Hostile Hostels

Okay, so that title really isn't true, but it was too perfect not to use. And we did stay in some pretty . . . um . . . interesting hostels in Scotland and Ireland. Regardless of the hostels themselves, sleeping in a room with random strangers is just kind of weird, and maybe just very slightly scary. A few nights the five of us had a room to ourselves, which was really nice. And usually the hostels themselves weren't too bad. One had dogs, the owner's pets, which of course made me very happy. A few had kitchens we could use. At some we got free breakfast.

However, there were also flat pillows, dirty walls and floors, and towels costing at least one pound. The craziest thing that happened at a hostel was when the police came to our room in the middle of the night. We always had all five of us, guys and girls, in the same room, because it was just easier, and seemed safer, to have all of us together. But one night there were no rooms with five free beds, so we had to split up. Us three girls were in a women-only room, which felt safe. But sometime after midnight two drunk French women came into the room, being noisy. I didn't actually wake up then, but I did when a loud Irish policeman came in.

Apparently the French ladies had taken a taxi, and the driver had accused them of not paying. The policeman wanted the money, but one of the women insisted she'd already paid, and both said they had no more money. The policeman argued with them, saying at one point, "You're bothering all these other people!" Finally he took one of the women away. Another lady staying in the room tried to help the other one; she ended up throwing up in the toilet before climbing into her bed, which was unfortunately right next to mine. A little while lady the other lady came back, crying.

During all this I'd been laying there with my eyes closed, just wanting to sleep since we had to get up at 5 the next morning to make it to the airport for our flight to Scotland. In the morning none of us actually got up on time, and Dan had to come knock on our door. All of this just goes to prove that sleeping in the same room as random strangers is never the greatest idea.