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a
college friend of my father's. I must tell you about Ashok. He is no
ordinary businessman: keeping fish is a passion with him. He is far
more interested in chatting with his customers about fish than making
money selling them. I have never seen him forcing any of his
customers to buy from his stock of aquarium fish.
In fact, it was Ashok who introduced me to the amazing world of
aquarium fish way back when I was just nine and studying in Class V.
Under his guidance then, I experimented with breeding guppies,
platties and mollies, fairly simple types of fish to breed. However, it
was a matter of great excitement for me at that time to be successful in
my experiments and Ashok was generous enough to even buy back
from me the baby fish I reared just to encourage me. Later I developed
sufficient confidence to experiment with and breed more difficult types
of fish, like Siamese Fighting Fish and Blue Guramies-all under the
expert tutelage of Ashok.
So it was to Ashok's shop that I went every morning at 9.00 a.m.,
speeding on my bicycle to be on time. I would stay there until lunch
time, a regular hands on, doing whatever I was asked to do.
Ashok's shop is not very large. It is a two-roomed shop on the ground
floor of the Gomes Catao complex. It has a display section in front and
a store room at the back. The showroom has about twenty fish tanks on
display with a variety of fish that Ashok purchases mainly from
Mumbai. Each tank stores a particular species of fish. Ashok's shop is
located away from the main market area so he does not have the
advantage of casual customers dropping by. However Ashok has his
regular customers and there are always at least twenty to thirty
customers daily.
During my first few days at his shop, my work was only to watch the
tanks, clean those which were dirty, remove the dead fish and do some
other small jobs. I also fed the fish and treated the wounded and
diseased fish. Sometimes, I also attended to customers. Gradually, I
began to accompany Ashok on his rounds to various places.

A gentleman in Moira wanted to set up an aquarium at his home. He
had a tank. He also had definite ideas about how he wanted it to finally
look and Ashok was called to see how it could all be done. The man
sent his car for us. At his house we discussed the location of the tank,
lighting arrangements, the water filters, the kind and quantity of fish he
would like to have, and maintenance. After we were fully satisfied that
we had everything right and had noted down his requirements, we
returned to Mapusa. Later he came for the material which we kept
ready for him.
Another time I accompanied Ashok to a client's office to put a pair of
Dwarf Guramies in the fish tank and to fix a picture as a backdrop for
the tank. On such visits I watched care fully what Ashok did and soon
enough Ashok started sending me on my own to visit some of his
clients who had small or simple problems.
I went to clients to fix aquarium equipment such as air pumps and
filters, to fix toys in the tanks, to check fish for diseases or if there was
a sudden crisis such as fish dying in numbers, or if a client wished to
add more fish to his collection. I was sent to collect overdue payments
or simply to enquire the aquariums were doing. Sometimes I went on
my own to visit some of the places where we had set up tanks and
enjoyed watching the fish swimming happily in their new homes.
One day my employer decided to send me as a spy to find out the
prices of fish and fish food at a competitive fish shop. I tried to behave
like a casual customer and walked coolly into the competitor's shop and
gradually began to ask the prices of fish and fish food. After I had
found out what was needed I bought a pair of cheap Black Mollies from
his shop just to show him that I was a genuine customer. From the
information I got, we found Ashok's to be comparatively cheaper than
the competitor.
During this period I improved my knowledge about aquarium fish
tremendously. This was mainly due to two things. Firstly, I had spent a
lot of time observing the fish at Ashok's shop and getting practical
experience from the places we visited. Secondly, I had been reading the
fish books that my father bought for me as a gift for getting a
distinction in my