Chapter 11 "A day in the life of a hostel"

(I will now attempt to put myself into the mindset of a hostel and tell you about my day)

A hostel, in other words I, never sleeps. And even if I wanted to, I don’t believe it would be possible. If it weren’t for the never ending noise from the trams rolling and screeching by or the ticking of the pedestrian stop light all day (audible all the way into my tv-lounge) outside my doorstep, it would be because of my count- and restless guests.

My reception is open 24/7, meaning my door opens and falls shut at all hours of the day. If the rooms aren’t ready yet, I accommodate you, the waiting travelers, in the common room/kitchen, where you can sit around, get used to the sights, sounds and smells (!) of these four walls or catch some shut eye while waiting for former occupants to check out or the busy housekeepers to fix up the room. Once you’ve lugged your backpacks, suitcases, hand carries, camera and laptop bags, sleeping bags and tents, your roll of linen and yourself up the one, two or three flights of stairs and have located your humble abode along the hallways (and have a working key card, not always a given), you will find simple bunk beds, mattresses covered in slippery plastic, a blanket and a pillow. What more could you ask for? If you’re lucky, you might even find up to 6 of those bunks (meaning 12 beds) in that room. And if you’re really lucky, you’ll dive straight into an inhabited world of half empty backpacks, fully plugged sockets, dirty laundry piles, cups and glasses hidden under the bunks, wet towels draped over the only bunk left, bottles and junk food wrappers floating around not belonging to anyone and you will be greeted by a very “lived-in” scent, wafting towards you in welcome. You might be the one to live in a 4 bed dorm, shared a few nights with plastic-bag rustling Japanese girls or drunk, fried chicken munching Aussie party people. Or the only lucky lady in a 10 bed dorm filled with guys or a Dutch guy falling out of the bunk above you in his underwear at an ungodly hour in the morning. I’m just like a surprise goody bag; you pay for it and never know what you might end up getting.

During the day, if the weather is somewhat agreeable, it can get quite quiet in my hallways, because most of you want to make the most of your stay here in this city and are out tripping around. Breakfast takes place anytime between 6am and 3pm, and you manage to keep a steady flow of Wheetbix, toast and jam, tea or noodle soups going during these hours. But come evening and your skinny wallet has once again left you with no choice but my free pasta and the cheapest ready-made pasta sauce from Cole’s, you all come flocking into my heart – the kitchen. It is definitely the most alive, with people, with produce and with things I wish weren’t alive in there. You struggle to find a plate, a bowl, a pan, a pot – anything to boil some water in, anything to eat from and anything to scoop food into your mouth with. Forks are an endangered species in the depths of my sinks, so are cups with handles. Pots and pans that aren’t blackened and encrusted have sadly become extinct. But you can eat pasta (or steak) with a spoon, right? Of course. And do you really mind washing your tea cup with an oily pot-brush? Didn’t think so. In the end, it is actually all up to you anyways. Some of you, the more courteous lot, have read the signs my caring managers have put up about washing your own dishes and leaving behind a clean kitchen. I shun you others, yes you, you know I’m looking down at you right now, while you once again only dump your plate into the sink you have already clogged with pasta.

My evenings have me singing lullabies to you who work all day and go to bed by 7pm, keeping the more relaxed entertained in the TV room, the more thirsty happy with tetra pack wine in the common room and the more neon-diseased out of my rooms and on the city streets. By the time the latter decide to sway their way home and have found the right room and the right bed, the first alarm starts ringing (more often than not a couple of times before you start to budge) and the first cups of coffee are made.

You’ll be happy to hear that I have a few bathrooms on each floor. And I’m happy about the fact that they are never all functioning and open at the same time, because if I gave you all the chance to shower at the same time, my hot and cold water wouldn’t be able to handle the strain and I’d be freezing half an boiling the other half of you (then again, this already happens when two cabins next to each other are occupied). Ladies, on the first floor, there are some excellent modern shower stalls, where you can actually hang your towel and put down your clothes on a ledge and can avoid getting them wet. But as I can see, quite a few of you enjoy walking out of the shower only to bump into the half naked and towel clad barefoot guys brushing their teeth (or not). I’ve realized that on weekends, my bathrooms turn into the favorite place for quite a few of you – those who use it only to empty your bladder, consistently being filled by a slow (or not so slow) and steady stream of alcohol, those who empty their stomach contents thanks to the already mentioned stream, those who use it to roll up controlled substances, leaving crumbs all over the toilet seat (I must say, I find that quite unhygienic), and those who think that bathrooms are more private that dorm rooms and use it for a romantic getaway. Ah yes, weekends are definitely the most entertaining for me to watch over.

I hope I haven’t given you the wrong impression about my daily life, because, in the end, it is probably the most colorful and un-boring life one can lead. I meet more people in one week than hotel-travelers do in a month, I hear more exciting stories than a travel book publisher, I am more multicultural than anyone could ever be and I am more alive than you could ever imagine. I see beautiful smiles, connect random people and touch lives in appropriate and inappropriate places – how much better can it get?