4W UV fluorescent lamp woes....

A client, who is a hairdresser and also does manicure, had an "oven" 
with a 4 W UV fluorecent lamp (a normal fl. lamp minus phosphor) that 
didn't work, so I took out the old (chinese!) circuit which was made of 
resistors and caps, and put a 4 W ballast plus starter and works ever 
since. The chinese of course are too cheap to put a real ballast and 
starter (the steel and copper are expensive) so they substitute it with 
a circuit that's cheaper.
I also tried to repair a el-cheapo torch that had a lead battery, with a 
built-in charger, touched the terminals of the battery and got the 
nastiest schock of my life! they didn't use a regular 12 V transformer, 
but a minimal circuit with a capacitor and a resistor! When a battery 
was connected the voltage was dropped to 12 V, but on open circuit it 
was 600 volts!!! It's a miracle I lived to tell the tale!