06/24/04
Day 50
Tong's Fish & Pets
After going to Laguna beach to snorkle today with my girlfriend Kiki, and my friend Kris, I decided that we should all go visit Tong's Tropical Fish & Pets store on Warner Avenue and Magnolia to buy a fish for my girlfriend, and so everybody agreed, and we went there straight from Laguna beach. To my surprise when I first steped into the store a middle aged Thai woman wearing big glasses immediately accused me of taking some mans bag of plants and some other things that he had bought the last time I came there. The last time I came there, I had only bought one piece of Tonga branch rock, and before that, I had came there to buy 1 pound of basic fiji rocks for my 5.5 aga. A young male approached me soon after who is the cousin of the family runned business. He came up to me and told me that I may have taken a man's purchased items by mistake that other day I made my purchase. Huh, I thought, all I did was buy a tonga branch which weighed 1 pound. Well, this sure is strange, seems to me that all the workers at Tong's fish store were informed that I was the one person that may have taken some man's plants? Well, this didn't seem to bother me just yet, because I thought It was some kind of joke, and continued on to search for a fish for my girlfriend. After my girlfriend selected a fish, I asked a caucasian male who worked there if the fish had any requirements as it will be in a 5.5 gallon tank which I bought here. He said "what requirements?" I said "you know, if It is okay to have one of that fish in the 5.5 gallon tank." He didn't seem to know, not only did he didn't seem to know something about the fish, other employees who work at this fish store don't seem to know much about the fish either. I give the male caucasian guy some credit for knowing the latin names, and phylum to the corals which I don't care about. In the end he told me it would be okay to keep. After he got the fish out of the tank I asked him for a small piece of fiji rock for free as a gift for returning so often, and that I felt to myself that I was treated badly as a continous retuning customer who always got treated as an unimportant customer. After he fished the piece out of the tank, he weighed it and said "it weights nothing, I am just a peon here and I do not have the power to give it to you for free, so I can not give it to you for free" and went to the front counter to ask someone of higher rank if It would be okay to give the rock to me. A customer with a blue dress shirt, black slacks, and suave wavey hair smirked, " you should be more strict," to the caucasian peon, and glanced at me as if I was some kind of free loading begger. As the male worker went to the front counter, I followed him there, and heard him say "can, we give this to him for free?" "No, but he can have it for 50 cents," said the young Thai girl wearing an Abercrombie t-shirt. Since I could not get It for free, I had felt that I might as well buy some more live rocks. The big male peon said to me, "go get the rocks your self." I was dissappointed to hear this, as It seem more unfriendly than treating me to dig through their rocks as a reward as Pacific Reef has. I told him that I had just been at the beach, and my hands my be contaminated, but he insisted I go get the rocks myself, so I did, I got 1 pound of small rubbles. The Thai girl came to me after I had finished fishing out the rocks I wanted out of a big glass tank. I asked her "how much are these rocks worth?" she said "I don't know, weight it yourself over there," and pointed to a scale with a white piece of foam ontop. I felt that she was unconcerned about me as a customer. I was begining to feel a gloomy and unfriendly environment in this fish store. Nobody here treats me well at all, what have I done? stole some mans precious plants? I weighed the rocks, and the Thai girl came over and said, it is about a pound, "so 4.98," she said, with her hands on her waist, like Peter Pan. She bagged the rocks for me and took it to the front counter. When I got there, the middle aged woman with big glasses working the cash register asked me once again If I had taken some mans items that he had purchased, and once again I told her no I have no idea what she is talking about. She then told me a sad story about how those items had been very dear to the man, and was exactly the ones he wanted and picked out, and took him a long time to find the perfecct one; they were set on the counter, and now is gone. To make me feel like a thief she told me the value of the items were worth 16 dollars. I told her that I am afraid I don't know what she was talking about, but I am sorry for his lost. While she charged my plastic card for the fish and rocks, I couldn't help but wonder how the man's plants may have vanished off the counter. Tong's Fish and Pets did not ever appoligize to me for what they said to me, and has always made excuses as something is not their fault. If you think about it, how can a mans Item come up missing when a woman at the front counter working the cash register never moves anywhere. If I took something there by mistake, I would know by now, and would return it by the time I got home and found it in my car. Why do I feel bad everytime I come back to Tong's Fish & Pets to buy stuff? Should it be this way for other customers as well?
I could still remember the last time I went there to find a frag of something I would like to have In my Nano Cube. I ended up buying a small Leather. I wasn't sure whether the Coral was doing okay, because it was all closed up, so I asked the white peon for some help. He told me that they had just gotten it in about 40 minutes, therefore it is highly stressed and is the reason why it is closed up. So what did I do? I waited and waited for the leather to open up, and 40 minutes had passed, and still it remailned closed. This had been a long time for me to stare at one thing in the tank, and the peon came by and said "look, if you don't buy it, I guarantee you that it won't be there tommorow, because for 15 bucks, that is very cheap!" So I bought it, because indeed what he siad may be true, and it may not be here tommorow. He fished the leather out for me, and placed it in double bags and some water in the bag, maked 15- on the bag, and gave the bag to me. I looked into the bag and told him that the coral looks kinda detteriated. He looked at it and told me it was fine, and looked upset. Then he pointed to a coral in the tank that he said looked detteriated at the foot, he said "see this milky stuff? this is what you don't want." That got me worried so II asked him a few questions about keeping teh leather healthy, and his responses were all very short amd made me think that he has become annnoyed of me asking so many questions regarding leather care. Well, I decided that that I had asked enough questions and steped up to front counter and was ready to buy, but before I did I asked the middle aged Thai woman wearing glasses If the coral looked okay, she said it would be fine, and asked a younger Thai girl if it looked okay, she also said it looked okay, so I made the transaction. Till today, the leather coral is extremly happy looking, but everytime I look at it, I see the workers at Tong's Fish & Pets faces, frowning upon me for asking annoying questions about care for the leather coral.
This recent trip to the Tong's fish store has been a great dissapointment to me because while all this disscussion about one mans lost of some items, and me being accused for stealing it, my friend and girlfriend was there listening to everything. I was very angry that they had to mention many times as If I had stolen the mans stuff! This has not been the first time I had some conflicts with this fish store. One other issue that had occured in the past had to do with the fish store overcharging me by mistake, then telling me I could only have store credit as it was their store policy for no money refund. It it was their mistake!
FInal thoughts: Although I was very upset with what they have done to me, I guess they are only human. Hopefully no more episodes of me being a scapegoat the next time I step into the store, and they could more friendlier and less hostile towards me next time.
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