Night 9 - A Laosy Place - March 7, 2013

Having reviewed the menu over caiprinhas the night before, and having REALLY enjoyed the service as compared to the non-service at the Capitåo Bar the night before, we returned to the Laos Lounge Bar for dinner. Check out the photos section of thier website to see dozens of examples of Brazilian chicas all dressed to kill and addicted to their mobile phones, with the Brazilian men nearly all dressed like slobs, which seemed to be quite normal for this country.  Both the very attractive hostess and the very insane waiter remembered us from the night before, and we demanded to be served by the same guy.  But first the hostess told us that we must have "a card."  They asked for my first name, and the hostess repeated it several times to the girl at the computer.  Latin names do not start with the letter S, and it was pretty difficult for the typist, but I suppose it came out OK.  We were handed a card with the club logo on the front and several lines of Portuguese on the back. We tried to use our phones with the restaurant's wi-fi to decipher it, and it said something about payment and R$50 (about US$25), but it did not make sense to us.  Our dinner and service were both awesome, with the waiter's crazy style and lame jokes.  I regret that we never learned his name, but he made the place rock.  We had excellent salmon ceviche, interesting pad thai, and "steak cheese" featuring a mountain of beef tenderloin.  More caiprinhas capped the evening, and then we paid the check.  The waiter made sure our new card was noted on the bill, and it included the normal 10% "servicio" gratuity.  I gave him another R$10 (US$5) for the great service, which he appreciated a lot.  Then we were left with the mysterious card.  I found the hostess and pantomimed to her whether I turn it in to her or keep it.  She indicated that I should keep it, then directed us down the disabled access ramp, which was in kind of a separate breezeway.  At the bottom we saw the burly security guy, sharply dressed, and for the first time in our experience he was not talking on his mobile.  The hostess indicated that I should give him the card.  I did so, and he scanned it into a laptop.  The terminal displayed a large "PAGO" (paid) icon, and he indicated we were good to go.  He kept the card.  So we surmised the purpose was to keep folks from ducking out on their bill, a practice which also accounted for the large number of casualties in a recent nightclub fire.  This place, fortunately, had plenty of window exits in case of emergencies!  We strolled lazily back to the Pousada another deep sleep.