Chinese Delivery Guy Wars

So here in the barracks, you can eat at one of two places: Chow Hall 1 or Chow Hall 2. They are approximately 300 meters apart, and they probably collectively serve around 1500-2000 people per meal, per day. They do their best, but you can only cook baked chicken so many ways before it gets old. We start week seven tomorrow, and quite frankly, I'm a bit burned out on the food. It's not bad; it does the job.

Others hit burnout at about week 1.5. So they resort to delivered pizza, and some local delivery places. In observing the Chinese delivery guys in particular, I have observed quite a rivalry in the chinese food delivery business, almost to the levels of requiring UN Intervention and the creation of a Zone of Separation (ZOS) to allow both chinese delivery companies to peacefully coexist.

When a guy comes to deliver food, he will place extra menus and flyers touting the authenticity and deliciousness of his chinese grub. He will place them everywhere, on just about every horizontal surface he can find.

This tactic of leaflet bombing seems to upset his counterpart, and chinese guy #2 will instigate a scorched Earth policy of sterilization, and he will replace all of chinese guy #1's propaganda with his own, which highlights how much more delicious his chinese chow is from chinese food guy #1's chinese food.

It all came to a head yesterday, as chinese guy #1 met chinese guy #2 in the parking lot.

Chinese guy #1 was inbound with a fresh load of MSG for a trooper who slept in and missed breakfast. Chinese guy #2 was conducting a zone reconnaissance, replacing chinese guy #1's flyers with his latest own, and soliciting chow requests in person. Heated words were had in the parking lot. I don't know what they were saying-- If they were going at it in Arabic, I might get some of it, but my Mandarin is a bit non-existent. But it was evident that this was an epic battle of deliverymen.

And then it happened. Chinese guy #2 knocked the carryout order that chinese guy #1 was carrying out of his hands.

I anxiously awaited as the two chinese guys squared off and shouted some more. I thought I would be treated to a flurry of ninja-ness, excited to see a kung fu movie plot unfold before my eyes.

But instead, chinese guy #2 ran to his delivery vehicle and sped away and chinese guy #1 let loose with a flurry of obscenities.

This rivalry does not exist with the pizza guys. They apparently have an accord or something.

This competition for business runs counter to my theory of chinese food restaurants. I believe the Chinese Government secretly owns the rights to all chinese food buffets and restaurants in the US, and the only way to open one is to agree to franchise it from Mother China. All of the food tastes the same, the decor is all the same, and the accounting when the bill comes is always mildly sketchy. But this delivery guy competition somewhat disproves my theory.

Perplexing.