An employee at Waffle House in Texas who deftly caught a chair thrown at her by an unruly customer during a brawl last year is now sharing her side of what happened at the restaurant that night.
The ex-employee, who was identified as “Halie” in a YouTube video, told her followers that she is now blacklisted by the Waffle House chain for acting in self-defense during the fight by throwing a sugar shaker has thrown.
Video of the scuffle between several Waffle House customers and employees went viral last week and shows the employee punching away a metal chair that was thrown over the counter.
Halie was hailed as a heroine online, but she revealed in the new video that when her boss saw the surveillance footage, she was messaged for throwing a sugar shaker at one of the customers.
A Waffle House employee identified as Halie, who deftly caught a chair thrown at her by an unruly customer during a brawl last year, is now giving her side of what happened that night
Video of the scuffle between several Waffle House customers and employees went viral last week and shows the employee punching away a metal chair that was thrown over the counter
The clerk left Waffle House, but when she tried to work for another restaurant in the chain, she found out she was blacklisted.
“I was blacklisted,” she said. “I can never work for Waffle House again. I tried to work for someone else earlier this year and they found out I was blacklisted.
In the new 20-minute video released last week, Halie explained how the events unfolded that night before the brawl and her reasons for throwing the sugar shaker.
“That’s not much,” she said. “They were rude, aggressive. I’ve finished what I started. It really is.’
Halie explained that on a particularly busy night, six customers walked into the eatery and attempted to sit in a cordoned off area. The group continued to sit and call for service despite being told the section was closed.
She went on to say that the women began “yelling” for their orders to be taken, leading to Halie telling them they could leave.
Halie, who has worked at the Waffle House for four years, has been rated a “Rock Star,” which is the highest level of cooking that includes chefs who also serve tables and run the place.
She said the group demanded that “the white girl” cook their meal when they started getting louder.
The video, which has since gone viral, shows an all-out brawl between customers and staff as one of them stands on the counter and a staff member throws a coffee pot at them.
In the Waffle House video, one of the women picked up a metal chair and threw it over the counter at the clerk, who threw a sugar shaker at her during the fight
A fight broke out at a Waffle House, reportedly in Austin, Texas, after a disgruntled customer climbed onto the counter while her friend snuck behind it
The argument escalated when an employee threw a sugar shaker at the woman
They try to climb over the counter again when Halie hurls a sugar shaker at them, which shatters on the floor.
“That’s how the night shift works, and that’s sad,” she said in the new video. “It’s not safe at night, so we have to do what we can.”
The women then jump over the counter and an all-out fistfight begins.
It ended when Halie flawlessly caught a chair thrown at her by another woman in the group.
“I caught it… and it bounced off my wrist,” she said.
They try to climb over the counter again when Halie hurls a sugar shaker at them, which shatters on the floor
After the woman fell over the counter, a massive fistfight ensued between staff and customers, prompting some customers to leave the restaurant
A third woman soon got involved and was seen pulling the employees’ hair
Other associates and friends attempted to break up the fight in professional wrestling style
Halie left her job at the Waffle House two months after the incident, but says when she tried to get a job at another, she was denied and claims she was blacklisted, although the original store told her said she could come back anytime.
The Waffle House video, which recently resurfaced online after being filmed at an Austin store last year, also showed two women yelling at the clerk while one of them stood on the counter, prompting the worker to do so to throw a coffee pot at them.
The viral video begins with a group of diners seated at a table yelling at a staff member while the man filming exclaims, “Bro, what the fuck is going on? Bro, I just want my waffles.’
At one point in the argument, a woman in a crop top and white yoga pants could be seen on the counter when one of her friends sneaked in behind.
After the woman got out, a short, blonde employee threw a coffee pot at her.
Looks familiar? Lynda Carter thought so! The actress, who played Wonder Woman in 1975, joked she “trained at the Waffle House” for the role after a video went viral of an employee deflecting a metal chair like a superhero
She posted the comparison on Twitter, to the delight of her fans, who claimed it was “Tweet of the Year.”
Then the woman’s friend, in a t-shirt, black leggings and yellow sneakers, climbs onto one of the stools at the counter and starts grabbing everything she can to throw at the employee.
But the friend, who had since decided to climb the counter herself, then fell behind the counter – whereupon the clerk grabbed her and started hitting her before the girl’s friends and other staff tried to intervene and the two women closed separate .
The fistfight has other diners running outside the restaurant in apparent fear for their own safety, though they continue to watch the fight escalate from the windows outside.
Many hailed the woman as the “Avenger” after she quickly deflected the chair with her arm without once breaking the scowl on her face
There they see that a third customer has grabbed the clerk by the hair while one of her friends continues to yell at the staff.
Soon, another member of staff decides to get involved and begins beating the women herself, despite her male colleague’s desperate attempts to stop the fight.
After a few moments, the man finally succeeds and the two women slink away, but not before the woman in the t-shirt grabs a bottle and threatens to throw it at the employees.
Instead, she and her friend walk away, grab some chairs, and hurl them at the employees.
The worker appears to tempt the noisy customers by waving her hands in a “bring it” manner before the t-shirted woman hurls a chair at them.
Former Wonder Woman actress Lynda Carter joked on social media last week that she was training for her heroic role at the Waffle House after the video went viral.
Carter, 71, played the iconic role in 1975 and compared her scene in the film, in which she blocks and breaks a chair against an assailant, to video of a Waffle House employee deflecting a chair thrown at her.
“I trained at the Waffle House,” Carter joked to the delight of her fans.
Similarly, in the video, a petrified Halie didn’t miss a beat after an angry customer threw a metal chair over the counter at her.
As the chair spun in mid-air, the clerk simply reached out and used one hand to guide the furniture away from her face and onto the floor, never breaking the scowl on her face.
Carter’s quip infuriated internet fans and even caught the attention of DC Comics, who jokingly tweeted, “Canon.” Canon is used to describing a storyline that actually took place in the storyline.
Others were excited at the thought of Wonder Woman in a Waffle House, with Twitter user Ian Boothby writing, “I could eat a Wonder Waffle.”