One Time

On of the best streets in Rotterdam is Witte de Witt Straat—a vibrant street filled with bustling restaurants, cute shops, and activity. A short two blocks off of the street lies the Gay Palace, the four storey mega-gay-dance club for Rotterdam.

As I’ve learned my way around Rotterdam I’ve tried to stay as close to the Gay Palace as I can and to Witte de Witt as I can in order to take advantage of its activities. This time I stayed at the Bazar Hotel which is located on the street.

This will be a one time experience.

Although the hotel has an excellent breakfast, a prime location, and falls squarely into the ever so popular “boutique hotel” category, it has three major failings. First of all the keys to the room are attached to a large heavy thing that is obnoxious to carry in one’s pocket. Secondly, the hotel does not have Internet access—wired or wifi, thus making it necessary to find cafés with wifi access in order to read email. Finally my room has a step in it—between the bathroom and the bed.

Now a brief word on boutique hotels—I’ve stayed in a few in my time and each one of them have quirks that are annoying. The one in Frankfurt had a window in the bathroom to bedroom area—thankfully I was staying alone. In London the boutique hotel had a bed so low to the ground that I might have well slept on the floor, and in Cheltenham Spa it was sterile and cold.

The Bazar Hotel does not have a door on the bathroom; rather it has a beaded curtain. Additionally the shower is not in a separate space but is just there. That’s a quirk I can live with, but the step between the bathroom and the bed has nearly killed me twice. First, five minutes after I entered the room, I had already forgotten it was there and I “fell down” the step. Later that evening, at about 3am, I had remembered the step was there but as I returned from the toilet to bed, I had forgotten exactly where it was and I nearly fell down it again as I only had my heal on the step.

It’s unfortunate that the Bazar Hotel was not better thought out—a flaw that many hotels share, both boutique and normal. I’m starting to think, quite frankly, that hotels are designed by people who never travel and never think about what people who travel might like in a hotel room.

Meanwhile I am at the Bagel Bakery, a café a block away from the Bazar—with free wifi. Fortunately there are multiple sources of free wifi—one of the “free” sources requires registration and click through to confirm membership—unfortunately in order to click through you must log-in and check your email account, something you cannot do on the free wifi because you cannot log in until confirm. Nice conundrum.

And with respect to Eurovision: very disappointing results last night.