Water, water everywhere and not a drop to drink

A happy group of foreigners gathers at the door of an exotic Sichuan restaurant and a waiter leads the party of five to a lovely hand-carved wooden table.

Pictured menus are handed out and fingers point to the dishes of desire. "One of them and two of them," someone says, even throwing in the odd nage (that) zhege (this) for good measure.

Drinks are the next items on the dinner ordering agenda.

Beer, cola, and everybody wants water, but the waiter is having a hard time understanding the request for ping shui (bottle water).

This is the most basic beverage on the planet, why is ordering water always so hard?

The dinner party's Chinese water torture begins.

"Wo yao ping shui (I want bottle water)," one says.

The waiter looks vacant and ping shui (bottle water) is repeated three of four more times.

Someone adds a bing (cold) to the ping, and all these bing ping, bing ping sounds like a pinball machine.

The waiter is still unclear about all these pings and bings and does not understand a thing.

"Maiyou (not have)," he says.

"What do you mean you don't have water, or course you do, there is a bottle on that table right there," one fellow will say loudly in English thinking a higher volume will somehow solve the problem.

But now the waiter, who is trying to process the last sentence of foreign gibberish, is really confused.

The thirsty diners, who can see bottles of water on many tables, are also baffled.

Water, water everywhere and not a drop to drink.

Another frustrated member of the party leaps from the table like a jack-in-the-box, rushes to the nearby fridge, opens the glass door, grabs a bottle of water and passes it to the waiter.

"Ping shui," he says holding up his hand indicating five waters.

"You, you (we have, we have)," says the waiter.

"This happens every time at every restaurant I go to ... why can't I order water?" says a diner.