It is 8 oʼclock on an unseasonably warm Monday morning and Iʼm starving. I make my way to the Cub Café in the SUB, head over to the Burger Studio and order a breakfast sandwich. My number is B-003. Iʼm the only person in line; the only customer at this ungodly hour.
Moments later, my number is called. I grab my sandwich, pay and take a seat. I unwrap my sandwich and, unfortunately, reveal a sight that I have come to expect: my sandwich is a mess. Half of the egg is hanging off the sandwich, half of the sausage is hanging off the other side, most of the cheese isnʼt even on the sandwich and has melted onto the wrapping paper and the sauce Iʼd ordered isnʼt even present. This is ridiculous.
I’m sure working at a food service on campus isn’t as easy as most would assume. I canʼt even imagine working in the Cub Café during peak hours. Between noon and 6 p.m. there must be a rush of hungry students every hour. A mistake during these times would be completely understandable, as Iʼm sure the pressure is on. But when Iʼm the only person in line and, with the exception of the sauce, get a plain sausage, egg and cheese sandwich, the only excuse for this sloppy sandwich is laziness.
The lack of respect for the student body does not stop with just mere laziness. Two weeks ago, my girlfriend got out of her 8 a.m. class five minutes early. With 15 minutes to spare until her next class, she decided to get a sandwich. She was one of three people waiting in line. Ten minutes had passed; no oneʼs number had been called. So she peeked behind the counter and saw that the girl who was supposed to be working the fryer hadnʼt even started any of the sandwiches. Instead, she was eating a sandwich of her own. Needless to say, my girlfriend was late for her next class.
Unfortunately, this does not stop with breakfast. Last week, I was working in the library and decided to get a cheesesteak before heading home for the night. I stopped off at the Burger Studio and placed my order: a plain cheesesteak with American cheese. What I got was a cheesesteak with onions and tomatoes. The people working appear to go out of their way to make their job harder.
Iʼve never worked food service, but I have worked retail for five years, which I think can be more difficult. When it is busy at work, it is easy to make a mistake. But when there is hardly anyone around, I donʼt think it is too much to ask that the people making our food at least try to make it correctly.
There is no reason the people making our sandwiches canʼt place the cheese on the sandwich instead of just kind-of on the sandwich. There is no reason to put a bunch of stuff on a sandwich that wasnʼt even ordered. If it isnʼt on the order, donʼt put it on the sandwich. Maybe Iʼm just bitter, but in a place as stressful as a college campus, the last thing the students should be worrying about is an incorrect food order.

By Mark Rotondo