The Nha Trang Beach Hotel is, by local standards, a nice hotel. So when I say that it only cost $12.00, you must understand that many backpackers are staying in decent places for the standard rate of $6.00 We are far from slumming it. In fact, at $12.00, we're a little upscale.
Now it looks as if the hotel was built in two phases and those phases don't quite line up in height. So from one building to the next is a half flight of stairs.
Our friends have a $16.00 room in the front half and we have our less expensive room in the back half. The key difference in the two rooms is that their window faces the street and our window faces the hallway. We have air conditioning and the window locks and so it doesn't seem to be a big deal when we book in, but in the night the wind picks up and the window begins to rattle.
I am awakened not by the window, but rather by Donna wanting me to resolve this rattle problem. Which I do - by opening the window.
I am awakened again, this time to discover that Donna can't sleep. She is afraid that someone is going to get into the room while we sleep. I try to convince her that it is far more likely that they would break in while we are away, but this is doing no good in a dark hotel room in a foreign country with the Loop-O-Matic in full effect.
Why do I say that she is the Loop-O-Matic 3000? Not because she is afraid, however unlikely, that someone is going to reach through the window and open the door. Not because I discovered in the dark that she had lodged a chair under the door knob - a locking mechanism that is far superior to the hotel locks and should someone be able to reach through the window and unlock the door would then foil them somehow. No, it is because I was able to get her to sleep by placing a bag of chips on the edge of the curtain. Yes it was the additional security provided by the ancient Chip Trap that let her get to sleep.
Of course, we found a new hotel the next night that met her security standards for the low low price of $50.00
4 comments:
Sorry Donna but truly funny.
Barbara
Never mind Donna, I too have fallen for the chip trap, OK I used tiny airline sized empty rum bottles strung together with a shoelace, but it had the same effect! Possibly the consumption of the contents of said bottles helped the empty bottle trap make perfect sense....I am not sure how that reasoning applies to the chips....? I'll work on it.
Ms. Vickies?
-sparky
brings back memories of a night we spent in Rome. It was 35 degrees at 2400hrs, no air conditioning....not even a fan! Donna insisted the window remained closed...fearing the ever so talented thieves who would scale the wall up to the 12th floor! The hostel had no patios or balconies! Needless to say, it wasn't a restful night!
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