Twenty years in a kitchen, watching riders come and go

I have worked in restaurant kitchens for about twenty years. Spain first, then Hamburg. In that time I have handed thousands of paper bags across a counter to young men and women standing there in a wet jacket, waiting.

Most of them are from somewhere else. India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Syria, Afghanistan, Romania. Most are students. Almost all of them are new here, and almost all of them are tired.

I have never done their job. But I have watched a lot of people start it, and I have watched who is still there a year later. There is a pattern, and nobody tells the new ones about it.

The first thing: come inside

In winter I see riders standing outside in the rain, staring at the phone, waiting for the order to be ready. Nobody told them they could come in.

Come in. Nearly every kitchen will let you stand inside by the door where it is warm. We are not going to send you back into the rain. Say hello, ask if the order is ready, and stand somewhere out of the way. That is all it takes.

The ones who do this are dry when they leave. The ones who stand outside for eight hours a night are the ones who quit in November.

We are the reason your order is late, not you

This is the thing I most want riders to understand, because I watch it eat people alive.

When the app says the order will be ready at 7:40 and you arrive at 7:40 and it is not ready, that is us. The kitchen is behind. A big table came in, or the fryer is full, or someone did not turn up for their shift. It has nothing to do with you.

I have seen riders get angry at the counter about this. I understand it — their timer is running, their rating is watching. But the shouting has never once made food come out faster. What it does is make the kitchen slow down for that person next time. That is human, and it is unfair, and it is real.

The riders who say "kein Problem" and wait get their bags first. Not officially. But they do.

Five German words will change your night

Most of the riders I meet speak good English and no German. That is fine for the job. But five words change how people treat you, and they take one evening to learn.

Hallo. Danke. Alles gut? Ist die Bestellung fertig? Schönen Abend.

That is it. That is the whole list. I have seen a rider walk into a German kitchen where nobody wanted to deal with him, say "Hallo, alles gut?" with a smile, and by the third week the cook was keeping a coffee for him.

It is not about the language. It is that you made an effort, and everyone in a kitchen knows exactly how much effort things cost.

The bag matters more than you think

I have handed food into some delivery bags that I would not put my own dinner in. Wet inside, crumbs from last week, a smell.

Wipe it out once a week. It takes four minutes. When food arrives cold or smelling wrong, the customer blames the restaurant, the restaurant blames the app, and the app blames the rider. You are the last one in the chain and the easiest to replace. Protect yourself.

Same with the food itself. Keep it flat. Put the drinks in the side pocket. If a lid is loose, tell us at the counter and we will fix it. We would much rather fix it in the kitchen than get the complaint at eleven o'clock.

Do not ride angry

The worst thing I ever saw was a young man who had an argument with a customer, came back for his next order still shaking with it, and rode off into traffic in that state. He came in three days later with his arm in a bandage.

Nothing on that phone is worth your body. Not the rating, not the bonus, not the customer who says he never got the food. If your hands are shaking, stand in a doorway for two minutes first. The order can be two minutes late.

The ones who last

Here is what I actually notice about the riders who are still going after a year, compared to the ones who disappear.

They spent money on the right things early. Proper rain trousers, real gloves, two powerbanks, a good lock. The ones who quit are usually the ones who tried to do a German winter in a hoodie and a €10 rain cape.

They know what they signed. They can tell you whether they are employed or self-employed, what they earn per hour, and how many working days they have used this year. The ones who get into trouble are the ones who signed something in a hurry because a man in a Facebook group said it was easy money.

And they treat it as a job that is paying for something else — a degree, a family back home, a better job next year. Not as their whole life. The riders who are angriest are the ones who feel stuck. The ones who are calm know exactly what they are riding towards.

One last thing, from my side of the counter

I am going to lose my own kitchen job soon. My restaurant is cutting staff. So I am not writing this from some comfortable place.

What I know after twenty years is that this kind of work — kitchen, delivery, warehouse, cleaning — is not shameful and it is not permanent. It is how most of us paid for the first years here. The trick is to be the person people are glad to see, learn the language while you do it, and keep your eyes on the door you are actually trying to walk through.

Say hello when you come in. Somebody in that kitchen is probably from your part of the world too.