Accommodation in Lijiang

We stayed in a motel located within the Shuhe old town (束河古镇). This place is recommended by a friend, and I too, highly recommend. And I would ask you to stay much longer than what we did. We only spent two nights, which is certainly not enough!

Motel: 田园牧歌客栈
Address: 丽江, 束河古镇开文六社康普巷 (束河办事处旁)
Tel: 0888-5115922
Website: http://www.tymgkz.cn/

We highly recommend this for its hospitality and flexibility. The owners are very nice. It is run by very young people, who actually spend the whole day with the guests. You can chat with them till late night, to understand the local cultures better. They even brought us to the square and we danced together. They make friends with their guests, which is kind of uncommon in other places.

This is the room that we stayed in: 等月亮

Top left: when we open the door in the morning, this is what we see.
Top right: toilet/bath
Bottom left: our bed
Bottom right: outside view at night, it is a corner lot.


This is the corridor – very quiet in the morning…


Top left: outside view of the motel during the day.
Top right: a long table where people gather for meals and drinks, very cozy, like a lounge.
Bottom left: this is where we first had our dinner, a small square surrounded by the rooms.
Bottom right: our room is just behind the 2 loungers.


Look at this lock! They are so Chinese! I thought of buying one but forgot about it later! It looks like a combination lock with Chinese writings…

The Queen Elizabeth 2 Conference Centre

The Queen Elizabeth 2 Conference Centre (QEICC) is located in Westminster, London. In terms of location, I think it is the best for any business conference, as it is just situated shadow of Big Ben, Westminster Abbey and the British Airways London Eye.

It has wide variety of rooms available on 6 floors, with syndicate rooms available for group breakout discussions (very useful for workshops!). It also offers wide variety of food for conference organizers. The menu is extensive, from a la carte to buffets, to cocktail party, etc.

They also offer event management service that would help event organizers. I've worked with these event managements people before, they help a lot in coordination and making things are in perfect order - less hassle for organizers like us.

In terms of accommodations, people can choose to book last minute or book in advance at nearby hotels in London. Hotel in London is always perceived as very expensive, especially after conversion to RM. I am surprised to find good deals for last minute London hotels booking. I always thought last minute (inside 21 days) bookings are always more expensive, not necessary. There are deals start from GBP10!

Brought to you by cheaperthanhotels.co.uk

Travel to Melbourne

Are you planning to travel to Australia? Which part of Australia would you like to visit?

I've been to Perth only. Maybe will consider Melbourne in the future. Ever since joining this firm, though I am in the Asia Pacific role, and Australia is in my portfolio, I haven't got the chance to go on business.

My boss went to Melbourne once for a training, and she purposely scheduled it around the F1 period, so she got a chance to be there as well. Well, she is the boss, she could do that, but I can't!

Anyway, going to Melbourne during the F1 period is not easy, as most hotels would be fully booked. It would be hard to look for cheap hotels in Melbourne during that period. So, that is a disadvantage though. :)

Bad Experience with Marriott Karachi

I copied this as it is from my other blog. The reason is, I want more people to read this, as it is something really worth sharing... I will write my conclusion in another post.
------
Imagine this:
You made hotel reservation a month in advance. Midnight, upon arrival at a security heightened country, you found out that you have to share room with a complete stranger, and you have no other options but to accept it. Not only that, you have to sleep in the living hall on a made-shift bed, and yet expected to pay around RM700 ($200) for that.

This happened to me, in Marriott Hotel, Karachi. This is the most ridiculous thing that I’ve ever encountered in my travel life.

I arrived Marriott Karachi at 2:30am KL time. I was exhausted, desperately needed a shower and a good sleep. But upon arrival, I was told that the hotel was overbooked, and they have simply put me and another lady stranger in the same room, without seeking our agreement. Though this lady comes from the same country and same company as me, I do not know her at all! Furthermore, I need my privacy to express my breastmilk, and this has completely infringed my privacy rights!

The Full Story
During check in, we were not informed about the situation. They just made us sign the check-in form/agreement. Then, I got a glimpse of the room booking printout – someone shares the same room number as mine!

Upon asking, the receptionist then told us their problem of insufficient room. They have ‘kind enough’ to upgrade me and the other lady to an expensive presidential suite. They convinced us that it has two separate rooms.

We thought it was two bedroom suites. We finally agreed to say in the ‘two room’ suites. BTW, same thing happened to my boss too, has to share with another HK lady.

But then… when we opened the door, it was actually a 1-room suite. They put up a made-shift bed in the living room, in between the dining table and sofa; expect one of us to sleep there! And they dare called this as ‘2 separate rooms’!

I needed my privacy to express my breastmilk. The other lady was kind enough to give me that room. But I feel bad. My boss has to stay in her living room, coz we arrived later than the HK lady who took the (only) bedroom already.

We were very upset of this incident. After arriving in the Pakistan office this morning, we told the officers, and we were asked to change hotel and do not pay for the night we stayed. We did, with a lot of arguments at the lobby. It was just too dramatic just now, if you can imagine.

