Social media storm over racism in Cairns café

A lot of attention has been placed lately on former refugee Josie Ajak, 20, who works as a shift supervisor at the busy Gloria Jeans cafe in central Cairns.

Ajak, who moved to Australia from South Sudan with her parents as an eight-year-old, tells the story of how she took over the cash register and tried to handle a growing queue.

An elderly female customer in a wheelchair refused her assistance.

Instead, she requested her to ‘get a white lady’ to serve.

"I was shocked but I responded very kindly, I said that’s fine and just moved her to the side and continued to serve the other customers," Ajak told SBS.

"She sat there waiting, looking at me with very angry eyes. Every time I served someone she would make a comment about them [other customers] pushing in. She was really rude and asking rude questions while she was waiting, I don’t know what she was waiting for.

"After a couple of minutes she rolled away in her wheelchair while giving us the finger."

Ajak passed on the story to her friend Jade Arevalo who posted the details about that encounter on Facebook. It had a massive response: 500 shares, 13,000 likes and hundreds of comments from people who were furious that this could happen in Australia.

And when it was put up under the hashtag #buycoffeefromjosie, it resulted in new customers coming to Gloria Jeans in Cairns asking to be served by Ajak.

For her part, Ajak has put it into perspective.

"The lesson here is treat everyone with kindness, when the lady said those words to me, I didn’t really feel hurt, I felt disappointed," she told SBS.

"I felt sorry for her, to treat another human being like that, especially now, what does that mean for her?

"She probably had a really terrible life, probably came across some really dark things in her life and maybe that’s why she treats people that way."