Please note how she said ‘I didn’t do anything this ti-‘ and cut herself off. Sounds like she might regularly cause problems here,” suggested another.
One user summed up what many might have been thinking, asking, “Isn’t everyone exhausted…I’m so exhausted of these people.”
The Daily Dot has reached out to the creator via TikTok comment and to the Pelican via email.