Olympic figure skater Kurt Browning recalls a very low scoring summer at Chi-Chi’s.Photo Illustration by The Globe and Mail. Sources: Dustin Rabin, Getty Images
Olympic figure skater Kurt Browning wowed crowds by landing the first quadruple jump in competition. But have you ever seen him balance a tray of a half-dozen sizzling fajitas? You could have in Edmonton in the mid-1980s – provided you got there before he (quite rightfully) got the boot. In the first instalment of The Globe’s “How I Spent My Summer” series this year, Mr. Browning recalls a very low scoring summer at Chi-Chi’s.
I’d been training in Edmonton since I was 16 with Mom and Dad footing the bill for all my lessons, living expenses and food. At one point during a visit home, we had a little family meeting where they said, “You’re spending too much money.” It made me a bit mad, and I was an insolent kid, so I said, “Fine, I’ll do it on my own! I’ll get a job.”
I got the first job I tried for at Chi-Chi’s, a Mexican restaurant chain I could see across the parking lot from my apartment’s balcony window. Rumour is the boss named the restaurant after his wife’s breasts, her “chi-chis.” Restaurant folklore? Perhaps. This location must have been new, because there’s no other explanation for why they hired me.
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This was before I’d won a world title so I wasn’t famous at all. My name was on my shirt, a brown polyester throw-it-in-a-landfill-and-it-will-never-ever-die shirt. I worked a four-hour shift, the late morning and early afternoon one, and then I’d go skating. I don’t think I ever even graduated to the dinner service rush.
One of the coolest things was the deep-fried ice cream, which the waiters made themselves. You’d go into the freezer and unwrap this pre-formed ball of ice cream and stick it right into the oil. It was a challenge and an art, because if you missed it by 10 seconds, it’s gone. I was good at that, but was I a good waiter? Um, I was friendly. I don’t remember any big tips though, so maybe I wasn’t as fun as I think.
I sometimes got a “Chi-Chi’s hickey” — a burn on your neck from the hot plate on one of those big trays when you’re balancing five or six meals. I even fell with one of those once and made a huge mess.
My manager was this guy, Andy. Chi-Chi’s has this quality service check called the QSC; you don’t know when it’s happening but a customer is sent to test you and see you do everything right. You need to be there within two minutes of when they sit down, for example. You have to greet them happily and say your name.
One of the rules that really bugged me was one where you had to walk up to the table and say, “Good morning, my name is Kurt Browning and would you like a Big Red?” That’s a Mexican beer, and if you ask people that at 9:15 in the morning, they look at you like, “No, weirdo, I’ll have a coffee.” Then it’d be awkward the rest of the time. So, I stopped doing it.
One day, the QSC guy was assessing my performance with a little cork board thing under the table. That same day, this other guy I worked with — a really good waiter and total pro — didn’t show up, so I had eight tables instead of four. I didn’t do very well.
A few weeks later, I got pulled into Andy’s office and told I’d got QSC’ed. “You scored 75 per cent,” Andy said. That didn’t sound so bad, so I said, “I guess I could have done better.” He said, “Could have done better? You have the worst score in North America.” Of all the Chi-Chi’s across North America, I was the worst. Turns out Andy doesn’t accept anything less than 98 per cent, so 75 per cent suddenly seemed pretty bad.
There was a long glaring silence and then I said, “I’m fired, right?” He said yes, absolutely, but that he’d give me a glowing recommendation that I was at least a nice guy. But I wasn’t upset. I remember thinking, “This is a good thing. I need to be at the rink anyhow.” I was never meant to be a waiter, so Andy did me a favour.
I was only there a few months, but I very quickly surmised the fact that my pay cheques were hardly putting a dent in what my life cost. I got a new appreciation for my parents and a quick lesson in the value of a dollar, which was good because soon enough I was being invited to do skate shows and didn’t need Chi-Chi’s anymore. But I still liked Chi-Chi’s and went back all the time. They gave me free meals and a Big Red.
As told to Rosemary Counter