Not to burst your bubble but you are not going to be able to stock much in a 30. At minimum a 48" tank would work for a male show tank with more passive fish. You might be able to pull off one of the smaller peacock species breeding group in a 30 something like Aulonocara ethelwynnae, Aulonocara kandeense, Aulonocara maylandi, or maybe Aulonocara stuartgranti (Undu Reef). Id swing for 1 male 3 to 4 females. The males will also show more color this way seeing as they are the dominate fish in the tank.
Now for the subject of here seeing un-appealing fish on tanked. That isnt really a shocker to me. The fresh water fish they always get look like crap even 90% of the time because they deal with seagrest farms a lot of the fish from there come with sunken bellies and parasites. So maybe taking her to see fish at like belle isle would be a better idea so she can see what healthy cichlids look like. Last time I was there they had a nice tank set up with fish donated from local breeders.
