The Village Coin Laundry in Rutland.

(CARLI BERRY / iNFOnews.ca)

A Hispanic family visiting Kelowna say they were shocked when a vehicle altercation at a coin laundry escalated into racist remarks being made toward them.

Ruby Melendez, from Surrey, was visiting a family member to help them move to the Lower Mainland when she and her family stopped at the Village Coin Laundry, March 26 at around 11 a.m.

She reversed into the stall and her mom pointed out an older white woman who gave them a look of “disgust.”

Melendez initially ignored her when she got out of the car to take her dog for a walk and when she returned, her mother said the woman hit their vehicle with her car door.

She said the woman started calling her and her family “stupid” for reversing into the stall.

They told the woman they would file an ICBC claim.

Tensions escalated and Melendez said the woman grabbed her wrist when she went to take a photo of her license plate. A heated exchange ensued and the woman told them to “go back to your country,” Melendez said.

Melendez hasn’t yet reported what happened to the RCMP but plans to contact the police and ICBC. “I guess I’m a little bit almost embarrassed about what happened but I know that people keep telling me that I should,” she said.

“We did feel unsafe. I actually did, there was a split second in my head that this woman can do anything she wants and get away with it.”

Melendez is from the US but grew up in Canada, she said.

They contacted workers at the coin laundry and let them know what happened and she shared her experience on Facebook to show "that racism is right next door," she said.

It’s not the first time a person of colour experienced a racist incident in the city.

A man was filmed by iNFOnews last July calling a Sikh security guard “disgusting” and to go back home to his home country. The Kelowna RCMP investigated it but no charges have been laid in relation to the incident.

READ MORE: Still no charges for Kelowna man who released racist tirade against security guard

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