Mugigae @ Bugis Junction

These few days, I have been going around town, in search of a dress for a wedding reception. Actually, it is just an excuse to get more pretty clothes.

However, there were some not so pleasant experiences with the sales persons. One such bad experience was at Mugigae at Bugis Junction. No offense, but this was yet another shop which employs foreigners, mostly from a country that does not speak English. I do mind a little for I just feel that they should at least try to learn how to speak a little English. It will be of great help to them. The operative word here is "try".

In any case, I digress. All was going well and I have finished trying the clothes. I was quite undecided though for it was only the first shop my Mum and I had gone into to try clothes. I liked the dress (90%) but had just wanted to exercise all my options first.

Therefore, I asked the salesperson if she could 'hold' the dress for me for a few hours. It is not even for a day. If it were Dorothy Perkins or Topshop, they would have held it overnight for me. I suppose they were trying to send out a message that their clothes are not mass produced. This I understand. Now, if only they put it across the right way!

Salesperson (avoiding my question on whether she can hold the piece for me): This is the last piece already.

I(smiling, in fact almost apologetic since I was the one who was undecided): Yes, but can you hold it for me, for awhile?

Salesperson: No we cannot hold for you (pause and no eye contact all the time), if you want to hold must put deposit.

I (getting a little annoyed but trying to calm self down): OK, so how much deposit do I need to pay?

Salesperson (still no eye contact): The deposit is non-refundable.

I: I understand. So how much IS the deposit?

Salesperson (paused for one second): 50% (Can't quite remember if it was 50% or 30% as I was already mentally calculating whether to ditch the whole idea of buying the dress).

I (being a little mean now and wanting her to calculate the amount): So how much is that?

Salesperson (paused to do mental calculations): $50...and it is non-refundable.

All this time, she was just folding up the clothes that I tried on and tidying up, giving me only sideways glances. Her actions were haughty and her tone, not so good. I smiled and walked away. The message that I got was either: if you do not have the cash, don't buy; if you can't make up your mind, don't buy; you do not have the shape to carry our clothes so better don't buy; all of the above. There was to be no deal with this shop. Not today, not for a very long while, even though they sometimes have clothes that I like.

I can understand if you want to make a quick sale. I can understand if you want to close a deal and up your sales for the month. However, I do not think that speaking rudely and giving out rude non-verbal actions would be able to save your monthly sales figures, if there really is any saving to do. In the end, she did not manage to clinch a deal. She also managed to help her bosses lose a repeat customer.

Come to think of it, this was the same shop who had the very bad, old habit of adjusting the rack of clothes that I have just gone through. I was there earlier than Mum and so decided to take a look-see first at the various shops. Every time I finished with going through one rack, they immediately rearrange it.

I am not sure whether they were taught to do so but whoever thought of this logic is not making much sense as the non-verbal message that you are sending out to your customers is this: You have messed up my display.

Well, I think that it is meant to be messed up. Not so much as to mess up, but to go through. If not, how are we to see how the clothes look like. And it is not as if there were Call Numbers like library books. We do not jumble up any sort of number or order. It is true that a shop should look neat and that one should treat their customers like Gods, but I would not go to the extent of sticking so close as to almost hug the customer and I would wait till the customer has walked far away, or even out of the shop before I rearrange.

Under normal circumstances, if I see a salesperson start to 'ruffle' through the hangers randomly, I would just walk out of the shop. Why bother seeing since you do not want me to mess it up? Then of course, I am learning to be tolerant and so I continued to browse.

I suppose customer service issues are everywhere as we are all humans and handle things differently. The thing for me now is to learn from these different situations as I will soon be joining this line of profession again very soon.

Mozza Pizzeria

The two pizzas

The pizzaiolo in action

Fried potatoes with kacang puteh and rosemary

My first impression of this place was not so good for the hostess at the reception cum cashier table was non-apologetic when we found that we had unknowingly reserved in the wrong section of the restaurant.

