1 Nov 2006 (updated 1 Nov 2006 at 07:37 UTC)
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Perspective
I just spent a delightful weekend with slatepelican in
Montréal. We walked around in the ridiculously cold
and wet but
oh-so-Montréal weather, ate ridiculous quantities of
unbelievably
unhealthy food and saw some friends. So it was a great time.
But I found it a little odd being back. I remember when I
first visited
Montréal I thought it was such a big, modern city.
And of course
it still is a big, modern city. But after New York I feel
"dirty"
somehow, because the wonder was lost on me this time. Or if
not lost,
it was at least different. This time Montréal felt
like a small,
quaint town. Which is not really a bad thing; in some ways
that's what
Montréal's going for. But I was somewhat stunned with
my own
changing perception.
Nickel and Diming
In Montréal, slatepelican
and I stayed
in a fancy
hotel. The room was
very nice, and we enjoyed it a lot.
However, they charged ridiculously for lots of things.
Access to the
Internets, for example, would set you back $15 per day. The
bottles of
water in the room: $8.
Now I find myself in a somewhat less fancy (but still quite
nice) hotel
in Palo Alto. Fast Internet is included in the room, and the
bottled
water is free.
andukar and
I had a
similar experience in Seoul. We stayed at a hostel for a few
nights
and then moved to a fancy hotel. The hostel had free
Internet access,
lots of channels on TV (including a Starcraft channel!) and
a modest,
but free breakfast. The fancy hotel had neither free
Internet nor
free breakfast, and had a downright awful selection on TV.
Why is it that when you pay more for a place to stay, you
get less?
In both these cases it is true that the more expensive
option had
better location and better accomodation, but on the other
hand there
already is a price premium, so the nickel and diming seems
obnoxious.
Random (potentially NY-related) Tangent
Ok, what is it with the giant sunglasses, people? The
70s are
calling and asking if we got the memo that giant freakin'
glasses are
ugly. That is all.