Service With A Smile

Have you ever spent a day shopping and relaxing in Los Angeles? The rest of the world could still learn some lessons. My day started by our parking in The Grove. This is a purpose built, almost Disney type shopping experience for adults. It is so clean, efficient and excellent that you would think it would be hateful and undesirable. Instead of which we parked in the pristine parking lot, which was spotlessly clean and had a choice of descending the immaculately clean stairway, the pristine escalators or the bank of efficient elevators. I chose the escalators and passed lobby areas in which chaps were lounging on settees using the free wifi connections to their laptops.

Arriving at the bottom of the escalator I journeyed less than ten yards and there was a small group of fantastically lithe and well endowed young mothers, complete with new born babies in front of them, doing jumps on the spot. The results were so fantastically pneumatic that I found myself walking into the nearest wall before I was rescued. I quietly uttered the words, “Thank God for California!”

I ate a fantastic breakfast in the sunshine in the same kind of environment. I then went to a bookstore and was looking around when a staff member enquired if `I needed any assistance. I hadn’t bothered them about my wistful search for a book I had no right to find, having forgotten its title, author or year of publication. The ultra efficient, friendly and helpful staff would not be deterred by any of this and found and ordered me this book in a couple of minutes. This is not the service you would get in the UK, or anywhere else in Europe. We still have a lot to learn.

During the day I found unfailing courtesy in restaurants, parking lots, schools and a kids swimming lesson I attended. It wasn’t phony and it was extremely pleasant.

I visited an exceptionally good faith school and the standards were tremendously high. Every school in the UK would do well to imitate it if the children I saw were examples of what can be achieved with well-motivated parents, teachers and kids.

The swimming class was part of a business run by a five time Olympic gold medalist, attended by two of my grand children. I know a bit about swimming but I thought this swimming school was on a whole different level to anything I’ve ever seen before. I am sure there will be many future champions who will come out of this training method. The school was staffed by an excellent team of trainers who really knew what they were doing, and could communicate this to the children of different levels of ability and age that they were training.

All day I heard no one swear, I didn’t see anyone litter, and everyone I met was courteous. This resulted in making the experience of the day much more pleasant. I don’t see anything wrong with any of this and would love to see some of these aspects of life spread to Europe.