Konuk yazar : Lady in Purple
What you will read below is a very ironic example of migrant exploitation.
The restraurant called Makan has been operating in Beirut, Lebanon for a few years now connected to many other companies, businesses like Motto, Plan Bey, Beyt, Zawla and so on. And they are growing more and more. They are in arts, food, hotel, wine, architecture and so on.
Good for them, no issues so far. What is bothersome here is that they portray themselves as a social collective who help people, especially through Makan they claim to reduce discrimination against migrants in Beirut and promote their culture.
The truth is far from this. They have a model of "Pay what you think is far" every day a set menu is served by 2 migrants (who turned out be employed be them illegally) to 50+ people. The ambience is nice the food mostly is good but it is probably wothed max 12 USD as the service is very slow and the food is not customized, it is not a restaurant anyway, it is under guesthouse status as you will see below. " Pay what you think is fair" gives the impression and they imply this deliberately as if the money goes to a cause. And if you pay less than 25$ the manager comes and embrasses you and asks to pay more. So having had this experience personally and through friends many times, i decided to leave a review on their facebook page last week with the criticism above, the "Sopthisticated Exploitation" they practice.
Selma Sevkli reviewed Makan — 1 star
"Makan is a "prestigious" restaurant that serves a set menu but expecting people to pay a fine dine price. Actually not only expecting but asking rudely after the check: "Are you sure this is what you want to pay?""Was there something you did not like?" by staring at check And this happened after putting 18.000 per person, and not even once. Or sometimes texting after reservation "please note that today it is 25 $ per person" yet on the check it is clearly stated "pay what you think is fair"
I have eaten at Makan over the course of 16 months about 6 times, and i really enjoyed the food, yet the customer service was always poor and slow as well as this pressure from the owner regarding the check.
Serving more than 100 dishes a day, again which is a set menu, with 2 service staff only who are probably exploited and getting max 700 $ a month Because the food is good, that part of the story is overseen and ignored by most.
No ethics, public embarrassment by owner/manager does not fit in any ethical standards, neither in restaurant business or in any human relations, this is especially a shame in a lovely hospitable culture like Lebanon!
Yet the owner needs to be congratulated for the business idea: He does not need to meet any restaurant standards, employ insufficient number of people, and having a "hip" policy makes the same amount of money or more for those who invest much more in all aspects of restaurant business.
Of course Lebanese "not losing face in public" culture is great to take advantage of, it is known and experienced well that people would pay more especially in this kind of set up, out of pressure.
It is not written anywhere or explained the rationale why sometimes the owner decides to set a price for the day and tells you quitely when you get into the restaurant, and tells some customers but not the others on the same day. Perhaps he judges based on his criterias of suspicion if they would not pay enough. Same case goes when you are with party of 8 or more, needs to be 25$ minimum. Why? Are we dedicated a staff for ourselves? No we still had to wait more than hour for even appetizers to arrive.
What is not calculated in this "Actually pay what the owner think is fair" is that we are not in 90's anymore and locals are not the only customers. People speak, people experience better examples and people are not purely stupid.
My request from the owner is to respond to this message, explain how this policy works and simply change the policy/ set a price. Then it is fair, you advertise yourself at a price and people are free to choose to pay for this service at the pre-agreed price or not.
It is also important to note that i am not first one complaining about this issue. Yet none of them i saw on facebook, zomato and tripadvisor were ever responded. I think it is about time this issue is addressed.
What i am suspecting is Makan does not have legal business or restaurant status, that's why they have this policy and that's why they try to charge at least 25$ when people do not pay that much through different tactics.
An hour after my review, Makan shut down all the reviews and started writing me personally. The manager Karim Ghazzi, who is former bank investor, being politically correct and still trying to fool me and not responding to my accusations, my demands were clear:
1- Set a Price/ leave "Pay what you think is fair" system as you cannot stop intervening of what people pay.
2- Leave this supporting migrants game and stop abusing social justice ideas and portraying yourself like a non profit.
After Karim Ghazzi, Tony Sfeir the founder came into the picture who was relatively reasonable but still very secretive and willing to do anything for me to compromise.
