Adding injury to insult

A dispute between a restaurant and a customer boils over into a debate about class disparity and mutual respect.

On Aug 24, a verbal tit-for-tat in a hotpot restaurant in Wenzhou, Zhejiang province, escalated into an act that some call cruelty while others see as fighting back, albeit excessively.

According to a police deposition, the incident involved a customer surnamed Lin and a young waiter surnamed Zhu. At the Mr. Hotpot restaurant, Lin asked Zhu to add water to her pot, which she and her family were in the middle of enjoying. Zhu, busy serving the next table, took a look and determined it could wait while he finished his job. Lin was impatient: "Quick! What if my pot dries up?"