Valentine’s is the one day a year that brings an explosion of stories of love and romance.
Among the usual tales of how difficult it is to find a present for a man, how hard it is for a lady to choose the right shade of lipstick for the date and how tough it is to choose a restaurant for a romantic dinner, there are stories that are quirky, awkward and funny.
Many of these are discovered by people in the catering industry – those who sell flowers, who drive taxis and restaurant workers.
Volodymyr Shyptenko, a waiter from Oscar restaurant in Kyiv, remembers working on last year’s Valentine’s Day.
It was a night when luck struck suddenly – and then changed its mind.
Feb. 14 is known as a time when people tend to tip generously, so money for waiters is good. “People are mostly joyful and not greedy, so we get good tips,” Shyptenko says.
The restaurant was overcrowded; all the tables were reserved. A couple came in closer to the end of the night to take a reserved table. “Both looked good, but the young man was a bit nervous. It was obvious that they are having a first date,” Shyptenko recalls.
So far, so good. The couple had a long evening, talking a lot, eating fruit and drinking expensive wine.
The bill was more than Hr 500. “Later, when I brought the bill, the man smiled at me, thanked for a good evening and gave me a Hr 200 tip. I was surprised, but considered this to be a generous gesture from a grateful customer,” Shyptenko says.
But the next morning it turned out that the client had second thoughts about his generosity. The man came back, looking ashamed and asking for his tip back.
“He felt a bit uncomfortable when he came to me, explaining who he is and what he wants,” says Shyptenko. “He said: ‘I hope you can understand me as only a man can understand another man.’
“The lady must have blown him off and he decided at least to get the cash back,” Shyptenko concludes. He felt sorry for the unlucky bloke, and gave him his money back for consolation.
Mykola, a taxi driver, drove away with plenty of cash on the last Valentine’s Day. He did not want to give his last name for print because of the way he made it, though. “I don’t want my wife to find out,” he says.
He had no celebrations planned, just work. At some point in the evening, he took what looked like a typical order. Three ladies got into his cab, looking pretty and festive. The driver took them around the city for a bit, chatting all the way.
At the end of the trip the chirpy driver received an unexpected offer: to spend the night with all three of them, and get paid what he usually made in a night of taxi driving.
“They were nice and I agreed,” he says simply and somewhat timidly. He is now afraid to watch TV shows that help people find their relatives. “I am afraid someone may be looking for a daddy,” he says, with a nervous laugh.
Drama seems to be the second name of Valentine’s Day. Ilona Beh, a waitress working in Kyiv for six years, has seen plenty of them. But her favorite one is about the runaway bride, which happened a few years back.
A young man called her restaurant to book a table. He warned that it will be a special evening for him as he was planning to propose. He got an intimate table in the corner, and prepared well. He brought photos of himself and his girlfriend to set on the table and extra candles. He proposed over champagne.
“The ‘happy’ fiancee said nothing, then took her phone, her purse and ran away,” the waitress says. She ran so fast that her coat was left behind, and she didn’t seem to care.
“It was cold outside and I thought [at first] that she is off to meet someone, so I didn’t pay much attention. But she never came back,” Beh says.
Another one of Beh’s favorite love stories has a totally different flavor. “I have never seen so many white roses,” she recalls. One of her clients booked a whole restaurant to propose. The couple had been living together for a number of years, had children, but were not married.
“He made it a fairytale, decorated everything with thousands of white roses, invited guests – all in white – and proposed when she came in,” she says. She whispered ‘yes’ as he hugged her, and they married right there and then, in the hall of the restaurant, after he answered ‘Let’s not put it off any longer.’”
Oleksandr Ivanov, a tourist agency director in Kyiv, has his own favorite Valentine’s Day story to tell. “I always remember one couple, both over 50,” he says. “She booked a trip to Maldives, a romantic dinner on an uninhabited island and a photo session in wedding attire.”
This is why he remembers it: “It’s not an unusual story, but it proves that you can do something special for your loved one, no matter how old you are.”
Kyiv Post staff writer Daryna Shevchenko can be reached at [email protected].
