Hotel-rooms/Don Rosa/Donald Duck/Jetlag/Laundry/Student-accommodation

[Christian Stubø]

--- "Neil Ward" <neilward at dircon.co.uk> skrev: 

[snip]

> So, my hotel is something else.  The Cher-themed room is covered in 
> leopard print: the walls, carpet, ceiling, lamp, shelves and table.  
> This is mixed with industrial sheet metal.  I'm really not sure what 
> this has to do with Cher Bono.  The bedsheet has cigarette burns in 
> it.  Is she a heavy smoker, perchance?  Can anyone explain???

I have had a number of strange accommodations in my time (including one site in Sweden
where the toilets did not have a roof - and it was a rainstorm at the time), but as far
as proper hotels go , the worst I've had was with a chain of hotels called Ibis.  

Ibis is apparently one of those companies which has all its hotels prefabricated in
modules at a central plant, and then has them shipped to the site.  The reason for my
believing this is that I have tried Hotel Ibis both in Augsburg, Germany, and in Paris,
France.  

The rooms are exactly identical in shape, layout and size - whether they have two beds or
four beds.  As a room with two beds is just adequate in size, you can imagine...  The
room is long and narrow (entrance at one of the short ends, window at the other short
end) and is two beds long, with the beds along one wall.  The bathroom is opposite the
bed nearest the window-end, and is one bed long.  Space between that bed and the bathroom
is just enough to open the 30in-door.

A room with four beds is exactly the same as one with two, except that it has two beds
hanging on the wall above the other two - if the rooms is leased out as a two-bed
bedroom, the beds can be folded up against the wall (like on a sleeping-carriage on the
railway).  On the trip, I found that with four people, each having a large suitcase and a
bag (we were on a three-week bandtrip), we had to choose between having people in bed and
luggage on floor, or vice-versa - there simply was not room for both.  This made for
complicated logistics when going to bed or getting out of bed (particularly if somebody
needed to use the bathroom during the night).

In general, on the band-trip, I got to experience many hotels (In Germany, Austria (where
our, and other rooms, were looted or attempted looted), Italy, Switzerland, France and
UK), though my favourites were Hotel Continental in Lugano, Switzerland (good service,
wonderful garden, easy access to the city, excellent view, good food, railroad nearby (I
am a rail-fan), and I could go on like this) and Regent's Palace Hotel in London.  

That hotel actually was primitive in some ways (the rooms did not have individual
bathrooms, just a sink), but still, I really liked it.  The rooms were very comfortable,
and access to the facilities was generally very easy, except trying to get a shower
during the morning rush.  For a shower or a bath, you called the desk and requested it,
and a porter would show up as soon as a bathroom or shower was ready, with towel and
washcloths. 

A good no. 3 was the hotel in Lausanne, Switzerland, but that city was incredibly steep!

> (It's so noisy here!!!) 

And I am convinced it is nothing in comparison with what a student-village (see below) is
like when there is a party in the works.

--- "Doreen" <nera at rconnect.com> skrev: 

> One of my heroes, Hugo Keno Don Rosa, is visiting Norway these days.
[snip]
> P.S.   Ever noticed the strange phenomenon that when Donald Duck
> wears clothes, he does not wear trousers (or any equivalent article
> of clothing), but if he is seen exiting a shower, he always has a
> towel around his waist?
> 
> Can you get an autograph of him on a DD cartoon?

When you wrote "DD cartoon" I thought you were making a reference to Draco Dormiens, by
Cassandra Claire, and I was most puzzled.  I worked it out eventually, however.  

No, I cannot get his autograph, as he is in Oslo, and I am in Lofoten - that is a
distance of quite a few hundred miles, and around US$1000.  A bit much for an autograph
on my budget, I'm afraid.  It is more expensive travelling within Norway on certain
stretches, than it is going to USA from Oslo.

--- "Heather" <aichambaye at yahoo.com> skrev: 

> I love this list too. It always makes me giggle. 
> 
> To wit:

[snip]

> "Pants vs Towel: Donald Duck in an Oslo Shower"

I do not believe there is canon proof that Donald Duck has in fact ever stayed ona hotel
in Oslo, also it is a fact that he did go to Norway during the fifties, on a wild
lemming-chase.  He has been observed in the shwoer in Duckburg, Calisota, however.  ;.)