It is just not right in principal:

Dishonest
First, they were not honest with us. They should inform us the situation, instead of conned us into signing that form/agreement and used it against us. That receptionist brought us to our room. When we realized the real situation, he tried to sneak out. He thought he could just dump us into the room and his duty was over.

Room Rate
They expected us pay the full rate of Rs11,900 (RM700/$200) each, for sleeping in the living room. Only after we protested and refused that room, they then offered us half the price. But that wasn’t what we want. Even with that half price, none of us would like to stay with a stranger or in the living hall, especially on business trip and for me – who need privacy to express my breastmilk.

Gender Discrimination
This really pissed me off. There are 6 of us from my company, 4 females 2 males. The males arrived later than my boss and I. They got single (normal) room. We had to share. The HK lady arrived at least 3 hours before us, she had to share with one of us. Why it has to be females to share and the males have their own rooms?

Unprofessional Attitude
The staffs were rude. They kept defending that it was ‘2-separate-rooms’. Ya, one is living room. We told them that it was unacceptable, but they just don’t understand. The worst thing is, until the moment we cancelled our stay, they still thought we were being difficult, and they couldn’t understand why we were not happy with their ‘nice presidential suite’.

What Is Acceptable?
Well, if they have problem with availability, they should have called our office yesterday, and immediately arrange for us to move to another hotel. It is actually more professional that way! If they really want to try that so-called presidential suite, they should have checked with us instead of conning us and trying to dump us in that room. If it was agreed by our office, then we will accept it. Furthermore, our office would be able to advise them who can be put together and who cannot.

Next Steps
I am going to write to their HQ, and I’m also going to write to our procurement department to de-list them as our panel hotel. It is not cheap to stay in that living room, you know?

Now…
I am so happy that we have taken necessary steps, and I had some kind of pleasure – seeing their shocking faces when we cancelled our stays. Moving into Sheraton now is a good choice. This hotel is much newer, larger, with better facilities, and cheaper!

Added on 6 Mar
This incident in Marriott is only an isolated case, which should not be used to evaluate the country. Please do not generalize this experience to the general public. In fact, I enjoyed my trip very much, met a lot of nice and helpful people. Sheraton is also a very good hotel to stay in. I will write separately to share the fun with you all later.

Magnetic Hotel Key Cards

There was a circulation lately, that the hotel key cards contain guests' personal information including credit card details. In that circulation, it asks all hotel guests not to return the key cards, and destroy it at home.

Recently my office also received this circulation. After the security department researched further, it is confirmed that it is a hoax. You may want to read the detail here.

However, as pointed out in the site, though all major hotels do not practise encoding these sensitive information on the hotel key cards as it is not necessary, the point to ponder is:

IT IS TECHNICALLY POSSIBLE TO DO SO

Therefore, to reduce the risk, if I am not staying in major hotels, I would destroy the keys at home. What about you?

Dirty Hotel Rooms

Have you stayed in any hotels that you find the room(s) is dirty?

Some time ago, I received an email with all photos attached, about a couple staying in a 4-star hotel in Penang Island. On the first night, the lady felt something biting and she felt itchy.

After switching on the light, they found fleas on the bedsheets! In fact, the bedsheets are not clean, i.e. with light stains etc.

They called the hotel, requested for a change of room and immediate medical assistance, coz the lady started to have rashes all over. Unfortunately the hotel was full, they didn't get their room changed. The staff went into the room and sprayed insecticies instead!

The 'medical assistance' they provided was --> plasters! I actually found it funny and laughed out loud, coz how can a 4-star hotel hire some intelligent people like that huh?!

Anyway, here is a blog that writes about dirty hotels, and even provided a top-10 dirtiest list in their blog. I hope they include hotels outside US in their ranking. As for hoteliers that are listed there, they would need to work hard to win their customers back!

Brought to you by tripadvisor

USD100 Is Yours!

Now, after getting free or cheap air tickets from AirAsia, the next thing is to find a cheap accommodation for your holiday.

You can book your accommodations via a few ways: directly with the hotels, via an agent, or online (any other methods?).

I prefer to do it online, coz it is the cheapest and most convenient way. Furthermore, if you want to book directly with any hotels, do you know which hotels are available if you have not been there? :)

In Hotel Reservations, you can choose from a range of different types of accommodations, that includes hotels, condos, bed & breakfast, apartments, etc. Their services also include car rental and flight booking (which you might not need now, if you have AirAsia's free tickets already).

What’s more? You can now save USD100 more, if you book 12-nights (there are different tiers, just check it out at their website)! That’s a lot of saving to me.

The only thing I don’t quite like is the process to claim the USD100 rebate. You’ll need to print out the coupon, fill in and mail it to them. They will credit the rebate back to your credit card, which takes another 3 weeks or so. A quite lengthy process I would say.

Hurry up! Promotions end on 28 Feb 2007.