LAST May 10 my late mom’s face appeared in my dream just moments before I woke up.
I decided to visit her grave and went straight to the Loyola Memorial Park in Sucat, Paranaque to light a candle.
To my shock, in lieu of her grave were mounds of trash, dried bermuda in squares and dried leaves that apparently came from the adjacent tomb which was freshly spruced up.
Instinctively, under the sun’s scorching heat, I hurriedly removed everything on the spot where I knew the tombstone to be until a kind-hearted caretaker named Andrew dela Cruz took pity and aided me.
He took a shovel and used it to remove all the trash covering the tombstone. He then poured water to remove the soil that hardened on top of the tombstone and then put some of the old bermuda under it to bring it back to its former elevated state.
From there, I proceeded to the management office all soiled up and sweaty to formally complain.
A certain David Sarmiento asked what my complaint was all about. To my dismay, while I was stating my complaint, Sarmiento stopped me and with a sarcastic face and tone and with matching hand gesture, told me “kalma lang, kalma lang” instead of letting me finish my story.
I told him it is hard to calm down if you see your parents’ gravesite desecrated.
The questions are: how many days had it been like that and how many more days would it be like that if I did not pay my parents a sudden visit?
Instead of expressing sympathy or showing he is sorry for what happened and will have the matter investigated and acted upon, Sarmiento said dumping on another gravesite cannot be avoided during interment, meaning, it is really Loyola’s practice to disrespect other graves, following what Sarmiento said.
I pointed out that if any dumping had to be done, it should have been on our other lot which is vacant and just beside the gravesite where the dumped trash came from. There were also vacant lots right on the other side where the dumping could have been done, without bastardizing my parents’s gravesite.
Moments later, supervisor Ruby Grace Lagrama arrived and accompanied me to the site to see and learn for herself what happened.
Unlike Sarmiento, Lagrama repeatedly apologized and expressed sympathy, while assuring that it will be acted upon and she even had the site cleaned up when I left.
Unfortunately, Sarmiento arrived at the scene but did not help any in the situation and even made matters worse. He questioned my use of the term “binalahura” to describe what happened.
Apparently, to him, the despicable act and sight was just “normal”. Either he is blind, plain stupid or maintains his earlier pronouncement that dumping reject soil and trash on other people’s graves is fine or common practice at the Loyola Park.
The fact that he is talking to a Loyola client who has a valid complaint and has the temerity to engage in a verbal tussle to stand by his awful justifications is shocking.
Even if a client is wrong, there is such a policy known as “the customer is always right.” What more if indeed, that customer is right?
Instead of doing everything within his power to ease the hurt feelings of a client whose parents’ gravesite had been turned into a dumping ground of reject soil and bermuda grass, Sarmiento rubbed salt on the wound by making it appear that the complaint was no big deal and that the practice of dumping on tombstones is common and acceptable, using terms that are sarcastic and downright rude.
I was very angry at what happened to my parents’ gravesite but Sarmiento’s apathy and rudeness would really make one angrier by at least ten times.
He is a far cry from the supervisor who handled my complaint and even the caretaker who helped me without asking for anything in return.
Sarmiento does not care about how the clients of Loyola feel and obviously, he also does not care if it backfires on the company itself. The very company that feeds him through its clients.
It is so disappointing how Loyola management could put someone like Sarmiento on the frontline. He is a square peg in a round hole.
He should be the caretaker of the graves so that he would no longer need to deal with the living who have feelings and need to be at least listened to.
If you come to his office with one problem, you will end up having more. I hope the kind of attitude or behavior he displays towards complaining clients is not standard policy in Loyola.
Sarmiento is a perfect example of someone who should not be allowed to deal with clients.
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