Please see the articles on business they have and how they portray themselves:
Finally it came down to them shutting down entirely that they announced on FB on sunday:
(hello and goodbye)
friends and colleagues,
Makan
started as a summer pop-up space, a free tribune for amateur and
professional chefs to come offer the best of what they make.
the guests would join, accept the chef's offering, and grade their experience by paying what they thought was fair.
in
a country where the possible and impossible are close neighbors and
intimate enemies, our food voyage ideas were growing with difficulty on
that demarcation line.
the chefs' expectations were met sometimes by their guests' "grading", and on other times it was not.
we were asked to moderate and intervene, and that has tested our motto 'Pay What You Think Is Fair', creating sometimes uncomfortable situations.
we were asked to moderate and intervene, and that has tested our motto 'Pay What You Think Is Fair', creating sometimes uncomfortable situations.
today, we have the strong feeling that we drifted away from our original idea.
it is now time to thank you all for a long-lasting "summer",
we will be saying goodbye by coming spring (end of March).
leaving the way for art and creativity to take place and bloom in our gardens.
we will be saying goodbye by coming spring (end of March).
leaving the way for art and creativity to take place and bloom in our gardens.
farewell
the Makan team
the Makan team
Under this, i posted the following comment:
Selma Sevkli It is unfortunate and quite visible that Makan drifted from the initial idea (not clear what it was)
And unfortunately they cannot set a fix price because they are not legally a restaurant, operating under guesthouse status.
Therefore the "pay what you think is fair" was a creative concept to get away with tax.
Since this is abused by manager (in a very diplomatic way, kudos for that) by approaching customers and ask for more money (sometimes via text, sometimes whispering, sometimes if you are 4 or more people, sometimes when he simply does not think it is fair or not enough) and the criticism started growing around this, they needed to intervene.
Could this intervention have been fixing a set price? Not under this status.
Could they get restaurant status? Probably costly.
In addition, there is a more serious issue of employing migrants illegally and exploiting them. They were about to and still may be subjected to get into serious trouble.
Do you remember the facial expressions of the staff? How depressed and oppressed they looked? Have you ever talked to them about their food? Ethiopian or Sri Lankan? There was no cultural exchange with the people who cooked and served the food, it was a sad exploitation story in a "hip" style that had to come to an end.
Makan owners are more than free to open a restaurant simply by setting a price and do some fair profit for themselves and for others, if this was their "initial idea"
No need to be hypocrite on cultural exchange or supporting communities. Sorry for all who were illusioned by this idea, no worries, you want ethnic food? Borj Hammood has many Ethiopian local restaurants. Or you fancy Thai, there are many of that all over as well and you pay much less.
I still hope Makan one day will get what this criticism meant and do things properly without fooling themselves and others.
After this point we stopped emailing each other, they got people's sympathy as if they are pushed to close due to financial difficulties.
I want to report them to Ministry of Labor, but i am not in Lebanon anymore. This issue to me should set a case study example of exploitation could be done in so many different ways and people like Karim and Tony should have a lesson on abusing humanitarian values and migrants which can only be done in my opinion through exposure.
So please take some time and read all and your input of any kind would be appreciated.
I am moving to Bangladesh this weekend for another humanitarian mission, specifically with World Health Organization to coordinate Mental Health and Psychosocial Support activities, as i have been doing many years in Turkey, Iraq and Lebanon. See my professional profile on linkedin and google my name for more activism related issues.
The best solution would be Lebanese to take the case from me and see what should be done. Time, energy and expertisewise it is beyond me at this point.
Them shutting down Makan for me is just to hide more serious facts. Otherwise why would they shut down based on one person's comments? I heard they are opening another "restaurant" in Hamra, and they need some investigation, specifically on:
1-Running a restaurant without restaurant license
2-Employing migrants illegally and exploiting them.
Your help is truly appreciated, i will try to follow up on the case and be involved as much as possible but as i said at this point, my resources and availability is becoming limited.
Feel free to contact me at any time
Selma
Threads between Makan managers/owners/founders. Sorry for the format, i copy pasted them from facebook.
21 FEB 1.38 am from Karim Ghazzi, Makan's Manager, from facebook:
21 Feb 2.46 pm from Selma to Karim
Hello, i guess my expresed opinions are too strong to respond to that not only my review you removed, you closed the whole reviews section, interesting.
Instead of trying to be nice and calling me, i'd rather you provide some response publicly, you can close facebook reviews but not zomato and trip advisor, time to get honest and real
Dear Selma,
Well, yes ofcourse, we prefer not have too many messages back and forth on facebook. And prefer to contact you directly and respond to your questions and more. Because I am confident that once you learn about us, our operation, and the philosophy behind our collective, then your opinion will change...
Kindly could you send me your email address and telephone number? I'm hoping to be able to send you the explanations by email, and call you after that 
And we will for sure make further explanations publicly on our page to those who don't know about us... In both cases, we have a printed info that is distributed to all our guests when they arrive. We call it our 'manifesto'
It is printed on the menu paper that is placed on each table... Will send you a copy of that by email as well..
