On the perils of foreign cuisine

I took clients out to dinner last night (with a couple of my colleagues). We got to dessert, and the first two clients get sorbet, so I order the zeppole. The only other time I've seen these things, they were sort of a cream puff-like thing, so I'm expecting one or two cream puffs, basically. Of course, everyone after me orders nothing but coffee. So it's two sorbets, and my dessert. Which turns out to be not two but seven doughnuts, each the size of my fist, covered in powdered sugar and with a half cup of honey on the side. Everyone at the table basically stares at this ginormous plate, and then bursts out laughing. The laughing was good - everyone clearly had seen my aghast look at the size of this dessert, so I'm pretty sure this came off as an unluckily foolish order instead of greed. They were kind of impossible to eat neatly, too. We finally gave up after I tried to give one to one of the clients, which resulted in grease and honey everywhere, and then he good naturedly insisted that we take a picture of him covered in powdered sugar. So I dotted my nose in powdered sugar like a good sport, and let them take pictures of me as well.

Still less weird than the Asian women last week who insisted on taking pictures of all of us with every possible combo of people and random implements from the table. (A with his tea. Me and A as I pour milk into his tea. Client and me with water glasses. Client 2 and me with candle. And so on.)