Fitness First Forget Friendliness

I have been a member of one gym or another for many years now. I started out at Equinox in the KL Equatorial Hotel, while working in Menara IMC. When my office moved to Jalan Tun Razak, I switched to the Crown Princess Clark Hatch and while there, used many Clark Hatch gyms all over Malaysia, but mainly in KL Hilton, PJ Hilton, KL Istana Hotel, and a couple more hotels in KL, Subang and Shah Alam, which I have forgotten what they are called. When I changed job and moved back to Jalan Sultan Ismail, I switched first to the Istana Clark Hatch then, back to the Equinox. Curiously enough, my gym experience in Malaysia started and ended with Equinox. My last 3 years (2002 – 2004) in Equinox were particularly filled with fond memories, as it was a quiet, friendly and very well maintained gym. By and large in any event, the gyms in Malaysia I have had the good fortune to be part of were very friendly. Maybe because I was a regular and was often the first one there on weekdays when they opened in the morning, but my relationship with the trainers and attendants were all very cordial and friendly. Of course, there were exceptions, as invariably there was the odd one or two which had something to say about my profuse sweat glands, especially at the end of my run on the thread mill. But like I said, a huge majority of them were very friendly and pleasant. Even the staff at the clubs we were member like the Klang Club and Klang Executive Club had friendly gym staff. It baffles me therefore to encounter cold and unfriendly staff I have been dealing with at the Fitness First gym in Glen Waverley, where I joined a little over a week ago. Maybe it is the size of this place. It is larger than any gym I have been part of, had something like 20 thread mills and equal numbers of cross trainers, step climbers and cycling machines. That is only one quarter of floor space dedicated to exercise machines. The other 3 quarters had weight machines, free-weights, cardio circuit area, stretch area, studio for classes, solarium, juice bar and refreshment areas, it is just so big. Yet I cannot come to grips with the attitude of the staff. They are not necessarily nasty or rude in any way, just not interested in chatting with members and making them feel at home. This morning I approached one of them to collect my freebies which I was supposed to be given when I signed up (they ran out of stock and asked me to collect it them few days later). Without nary a smile the young lady at the counter simply packed the stuff into a big and handed it to me. It isn’t anything to do with race either (before anyone suggested it) as that young lady was an Asian, and has that same demeanor as the other girl on duty, a lanky Aussie girl. Sigh… as friendly as Melbourne folks are in general, gym staff in KL beat their Melbourne counterparts hands down. Maybe it was my state of being soaked when I approached them – I don’t see anyone around sweatier than me – but even then the Malaysian variety were friendly regardless of my state of sweatiness. That’s the other thing – it feels good to sweat that way, again. So, whether they are friendly or otherwise, I go away happy. Tired but happy.