My Run-In at Ocean Reef Apartments
As many of you already know, I am moving to New London soon. While I was in the process of finding a place to live down there, I had this experience checking out a place called "Ocean Reef." Yeah, I know, scenic name, isn't it? That's all that was scenic about it.
Without further ado:
Ocean Reef apartments, managed by Tarragon Management, is one of perhaps five apartment complexes located on Nob Hill Road in New London. They all share one leasing office, which I found after circling the neighborhood only about seven times and almost running over some old homeless black dude riding a decrepit bicycle down the road through the fragments of broken glass scattered along it.
To say that I had my reservations about the neighborhood would be a gross understatement. But you know me, ever the optimist, I had to keep my appointment in spite of first impressions and see what they had to offer me. The lady, Penny, from the leasing office called me on my cell just as I was parking on the street out front to ask if I was going to make it. I thought that was nice.
I will try to keep this story as short as possible without sparing any wonderful details. The first thing I noticed as I walked into the leasing office was the cluster of angry people in the entryway. There was a young man, younger than us, wearing a red, no-sleeves sports jersey type of deal with a penetrating look of consternation on his face; an older, dark-skinned, bearded man slumped in one of the chairs holding a bunch of paper and making strange salivating noises while grumbling angrily, apparently about the contents of said pages; and a young lady in another chair with her knees pulled up to her chin, saying nothing at all.
As I walked by the young guy, I said "excuse me," and slipped around behind him and he didn't move an inch. "Great," I'm thinking, "just the kinds of people I want to live with."
We looked at some paperwork and then Penny was going to take me over to the two-bedroom unit to take a look at it. As we were about to set off, the other gal there mentioned covertly to Penny that she didn't want to be left alone there with "those people," and so they tried to drum up another staffer to come out to the office but nobody was around. The other gal finally gave up and said it would be fine and that we should go. Strike two.
On the golf cart ride over to the apartment (Penny probably couldn't make it up the hill on foot even if she had wanted to, I'm afraid, due to both age as well as girth), she told me that those people were trying to get their money back because they had held an apartment for two weeks and then decided not to move in.
We reached the apartment building and as we entered the front door (with no lock on it, I might add), this middle aged, half-toothless, disheveled looking black woman who was just about to enter her own apartment turned to address Penny. "Hey, Penny," she called up to us from the bottom of the half-flight of stairs in a lispy, toothless kind of way, "I got all dese here little flies up in my house here, dey look like little butterflies you know..."
"Drain flies," Penny interrupted. "They're drain flies, I know."
"Yeah yeah drain flies yeah well I got a whole house fulla dese tings in here and you gotta get in an' spray or somethin' 'cause I got a house fulla dese tings now," she lisped.
"Right, well, you can't just spray everywhere, you need to find the source," said Penny, calmly, trying desperately to run some casual damage control before this lady totally trashed any chance she ever had of renting me an apartment.
"Oh I know they be comin' from in the bathroom, yeah, and I got water comin' in there you know, they gotta spray in there 'cause I got a whole house fulla dese flies now you know," she said, each "S" sound half-whistling like blowing through a broken kazoo.
"Okay, well, we'll dry out your bathroom, it's coming from the other side, we will take care of it, I have to go," said Penny, knowing that each word this old black lady said was pushing the prospect of a rental from me further and further away.
The apartment itself wasn't half bad. Something like 800 square feet and a brand new kitchen with new cupboards and appliances, impeccably cleaned and prepared, sporting a large living room picture window--complete with awning--overlooking the scenic New London ghetto. Imagine, all the crack whores and broken glass I could ever want, poised at the tips of my fingers!
This entry was posted from Air's Journal - Original post.
Without further ado:
Ocean Reef apartments, managed by Tarragon Management, is one of perhaps five apartment complexes located on Nob Hill Road in New London. They all share one leasing office, which I found after circling the neighborhood only about seven times and almost running over some old homeless black dude riding a decrepit bicycle down the road through the fragments of broken glass scattered along it.
To say that I had my reservations about the neighborhood would be a gross understatement. But you know me, ever the optimist, I had to keep my appointment in spite of first impressions and see what they had to offer me. The lady, Penny, from the leasing office called me on my cell just as I was parking on the street out front to ask if I was going to make it. I thought that was nice.
I will try to keep this story as short as possible without sparing any wonderful details. The first thing I noticed as I walked into the leasing office was the cluster of angry people in the entryway. There was a young man, younger than us, wearing a red, no-sleeves sports jersey type of deal with a penetrating look of consternation on his face; an older, dark-skinned, bearded man slumped in one of the chairs holding a bunch of paper and making strange salivating noises while grumbling angrily, apparently about the contents of said pages; and a young lady in another chair with her knees pulled up to her chin, saying nothing at all.
As I walked by the young guy, I said "excuse me," and slipped around behind him and he didn't move an inch. "Great," I'm thinking, "just the kinds of people I want to live with."
We looked at some paperwork and then Penny was going to take me over to the two-bedroom unit to take a look at it. As we were about to set off, the other gal there mentioned covertly to Penny that she didn't want to be left alone there with "those people," and so they tried to drum up another staffer to come out to the office but nobody was around. The other gal finally gave up and said it would be fine and that we should go. Strike two.
On the golf cart ride over to the apartment (Penny probably couldn't make it up the hill on foot even if she had wanted to, I'm afraid, due to both age as well as girth), she told me that those people were trying to get their money back because they had held an apartment for two weeks and then decided not to move in.
We reached the apartment building and as we entered the front door (with no lock on it, I might add), this middle aged, half-toothless, disheveled looking black woman who was just about to enter her own apartment turned to address Penny. "Hey, Penny," she called up to us from the bottom of the half-flight of stairs in a lispy, toothless kind of way, "I got all dese here little flies up in my house here, dey look like little butterflies you know..."
"Drain flies," Penny interrupted. "They're drain flies, I know."
"Yeah yeah drain flies yeah well I got a whole house fulla dese tings in here and you gotta get in an' spray or somethin' 'cause I got a house fulla dese tings now," she lisped.
"Right, well, you can't just spray everywhere, you need to find the source," said Penny, calmly, trying desperately to run some casual damage control before this lady totally trashed any chance she ever had of renting me an apartment.
"Oh I know they be comin' from in the bathroom, yeah, and I got water comin' in there you know, they gotta spray in there 'cause I got a whole house fulla dese flies now you know," she said, each "S" sound half-whistling like blowing through a broken kazoo.
"Okay, well, we'll dry out your bathroom, it's coming from the other side, we will take care of it, I have to go," said Penny, knowing that each word this old black lady said was pushing the prospect of a rental from me further and further away.
The apartment itself wasn't half bad. Something like 800 square feet and a brand new kitchen with new cupboards and appliances, impeccably cleaned and prepared, sporting a large living room picture window--complete with awning--overlooking the scenic New London ghetto. Imagine, all the crack whores and broken glass I could ever want, poised at the tips of my fingers!
This entry was posted from Air's Journal - Original post.