fighting over the bill: a chinese tradition

This always happens whenever relatives come over to visit -- we go out to eat. A lot. My aunt from New York is visiting this week. She's my dad's cousin (I think) and we call her "Biu Goo." So, today we went for dim sum in Chinatown at that restaurant on Spadina that's supposedly haunted. It was pretty good. Then for dinner we went to ANOTHER Chinese restaurant. At the end of the meal, they started fighting over the bill as Chinese people always do. Sometimes, this gets very loud and people start snatching the bill away to try to pay for it. Stealing the bill and hiding it from the other people is not uncommon. When the time comes to pay for the meal, they magically present the bill to the waiter while everyone else protests. People have also been known to sneak away and take the bill straight to the cash register to pay for it while everyone else is occupied with conversation. That method is probably the funniest one.

When I was little, I thought it was the most embarrassing thing when my parents and the other people got into the whole bill "fight". Sometimes it would last for 10 minutes!! I'm not kidding either. After a while, it started to become amusing. I think the waiters enjoy it too.