Opción A - 4 · Inglés PAU Castilla y León Extraordinaria 2021

OPTION A

COVID HAS BROUGHT OUT THE WORST IN CUSTOMERS

Waitressing can be a difficult job at the best of times. I fondly remember one weekend brunch shift when a woman criticized me because we only had white sugar for her coffee, not brown; she insisted that this was a breach of “etiquette”.

I took the job last summer as a way to make ends meet while I started a new life in Manchester after moving from London. Then Covid hit. We endured the closure of the restaurant due to lockdown, but from July onwards it was a relief to be able to keep the place open. All we asked of customers was to register with the Covid app, wear a mask when they entered the indoor area and stay seated as we provided table service.

Yet since customers have started to stream back through our doors, I have been faced with a different reality. When I greet them and ask them to scan the test-and-trace app barcode, many will ignore me or say they don’t have their mobile phones with them, only to sit down and put their phones on the table.

Then there’s making sure people are wearing their masks to keep each other and staff like me safe. You’d think we were taking away people’s right to vote by asking them to pop a piece of cloth over their face while they nip to the toilet. All of this would be bad enough, but to make things worse, management have decided that the maxim “the customer is always right” endures.

When you get everyone seated, then comes the shouting across the room to get your attention. I’ve cried in work more than once because of the way a customer has treated me.

We all want to get back to normal, but this situation has truly brought out the worst in people. If you plan to go out this week, please remember to be polite to your waiting staff: they’re living through exactly the same pandemic as you.

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4) VOCABULARY (2 POINTS).

4.1

Choose one of the options below and find one word in the text for its definition (0.6 POINTS):

4.2

Find a synonym in the text for one of the two words below (0.6 POINTS):

4.3

For one of the following words from the text, give a synonym that fits the meaning of the text (0.8 POINTS):