McDonalds employee Xiao Xie, whose manager constantly ensures that she greets customers with a smile, would never react to an irate or abusive customer. Asked how she would respond, she said, "We can't let our personal emotions show in our work. A few customers are rude, but I put it aside and continue." Part-time Pizza Hut employee showed similar self-control. "I would never talk back," she said, shocked by the prospect, "They told us to never do that."

At one Starbucks location, employee Xiao Kang "He was very rude to me, so I raised my voice a little..." Kang said, "but then I realized that I had spoken back to a customer, and I quickly apologized." Xiao Kang's example of her reaction to a disrespectful customer illustrates a cornerstone of the big company food service job: suppressing one's natural reactions to frustration.

Yang Yangzi, a Peking University researcher specializing in Organizational Psychology, claims that Xiao Kang's self-restraint may gradually result in poorer mental health. "In clinical psychology," Yang said, "the subconscious is what really controls our actions, and the more you try to control the subconscious, the more you need a release." He later explained that the sudden release of a suppressed subconscious may manifest itself in nightmares or acts of violence. With the introduction of foreign food companies, the Beijing waitress' repressed anger might eventually take a more serious, tangible form.

Establishing Rank

What allows waitresses like Cai Yun to talk back? Cai's coworker Hai Yan suggests that small restaurant bosses tolerate insolence because, "[They are] afraid that they would close if we all left, whereas, if an entire fast-food branch closed down, it might not really affect a big company." Cai agrees, saying that, in her experience, the larger the restaurant and staff, the stricter the boss-- and the more devalued the employee.

The complex hierarchy of bosses, managers, and employees at fast-food restaurants contrasts the traditionally relaxed small Chinese restaurant boss-employee dynamic. Some servers at the international chains said they felt like vassals stuck in a complicated pecking order of higher-ups affirming their authority.

Until his recent resignation, Heilongjiang native Han Fei worked as a busboy at a Beijing university dining facility- a hierarchical operation not unlike American fast-food chains. His manager, surnamed Hu, often established superiority by verbally harassing employees. "He often scolded me," Han said, "He would scream at us. He just wanted to show he was higher than us." Han gave a specific example: "On my 25th birthday, when Hu was already in his 30s, he said, 'At your age, I was already manager.' This was the kind of thing that he would tell us to show that we were lower than him." The power play at Han's university restaurant meant a tense work environment that often left him mentally exhausted at the end of the day.