It is printed on the menu paper that is placed on each table... Will send you a copy of that by email as well..
thank you and hope to hear from you
Hi Karim, it is not just me who is concerned about your philosophy and meanifesto but many friends i have in Beirut, so i stick to my position, i think you need to explain yourself publicly by explaining:
-Pay what you think fair system can only suggest price if this is related to donations and charity, as we know so far, Makan is not and NGO and and it is not expressed how these profits shared
-number of staff is very limited
to me you are abusing a charity model as business and using "social justice, anti discrimination" mottos yet no migrant in Beirut can afford to eat at Makan
I think it is time for Makan to explain their actual model, why sometimes require 25 $ pay, who gets the share as it sounds like a socially fair system yet as a humanitarian worker i see money greed by a former bank investor abusing the non profit system for his own benefit
I think you can share anything you'd like via facebook, i don't see the need of sharing my email address
Selma
and believe me if i get convinced, i will publicly and personally apologize to you but i strongly suspect this is not the case by your " customer sevice" style on on facebook (closing reviews entirely, trying to convince me personally) and in person (many times you approached people to imply they did not pay enough) and you employ insufficent number of employees.
Selma
if you like to see how actually collectives work in the model you claim to have here are two examples, i visited them many times, you don't even get a check, you put the money in a box and money is shared by migrants, and everybody can come and eat: https://www.facebook.com/komsu
Okay Selma, thanks for the info.. I will send you a message when we reply so you can check it.. This will all change im sure once you get to learn about us
Makan is a place that offers a space or a tribute to different cultures and cuisines and promotes cultural exchange through food.
When chefs come to cook, they take pride in their home country cuisine and we experience with them a great cutural exchange related to food stories and origins and
It is pay what you think is "fair" and not pay what you "want"
cooks are invited from different backgrounds and are considered our partners on that evening they cook in
when you pay, it is to cook that you pay
cooks get above 50% of what you pay
we don't serve more than 40 to 50 persons on any day
the chef cooks single-handedly the meals and tables are served one at a time and this sadly slows down the service
for the food to be good we needed to keep this pace
the rest of what we make goes to cover the high charges of such place in Mar Mkhael - Beirut
all our staff are treated fairly and paid far above the salaries paid in the country, thus all of the ones who started with us stayed unitl today
sometimes the cost is high on some menus and upon the chef's request, we are obligated to monitor the average of what people pay in order to offer you a diversity of meals in a good quality
we accept what people pay, but whenever it is far below the average of what the mass of other people paid, we go make sure if there was no problem with your dinner. because that is our feedback loop in which we can change the food offering and make it better
sometimes we make sure that there wasn't a currency misunderstanding that is why when feel our guests are newcomers to the country we ask them if they clearly understood what they paid
the issue with large groups, we ask large groups to pay the average.. because in the case that a large group pays very little. This would mean that the cook has lost money.
Hi Selma.. just sent you a few points about us.. and how we work.. its different than other collectives I guess with this model..
PLease have a read through and let me know if any unclear.. sorry its not written in the best english for now... Will also let you know once this clarification is on the public page..
PLease have a read through and let me know if any unclear.. sorry its not written in the best english for now
... Will also let you know once this clarification is on the public page..
Selma to Karim:
Wow, are you convinced yourself of what you told me? Incredible really, i am impressed, it is about the currency difference and the cook's share. And how about employing very few staff? After all that conversation, asking my contact info, i was expecting something more factual, not justifying the wrong. where is the cooperative idea i don't see, where is the cultural exchange i don't see, there is still "fair price" decided and enforced by the owner. And most importantly you cannot handle negative comments on your facebook page, not deleting my comment only but closing it entirely to comments. So tell me one thing honestly, if i arrange (and believe me i have a major migrant network in Beirut) group of Sri Lankans, Ethiopians, Syrians (and not in big parties, 4-5 people a day) and they pay 5-10 USD, would you agree? I would only believe in your sincerity if you actually get into some real cultural exchanges and hosting people from different communities who cannot afford to pay 25 usd for a dinner. You say you are located in Mar Mikhail, it is expensive, fine, set a price and stop fooling people with social justice, cooperative, cultural justice and fairness ideas. What i wonder really is do you also believe in what you say? did you internalize such a hypocrite business model in yourself with peace? We are not done yet, the more i see hypocracy and political correctness, the more angry i get. You are simply abusing and exploiting cultures and people. We are not done yet.
Selma
Unless you change your policy and out back my comment on the facebook page, i am going to write a full scale article (and i am a writer please google me) and share it all over social media about Makan's hypocracy. Unfortunately you took it to this level by closing the comments section, ignoring me in public and with your nonsense justifications.
