Chinese Restaurant Owner Realistically Passes Off As Robot And Confounds The Web

Foreground photo 124442812 © Ales Utouka | Dreamstime.com, background generated on AI

Remember the era when everyone pretended to dance like robots? Amplify those skills by about a hundredfold, and you’ve got this waitress.

Videos hailing from China of a waitress with robotic gestures are baffling viewers around the world. While androids in the service industry aren’t new, these clips are raising eyebrows because people can’t tell if the figure is human or mechanical.

But as South China Morning Post confirms, the waitress is indeed of flesh and blood. Known as Qin, she’s the owner of the hotpot restaurant where her robotlike performances are served on the side. In a physical rendition of AI is taking over our jobs, she executes Uncanny Valley-esque head bobs and arm movements with exemplary precision. 

Qin is also a professional street dancer, which explains her exceptional robot mimicry as she serves meals and drinks to her guests.

“I really thought she was a robot,” one commenter notes on YouTube. Thousands of others share this sentiment.

“She mastered the art of NPC robotic movements,” another person quips.

[via Insider and South China Morning Post, images via various sources]