The difficulty of getting a table during mealtimes…
The Spanish are known for taking allll afternoon for lunch, or allll evening for dinner. If you get a table at 2pm for lunch, it’s completely normal to sit there until 4pm or 5pm. The same applies for dinner, where you can sit at the same table well past midnight without the waiter passive-aggressively bringing you the bill. You’ll always have to specifically ask for the bill, even if you’ve been there for 3 hours and there are people waiting for a table. It’s just a cultural thing.
But that means if you arrive at a popular restaurant at 3pm or 10pm, you won’t get a table. In the states you might have to wait up to 45 minutes for a table, but you’ll always get one. Here, your name could be 3rd on the list and an hour later you’ll still be 3rd on the list. It’s better just to choose a different restaurant.
It’s interesting learning new things like this that are so different from the states. This post isn’t me complaining at all! One of these days I’ll be one of the lucky ones to get a table all night and then I’m sure I’ll appreciate this custom a lot.
