“I (have) live(d) in the USA over 20 years and always admired the way Americans treat other foreigners. Perhaps that is why Americans are considered 'the most friendly nation' in the world.”

Such starts a letter handed to me by Diana Apetauerova, MD, who works in the neurology department at the Lahey Hospital and Medical Center in Burlington, Massachusetts.

Diana is from the Czech Republic, seemed very friendly when we met and brought along her son and mother when she handed me the letter. She said she had been visiting Boothbay Harbor for the past six years because of its “charm and natural beauty.”

Though the letter started out positively, it went downhill in about the fourth paragraph.

This summer, Diana had invited her brother's family from the Czech Republic for a visit to her place on Southport, saying she wanted to share “my love of Boothbay Harbor with him and his family.”

The letter goes on to explain her utter disappointment with and the “discriminatory behavior” by an employee of a long established business in Boothbay Harbor. Having been told a feature of that business and disappointed that they received nothing about that feature, she went to complain to an employee. Diana said the employee “became rude, arrogant, and by the end of the conversation, told us ‘If we do not like it, go back to the Czech Republic’! He repeated this not once but twice.”

Diana went on, “In hope his manager will be a nice man, we went to meet him. The chain of disrespect and arrogance just continued. We were told he had nothing to do with the (business). To my disappointment, I found out later that he was actually the owner!”

Because of possible defamation on our part if we printed the letter identifying the business, we did what we normally do when we receive these letters — which is sometimes two or three times a summer: we brought it to the Boothbay Harbor Region Chamber of Commerce.

In the past few years, thankfully, the numbers of these complaints have decreased. I hope the chamber will deal with it in their own way by presenting the letter to the business. And perhaps not promote that business.

Arrogance, rudeness and especially discriminatory remarks have no place in society and especially in business.

I apologized to Diana and told her that I would not recommend this business to anyone in the future (it is not the first complaint we've received about this business and business owner).

Diana concluded her letter with the following: “This beautiful and free country has no place and tolerance for people like this. Discriminatory behavior was long ago forbidden and no one should be allowed to behave like this.”

Respect the customer.