Selma
and this will definitely have a major impact on the expat community in Beirut who are already suspicious and perhaps legal issues for you as i still think you have a fishy reason behind for this pay what you think is fair, perhaps you are registered as an NGO or collective which you are not
------------------------------
And the actual founder takes over the conversation, Tony to Selma:
Tony
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Selma to Tony:
------------------------------
Tony to Selma:hello Selma.thank you for your reply and sharing your email addresswe had to postpone our post till this Sunday for further debates and clarifications.we are leaning towards closure, since as I said earlier we drifted afar from our initial idea.in our sad country,legal is not always ethical and ethical is not always legal.you might have experienced this while living here.(I would like to clarify points you are raising but also would suggest if Vlad joins-in in our conversationhe would help enrich it, and also would serve as a reference for some of the facts I will share with you.anyways this is up to you.)I will be also sending you some links and studies on migrant workers conditions in Lebanon (some I helped with), and also other links to guesthouses that operate food venues in Lebanon. (Dar Alma - Beit El Qamar - and others)our migrant workers law in Lebanon is a bad copy of the Koweit that is already very bad. (the Kafala system)one cannot come freely to the country,there is a private for profit offices that recruit the migrant workers and then sells their contracts to one unique employer,this employer would come meet the worker upon airport and from there on would hold their passport tight, usually stored in a safe at home.and then "locks" the new hired "maid" at home.usually in a very small "maid's" room or even in the kitchen.they are paid usually between 150$ and 400$ / month (out of which they still need to pay a commission to the private office) they work all the day / seven days a week.on a quarter of the employers (there is 250,000 migrant workers allow the workers to go out on Sunday for merely a day or so and the others don't.the employers get abusive, violant sometimes and others sexually harass the migrant workers.there is an average of one suicide per week in only the Ethiopian communities round 50 deaths every year.a lot of them flee, however never with their passport since it is locked in a safe,and sadly find themselves in very difficult situations.the employer reports the fleeing to the police and they open a file case.jails are full of migrant workers,they can't leave the prison before serving at least two months,and sometimes they would be forgotten until someone comes and buys a ticket to deport them back to their country.we have three of our colleagues that suffer from this described above situations,one of them was raped and the other was beaten...(our other colleagues have all their papers regulated well kept with them with them),with us, they never work more than 8 hours a day eat proper meals (same of what we serve)they live independently,get paid three or four times more of they are paid usually,save money .we don't see this of course as a longtime situation but rather a harbor.in order for us to help solving the situation,we try to get them refugee statues or asylum to other countries through some non governmental channels (the only way without passing through jail)before the war in Syria they used to flee to Syriago to embassy claim a new passport and then leave back to their country.hope this gave you more insight..have to run for work now,will send more laterare you still in Beirut or back to Istanbul?all the bestTony
------------------------------
Looking forward to the announcement tomorrow.
I could not find my answer in your email why you employ them illegally? There are companies who employ them legally with NSSF registration. The stories you told are for domestic workers that i am well aware of.
Your story is still an exploitation story being more merciful. What i expect from you is not to explain the system in Lebanon but what you do in this system, i still see bringing Sri Lankans+ others and using "cultural diversity/ non discrimination" ideas without actual input the situation: employing them legally.
And how much exactly do they get paid? I think your responsibility as employer is not to help them with asylum or resettlement, simply employ them legally.
I don't know what Vlad thinks or writes, i am in this alone myself, taking him to this conversation will not help to convince two people and get away with the situation, the more you delay your announcement and changes, the more you are risking your reputation, business and safety your employees.
Have a nice evening
------------------------------
Hello Selma,
I start by answering your direct questions,
out of the 11 different (some have small part time jobs, like gardening etc), non Lebanese collaborators 8 have their legal papers and work normally (residency , work permit, and all the rest, anyways when you have one paper you have to have all the remaining papers).
3 have fled their previous employers, who kept their passport and papers.
we are regulating the status of one at the general security, the other two will either have to be deported with a jail sentence of two months, or manage to receive asylum statues from the UN.
they all get proper pays that allow them to live in proper housing, travel home every once in a while, cover all their needs and also save money that they send home on monthly basis.
all our salaries are fairly above the minimum wage in the country.
we make no difference between a Lebanese collaborator and non-Lebanese,
a race and another race,
women and men,
between a university graduate and primary school attendant,.
what I want to clarify is that the law I have described in my previous mail covers all migrant workers not only the domestic workers, we all need to abide by it.
we will be sending our weekly newsletter tomorrow it will hold our today post but also some more clarifications that I can also send you.
best
Tony 
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