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What about your trip?

Taiwan's cheap hotels

Practically everyone will have rested for the night at a cheap place in his or her own country that is in bad taste. However, for sheer kitsch, there is nothing to beat east Asia, especially Korea. That country, alas, is out of the scope of this article, so I will present readers with a description of a cheap hotel in Taiwan.

This hotel, named the Yushan after Taiwan's Jade Mountain, the highest peak in northeast Asia, is representative of a kind that abounds in that country, costing around NT1000 per night.

Like all such establishments, it sits on an unremarkable street no different from any other on that enchanted isle: two lanes wide, this thoroughfare has a place that sells jiaozi and other Chinese dumplings a few doors down from the hotel's inglorious entrance. Across the street is a "pastry" shop, and I am using scare quotes because Chinese ideas of what to put inside dough, which is itself often different in taste from what the reader is used to, are, well, different, too. A Vietnamese restaurant is a few meters further down from the dumpling outlet, and, of course, there's a McDonald's a few blocks away.

I did not expect anything special after so many sojourns in the inexpensive accommodations of the east, so the Yushan offered me no surprises. Besides the astonishingly cheap material of the door, the room itself welcomed me with its ambience of artificial wooden panelling over the bed, and wallpaper that could give a guest a mental illness.

To my left as I entered on that humid July day was a desk with no room for writing: a box of Kleenex, hot water pot, ashtray and sundry odds and ends all cluttered it. Beyond that was the large TV, which, like most cheap places in Taiwan, nonetheless gets cable; there is also a porn channel, to which I accidentally flicked with the remote, in case guests want to watch other people doing the activity for which they have checked in. To my right was a translucent, but opaque, window covered by an unnecessary dull green curtain, which, when both were slid back with some effort, revealed a vista of the concrete steps leading from the laundry room and the equally cheap apartment building behind.

Now to the bed--the bed! This is the most important element in any hotel room anywhere, and the Yushan, I am pleased to report, was perfectly consistent with the curtains and other furnishings. With a coverlet in a kind of medium red that had strange sequins adorning it, my double bed consisted of a semi-firm mattress, and, thankfully, clean sheets--at least to the naked eye.

Next to it was a sort of side table with a panel affixed to the wall from which you could and could not control the lights, which were all uniformly dim enough to prevent reading. The opaque shades of the bedside lamps, only one of which turned on, were positioned so that the bed was just out of the radius of their beams, such as they were; their tightly oval shape further restricted their ability to aid reading. The complimentary condom thoughtfully placed atop the light control panel further informed me that this establishment does not cater to people who wish to indulge even in map reading while staying there. The other lights in the room were in cavities in the ceiling, and, when I turned them on one at a time, created a semi-dark atmosphere that could hardly be described as romantic.

On to the bathroom. Like the bed, this is a crucial feature in any hotel. Although I did not in my circumstances require too much, I regret to report that, in the Yushan's room 301, it was worse than the bed. Other than the large, cheap, white tiles stuck on the walls, themselves no doubt made of high-quality concrete, the major object of interest here was the commode, which, strangely, was of rectangular construction, including the seat, making it just a little uncomfortable, and I am glad that I did not need to do so during my hours there. Indeed, one wonders whether color-blind, shape-shifting reptilians from outer space didn't design the entire room, and all the other budget hotel rooms in the orient as well.

The bathroom sink was tastefully fashioned from the same shade of rather clinical light blue as the can, whose strange seat and lid were of carefully designed, flimsy plastic. Over the sink was a wafer of glass instead of a shelf, offering free paper cups and inadequate toothbrushes in plastic packaging that included tiny tubes of inadequate toothpaste. Also included, just to add a touch of class, were plastic packets of scalp-stinging shampoo and tiny, round bars of soap. The hair dryer was attached to the wall, assuming the guest has any hair after using the shampoo. A plastic trashcan of another uncertain shade of red completed the effect.

The bathtub, without a shower curtain--certainly a superfluous indication of modesty in a room with a free prophylactic--was of a different hue from the other fixtures, doubtless for some aesthetic reason. For some functional or decorative purpose, there was an opening for a guest's foot near the olive green (?) floor tiles. The tub was just small enough to be awkward for soaking after a few hours of walking around in the humidity, and the hot water ran for a while, then ceased, just to shock the guest. Happily, since my visit was in July, there was no need for a water temperature above lukewarm. It was also fortunate that the aircon worked, but even measly, horny Taiwanese guests would insist on that. After all, cool air would be necessary for the use of a complimentary condom.

In summary, the Yushan's rooms are of a twisted, sub-mediocre quality that is uniform throughout the island. The management even charges NT1800 for them on weekends, which is hardly worth it. The yeogwan of Korea, which are even more likely to have been designed by strange extraterrestrials, and the hotels of the mainland for under 150 yuan per night, are similar. You have really missed something mind-bending if you have never passed the night in an oriental budget accommodation.

Sent by Hal Swindall (27-03-08)

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