Bad, Discriminatory Service

One would've expected in post-lockdown 2020 restaurants would be very eager to be delivering great service to those that can still make it a restaurant. That doesn't seem to be the case at Tashas at Mall of Africa. I particularly hate to make anything about race, giving the benefit of the doubt before jumping to conclusions, but today lent itself to a unique situation where I was nicely surrounded by couples of different races - an Indian couple to my left, white couple the the right and black couple out in front. Then there's us, the coloured couple. Things were sufficiently fine at the start when we were seated. Only then to be followed by changes in waitress, and extremely long waiting times. What's great about the surrounding tables is that the meals were near identical, a sandwich and a pasta for either one of the couple. Our meal took the longest to prepare it seemed. This I'll leave up to the kitchen, and not to blame any individual for. Fair enough. But when the manager visits each of the surrounding tables to ask if all is in order, and nicely skips us, then I start to take issue. Once, again, fair enough. But having then visited each of those tables 3-4 times during our meals I take big issue with. Then, to make matters worse, the table to the left and right of us received complimentary items - a water, or a cookie, etc. I knew it was because I could clearly here the manager state this, much to the delight of said couples. Then it came time to cash up. Our waitress disappeared with the meal to be put into a takeaway container. Here again, all the couples did the same. During this time, the manager, to speed things along for them, came to bring their bills, etc. to cash them up. And when their meals arrived back from packaging could easily be on their way. By this point, our waitress hadn't returned with the package nor the water we had requested - after the table on the right had received their complimentary water and were given our sparkling water after there was confusion. Now we were furious. The manager turned to us and saw this. He asked if we were fine. I said I wasn't. We were still awaiting our water, bill and takeaway. Instead of managing this, he went to call the waitress. She then had the incorrect bill because of the water confusion and then had to go back to correctly add it to our bill. By the time we had cashed up, the Indian couple to the left who had joined 15 minutes after us were long gone. The couple to the right too. The black couple were still eating, but had arrived some 30-40 minutes after (the timeframe it took for us to get our food in the first place). What a disgrace. I've been here before as part of the group and was a decent experience. Having recommended the place to my fiance, I now regret having done so. I won't be returning to eat here. What a waste of time and money. Get your act together!