"Put on a mask, please" and "You're stupid" in response or the service industry's covid realities

Maria Smyk

Rubryka spoke with a saleswoman, a barista, and a security guard and found out what they now face because of the need to remind people about masks and ask for vaccination certificates.

Barista: "We don't have the word 'mask' at all"

For safety reasons, the world is forced to agree to new rules: masks, disinfection, and vaccination. At least the first point is taken care of by service workers. Besides the fact that vendors, servers, baristas, security guards, and drivers have to wear masks, they have to remind their customers.

Valeria is a barista. She lives and works in a small town in the Rivne region. The girl explains: the smaller the city, the more lenient the quarantine. If in big cities the majority still wears masks, in settlements and villages, the situation is different.

"The word 'mask' doesn't exist and didn't exist. Everyone just doesn't care that some barista is asking to wear a mask. Once, when I once again reminded visitors about the mask, I was just put under moral pressure. Like, 'where's it in the law?' 'In our city, there is no such thing,' 'you have no right to tell me' and so on.

Then it suddenly became very difficult for me morally. I was tired of proving something, so I just kept quiet and started preparing orders. And that man kept mumbling something under his breath," says Valeria.

When we ask the girl if clients who follow the quarantine norms without disputes and reminders come to her, she says that they are usually people who come from big cities to visit relatives. And then adds:

"And my mother. She goes to all establishments in a mask."