A Nice Day . . . Up In Flames

My girl and I had a really nice day.  We got up late, played with our guinea pigs, and just cuddled around the house most of the morning.  Later, we went shopping at Target, had an uneventful but tasty lunch at Mickey D’s, hit a thrift store, and did our major grocery pickup for the month.  We decided that we would go home, drop off the food, and then walk to the Valley Fair Mall, just for the fun and exercise of it.

We got there about 8:30 in the evening, and I hit the video game store while she went into Hot Topic.  After trading some old games I never play anymore for a Half Life 2 game package with a bunch of other titles on the disc as well, I was summoned over to Hot Topic because my sweetie found the coolest shirt EVER.

It was a black t-shirt with a Superman “S’ logo made of red velvet.  I loved it immediately, and we were soon married at the cash register for $21 and change.  I almost never like paying that much for a simple t-shirt – but it’s Superman, and not one of you people out there can blame me.  If you do, I’ll shoot you in the face.  Just kidding… sort of.

Anyways, the mall was closing, so we started to walk back to our apartment.  She was hungry, and had been jonesing for some Huevos Rancheros from Flames Coffee Shop on Winchester ever since the previous day.  So, since it was close to the mall, and I wanted to have this really tasty and huge fruit smoothie they make at Flames, i said we she eat there, instead of going home to make some flimsy cheese and pastrami toasties.

We were dressed in jeans, and each had on some clean, respectable sweatshirts.  Neither of us had boogers in our noses, or giant flesh eating bacterial sores oozing blood and puss, but we were treated like lepers as soon as we walked in the front doors of Flames at about 9:25pm.  After a humiliating and degrading 15 minutes of discriminatory treatment, my girl said she had had enough, so we left.  Below is a copy and paste of the review I left on CitySearch and Yelp – two reviewing sites for consumers to share their experiences of different companies…

“My fiancee and I have been to Flames Coffee Shop on Winchester, and the location in Milpitas. We’ve enjoyed good food, and reasonably acceptable service – until tonight.

We walked in and immediately noticed the manager/supervisor give us a sour look. I wasn’t sure if she was just grumpy, or if she found some reason to look upon an Asian woman with a white handicapped man disfavorably. As we stood by the front counter waiting to be seated, many other (at least 6) customers were greeted and dealt with promptly and always with a smile. We continued to wait for even an acknowlegement, let alone some service. After about 5 minutes of being completely ignored, another employee came to the register near us. As he looked our way, the woman with the sour look leaned in to him and told him “Do not seat them at all.”

I was very offended and hurt by this, but said and did nothing inresponse – we just continued to wait politely and patiently. As time passed, it became painfully clear that we were being discriminated against for some unknown reason. We are both professional, quiet, extremely polite and respectable people in our late twenties and would NEVER present ourselves in a way that would give any business lawful reason not to serve us. Finally, after 15 minutes of being overtly ignored while many other customers were served, my fiancee had had enough and we left.

I, as a handicapped man, experience various types of discrimination from time to time, but never in my 30 years have had it at the hands of a customer-service oriented business, and never so blatantly obvious as it was tonight at the Flames Coffee Shop on Winchester. If we do not pursue this matter through an official boycott, or any other appropriate and deservedly immediate means,

I deeply hope that anyone who reads this will not give Flames any business, and spread the word about thier dreadfully inappropriate treatment of two highly respectable but disatisfied customers.”

 

I am considering offering this review up at every consumer review site I can find, and possibly figuring out a way to organize a boycott of Flames Coffee Shop.  I know I will just be ignored and blown off, like all other people in the world who speak up when they are wronged, but I feel that I have to do something.  It wouldn’t matter much to me if it was just a slight against me, but my love was with me, and to see her experience this type of horrible treatment makes me feel helpless and violated.

Damn them.  Damn Flames for this behavior.  My girl was upset, but let it roll off her back how she usually does in her own gracious, laid back way – but I am very different.  I can take someone spitting on me, but you spit on a loved one and I don’t let it go.  I’ll see you in hell, Flames!

And yes, I get the irony of that statement.

—- UPDATE —- UPDATE —- UPDATE —- UPDATE —- UPDATE —- UPDATE —- UPDATE —-

I have been trying not to stew about this all morning, but I failed.  So, I wrote letters to local tv stations and newspapers.  I don’t know what they would do, if anything at all, but I had to do something.  I will keep you all posted, if you want to hear what happens.