[snip]

> Oh and. I tried Jaffa Cakes in England - they were icky, but I liked 
> Hob nobs and digestive biscuits. I think it was the sqishy orange bit 
> on the jaffa cakes.

They can be abit on the sweet side - that much is true.

--- "Doreen" <nera at rconnect.com> skrev: 
> Heather wrote:

[snip]

> Ugh! The question is, which way to most people feel is worse? 
> East, or West?"
> 
> 
> --This is what I meant, but somehow still managed to say it exactly 
> backwards. It is worst to go West than to go East.
> 
> Scott
> Who suprisingly enough doesn't have jet lag, but still can't manage 
> to think clearly.

In crossing time-zones, I found going East was worse than going West, though it is
probably because of the conditions.  I was an exchange-student in the academic year of
1993-94, and crossed seven time-zones on my way to Kentucky, though the actual difference
is only 6 hours.  I arrived at local time 10pm (my body's time 4am - I had left Norway at
10am, Norwegian time - the journey went from Oslo to Newark Airport, from Newark to
Detroit, from Detroit to Lexington).  On the way from the airport I was treated to my
first McDonald's-meal ever.  On the return-flight, I arrived in Oslo at ca. 9am local
time (3am according to my body).

--- "Amy Z" <aiz24 at hotmail.com> skrev:  
> > Heather, who left a lipstick in her jeans pocket and probably ruined 
> > about $500 worth of WHITE clothes in the dryer today, but is not 
> > panicking YET, because she is trying several methods to fix it, most 
> > notably two tubs of something called quite ominously "M-30."
> 
> Oh my.  Sounds like something that the Pentagon hid in your laundry 
> room.  I hope it works!
> 
> Bleach won't do the job?  I mean, I hate to suggest it because it's 
> such a horrible, deadly substance and should probably be banned by the 
> Geneva Convention, but I've never found a stain that could resist it. 
>  Or are your whites not totally white?
> 
> Amy Z
> Stepford Wife (yeah right--actually, the dirty dishes are going to 
> rise up and attack at any second)

My condolences to Heather re: the lipstick.  That M-30 did sound ominous - sounds more
like a rocket-launcher, or some sort of chemical or biological weapon, than a detergent
to me.  

The various replies to this had me thinking about the Laundromat at the student-village
where I used to live.  Yes, students in Norway do their own laundry - even male students.
 We don't have accommodation on campus, like American universities and colleges seem to
prefer, either.  The closest thing we have are student-villages, which are areas with
apartment-blocks built for students.  Each unit has a kitchen and a bathroom, and a
number of rooms (most often 3-5) let out individually.  No equivalent of dorm-parents. 
We do our own washing.  Generally the students live like flatmates, allocating work
between them.  This was most difficult the last year, when I had a Chinese student on my
section - brought up in a society where women do the housework.

The student-villages in Trondheim are owned by Studentsamskipnaden i Trondheim (SiT). 
Norway ahs a law that states that all students at universities and colleges are members
of their local samskipnad (student-union or -association), and the term-fee is paid to
the samskipnad, not the university.  The samskipnad runs student-villages, cafeterias,
bookstores, food-stores (generally, the universities and colleges give the local
samskipnad a monopoly on stores and cafeterias on campus), health-services (both mental
and physical health), day-care-centres (some students have children) and allocates
financial support to various student-organisations and -events.

***

Hmm...  I was just going to write a short reply to Doreen regarding Don Rosa, and look
what it turned into!

Best regards
Christian Stub
Captain-General of the mercenary fleet, which just boarded the good (?) ship S/S
Trelawney/Snape in search of illegal contraband (at the request of an undisclosed
customer).  We found a very large shipment of non-regulation crystal-balls, and more
importantly, we found illegal variants of incense, the effects of which had been further
increased with dubious potions.


______________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Organiser sammenkomsten p http://no.invites.yahoo.com