You see, there is an osteria section and a pizzeria section. "Osteria" equals "eatery" equals more expensive stuff. If you want to enjoy good table service and fine wine and food, do go ahead. Pizzeria, to me, would be the fast food version of the restaurant that serves mainly pizza. Except, the wait for the pizzas actually start from 15 minutes!

"Sir. You did not make a reservation for the pizzeria. You made a reservation for the osteria", said the lady with a very strong Filipina accent (no discrimination intended, just wanted to start facts). That was when I half questioned my friend on whether he was told which section he was making a reservation for. His answer was negative. I know you are some celebrity restaurant/ chef kind of place but I think the least you could do is to state that the difference at the start of ANY reservation. At least ask if your would-be guests know that is actually a difference, instead of giving them a rude shock like we did.

We would not have minded it so much if not for the fact that the pizzeria was running at full house and we were going to catch The Lion King in about 2 hours' time. I made this known to the hostess because I really wanted us not to be late and get the seat quick. Besides, we were supposed to be celebrating a friend's birthday with this meal.

As usual, I was not too happy for the nonchalance and the news that we will only be offered bar seats at best since we are in such a hurry. Well, half an hour later, at 6.30pm, we really got our bar seats and it was actually a blessing in disguise coz I think we had the best seats in the house! We got to see the pizzaialos (the guys who make our pizzas) in action and smell the yummy food like the wood fire roasted chicken wings. Oh, and I get to be real close to some very cute chefs too :P

We ordered potatoes with sea salt, kacang puteh and rosemary. It is called fried potatoes ceci and herbs. I am assuming "ceci" is the Italian word for "kacang puteh". We had to wait quite a while more before our two pizzas came.

We ordered Funghi misti, fontina, taleggio and thyme pizza (vegetarian) and Fennel sausage, panna, red onions and scallions for the meaty one. It was yummy but the crust was a little tough. I ended up using my hands instead. Just as well for it tastes nicer like that.

However, I did find the potatoes and the funghi pizza (mushrooms) too salty for my liking. Even though it was sea salt (I presume), it still made me very thirsty after that.

In any case, the food dissolved all ill feelings towards the place. A good place to pamper yourself once in awhile.

Jou Jou Sushiya

If you did not do some detective work, you may never find this place. This shop is at Toa Payoh's HDB Hub area. It is a local Japanese food joint and it is a no-frills kind of place. It's location is not the best: behind a row of other shops (i.e. cannot be seen immediately) and riddled with poor ventilation despite very recent renovation.

It is nestled among well known roasted meat eateries like Hiang Ji and Choo Chiang and at first glance, I would not really try it. One day though, my mum packed a Japanese Bento back for me and upon asking, it was from Jou Jou. It was surprisingly good and value-for-money.

I decided to go there and try it for myself. Environment wise, one cannot be too picky. You would have to bear with the heat as mentioned, ventilation is poor. The same goes for other stores in that same row. I could get a decent bento for $6.80 and if I added a dollar or so, I could get a chawanmushi and hot/cold green tea. The portions are substantial and food tasted like restaurant standard. Delicious! When I mean substantial, it means I actually felt full and unlike those food court Japanese bentos that give you thinly sliced salmon or pork katsus. These are really thick slices. My personal favourite so far is the unagi bento.

I do not think they sell pork but to ensure that you are ordering the right thing, they have got a symbol of the animal at the side of the food pictures. Other than bentos, they also have udon, ramen and sushi. All sushi will be discounted at 8.30

Service was up to standard too. I suppose there is a lot of competition as well and so they need to establish good customer relationship. Whatever the reason, one could feel that they were genuinely friendly. Well, just this week alone, I have eaten there twice, so...I will keep going back!

Follow this link to get the address. Or, if you are well oriented with HDB Hub, walk towards the row of shops where there is Watsons.  Look out for Sin Ma and Singtel phone shop. There will be an inning to get to the back row shops. Enter there to find mini food haven :)