Just walked out of a work lunch - am I bad? (long)

[Guest guest]

My boss has just come back from a 3 month sabbatical and our project

manager organised a team lunch for us all, 6 of us, to catch up.

Unfortunately this guy is really " into his meat " . He booked us into

the Gaucho Grill in Canary Wharf - an Argentinian restaurant (he had

previously said how all of their meat animals were corn fed and so

how good the meat was. Its his favourite restaurant.).

 

I was reluctant, but went along to see what they could do.

 

I felt uncomfortable right from the start - you have to walk through

a leather curtain to get in, I realised that all of the chairs are

covered in cow hair hide, and there were further cow-hair ornaments

on the walls.

 

We stood in the entrance as the staff explained how they could leave

cheese of various dishes, and checked the pasta ingredients etc, for

my meal. It turned out I could have had a number of dishes (with

adaptions).

 

But at the table the situation suddenly hit me - and I felt really

uncomfortable. The schoolboy comments from various of my colleagues

didn't help (the usual things about deliberately ordering a bloody

steak to see my reaction). I then realised that I would be sitting on

a cow's skin seat, surrounded by 5 people eating great hunks of cow

meat, eating a meal that I could not be 100% sure would be vegan, all

the while having to endure their taunts.

 

So, I explained I felt uncomfortable and was leaving. My boss and the

project manager were concerned, and offered to go to one of the other

restaurants in the area (there's Italian, Chinese etc). But when I

thought about it, it would have been just as bad really, but probably

not so graphic. So I explained I didn't want to spoil their lunch,

and we all agreed that we would have a team drink at some point in

the future(Actually, they know I don't drink alcohol! and I find

smoke filled pubs unpleasant, so I'll probably just decline when the

time comes anyway). And then I walked out.

 

So much for team building. But in reality, this is a futile exercise

anyway, for various reasons (like the project manager can't manage!).

I guess they are concerned because I am the technical lead (we're a

software development team) and they rely on me a lot, but I am a

freelancer so I'm not bothered about team building, career etc. It

doesn't help that for the the last 2 weeks, since my boss has come

back, I've been seconded to work with our users on a different floor,

so I think the team is missing being able to ask me ad hoc quetions.

 

Anyway, do you I took my vegan beliefs too far? I'm not sure I can

stand to be in any restaurant with meat-eaters - ideally I'd like to

only eat at vegan/veggie places.

 

There'll be another walk out tonight - I'm meeting to ex-colleagues

after work and I know that at some point they'll suggest going for a

meal...

 

--

Rob