Living in a Hostel Environment…

I decided to stay in a hostel for a week while I become acclimated to the city and try to find somewhere to live. I chose the hostel I am staying at based on it being inexpensive and small (it holds only 20 people). Some hostels sleep 16-30 to a room and hold up to 160 people. With 3 suitcases, 2 bags, and a weeklong stay, I have no desire to deal with all that commotion.

The place I am staying is less than a mile from school which is great! The small thing is nice as well. And that’s about it. 🙂 I have never stayed at a hostel before, so I had no idea what to expect. Having been here for several days now let me say, should you ever decide to stay at a hostel you should probably keep your expectations really, really low because as the saying goes…You get what you pay for.

Mind you, everything is sufficient. The electricity works, the sheets are clean, and the plumbing works. However, the level of cleanliness would not meet my mom’s expectations by a long shot. And when it comes to cleaning, the Granimal sets the gold standard. I won’t get into the details, but I will just say the bathroom needs some serious attention…It wouldn’t hurt to hit up the kitchen and the living room either. Everything is just cheap looking and haphazard. I am not mad I am staying here especially since I have never done this before…BUT…I would never stay here again or recommend this place to anyone.

So, that’s the place…now let me tell you about the guy who owns it. He’s a 30s-early 40s hippy, and it seems he came to open this place because he ran out of other ideas and didn’t really want to put in any massive amount of effort to do anything new. The place opened in May, and from what I can tell of his attitude, he seems to be over it. He doesn’t have any staff and in terms on housekeeping he’s getting by on the “well, it’s doesn’t look totally awful” principle. Did I mention that when he does clean, he likes to put music on VERY LOUD…and sometimes he sings along. So far, I’ve heard the musical stylings of Vivaldi, Beth Orton, some opera stuff, Simon & Garfunkel, Ali McGregor, Sade, the Beatles, and the Eagles.

And who know what tomorrow holds!!!

Anyhoo…There’s more. So a couple of days ago, he asks me if I would like a part time job helping him clean. I certainly wouldn’t mind some extra cash, so I say maybe. I start making mental lists of all the ways to clean this place up! Well, the part time job turns into working here and living here which as now turned into asking me if I will go on a date with him…for Mexican food no less.

So, needless to say, this relationship isn’t working for me. If I don’t have an apartment by Saturday, I will be hostel-ing elsewhere…preferably a place without grody dudes all up in my square.

Decisively,

Me