The Italian Hotel Room

Now that I’m home from Italy, let me first tell you about my hotel room.  Since my sample size of Italian hotel rooms is now one, I can’t say for sure if any of these things are standard or not, but they seemed new and different to me!

Overall, perfectly comfortable, with a decidedly 70s/80s feel.  There wasn’t much of a view, but I could feel the trams rumbling past on the street around the corner.

Slightly Retro…

Nice bathroom, definitely not a Hampton Inn though!

Which One? My first bidet.

In perfect harmony with the slightly 70s/80s look of the room, mission control was situated bedside…

Don’t press the ejector button by accident!

I think by the third day I figured out at least the buttons on the right; the “Don’t Disturb” activates a red light on a small panel just outside the door in the corridor (which I should have used the first morning when the maid walked in on me in the bathroom).  The middle button appears to be a picture of a maid, so perhaps that is a different light to say “please clean this room”?? (Astrid thinks it’s the “call a prostitute button” — but I didn’t test that theory!)  Finally, the third one at first appears to be locking the door, but it actually unlocks the door, for those too lazy to get up and walk the 5 feet from the bed to the door (there is a buzzer/doorbell in the hallway).

The up and down arrows operate the blinds (took my co-worker a sleepless night and some early-morning blind repair work to figure that one out), and the other two buttons turn all the lights in the room at once either on and off, which is quite convenient for sleeping time.

-Alex

A spot of sun

The sun came out for a brief period this afternoon, so I decided to take advantage and go on a walkabout.  I took the train to Waterloo (12 minutes exctly) and then walked up to the Thames River.  You can cross a large plaza and then be at the London Eye fairly quickly. Then passing the Aquarium and County Hall (museum), I crossed the bridge over to Parliament and Big Ben. It was a lovely walk. I felt a teensy bit like a tourist, but it’s pretty nice to know that I’m not one.  I live here!

Buon Giorno!

Greetings from Italy!  I’m about to head to work but I wanted to quickly post to check in.  Hopefully tonight or tomorrow I can post more details and some photos.

So far I’m finding Milan quite nice – the people are friendly, the food is amazing, and the city has charm, although it is a bit more realistic and gritty than oh-so-quaint London (which can be a good thing!).

Yesterday was an exhausting work day – starting with breakfast with my co-worker at 8:30am and not ending until I returned to my room at 9:15pm – with 10am to 8:30pm spent with our clients.  A long day of trying to understand Italian and heavily accented English really takes the wind out of you!

Ciao!
Alex