Mark K.
Yelp
This week's adventure brought me back to one of my favorite cities on the planet-Tokyo-hosting a bunch of fantastic people from our distributor partners in China. It's that time of the year again where I start to build my Hilton nights back up to Diamond Status for next year, and I thought what better place to get that started than three days at the Hilton in Shinjuku. I mean it's a Hilton hotel first off, add to that it's in Shinjuku which is probably one of the most expensive places to exist in this already swanky city, so what could go wrong?
Well whether,it lies in the training (which is a total disappointment but likely) or in potentially the engineering or architecture, there were a few things that went wrong that a Hilton in this location and of this caliber should never happen.
I booked my room through my Hilton app, and wasn't expecting anything fancy because I did purchase a member priced room, so upon check-in, when I was offered with a smile, the option to switch my room to one of the upgraded two single beds from my king, I thanked the polite receptionist, and gratefully accepted.
My room was on the ninth floor, which was not a problem at all, clean and upgraded, With a very pretty bathroom, new carpet, and elegantly decorated even though the room was rather small. All the while, never regretting my decision to stay here, and looking forward to the next few days at this hotel.
Well, then night-one happened. It was about 10-11 PM at night and I could hear a father and mother barking at their kids in the next room, at least I hope they were kids. I could hear every drawer slam, every closet door slam, and they may not even have been slamming them. When they walked or stomped, I could hear The thumping even through my earplugs. I wasn't sure whether the thumping was coming from above, outside in the hall, or the rooms next-door, but good grief. Even then, in typical Japanese fashion, I GAMAN SURU'd (Japanese term for a culture of enduring-through) the first night thinking that maybe it was just one bad night. Needless to say I didn't get much sleep and was pretty tired the next day. The following night, a little of the same thing, strategically placed at points where I was just falling asleep. LOL. And still,I tried to GAMAN SURU. But today, I had an hour and a half where I was able to get back to my room around mid day, so I thought I'd catch a little nap being exhausted from the last two nights. And that's when the banging and slamming began in the next room. I had even put a do not disturb sign out on my door so that housekeeping would avoid coming in as I tried to catch at least one hour of peace to rest. Once I started hearing glasses being slammed on the table and drawers being slammed, That was it, I headed straight for the executive lounge to place a complaint and request a room change. They were very apologetic and said they would take care of it, so I told them to just call me when the room was ready and I headed back. As I reentered my room, I heard the next-door door open, so I poked my head out and it was none other than housekeeping who was slamming away in the other room. Did I forget to mention that there was also a locked door between the two rooms so I'm assuming this was one of those adjoining room type of things. Maybe that's why I could hear everything even more amplified.
My point is this, I am a Diamond member who spends tens of thousands of dollars into the Hilton hotel system and lives at least six months in them a year. I spent enough time in so many different Hilton Hotels that I have a very good comparison basis, and now throwing this hotel into that matrix, the Shinjuku Hilton is a disappointment and probably on the lower end of the spectrum.
The point is, if you have a Diamond Member, even if they paid a member price, the least you could do, is put him in a quiet spot where he would not be tormented, and then patronized in typical Japanese fashion after the mistake has already been committed.
It is my sincere hope that if the general manager reads this, they will send a reminder to their staff that Diamond Members should be protected from certain things like what I wrote about above.
What a sad day.
Boo.
Mark