I finally freaked out today (in the confines of my own head). I'll rewind for a moment. I arrived Saturday night in Berlin, Germany at "David's Cozy Little Backpacker Hostel." aka the cheapest one I could find on hostelworld.com. I would be staying here the next three nights and it was by far the weirdest place I'd seen...ever. A host of norwegian 18 year old girls were quite the welcome wagon. They told us we had to go out with them and (in a seductive, creepy manner) that "...they'd never been out with American girls before." That, along with the staring and graze along my rear as one walked past me was my que to go to bed and take a raincheck! So here we are. Thus far, although I have experienced various unclean and disturbing circumstances on this trip, I have not yet allowed myself to be "high-maintenance." Well, today is the day where that all comes to an end.
I had to wait for the one and only shower in the hostel. I was sitting on the floor (not the cleanest move, but my standards are pretty low when I'm still half asleep). I held onto my towel for dear life. I knew that although I could handle more than the average girl, my towel touching this floor containing suspicious hairs and who knows what else would not be tolerable. It was my turn for the shower. This was a 4x4 room with a single shower, tiled floor and absolutely no ventilation. I had my reservations before entering the small room based on the quality and cleanliness of the "sink row" in the hallway and "wc" or bathroom in american terms.
The room had a mop (a dirty mop) placed in a bucket of water (also dirty) propped up in the corner. There also happened to be a shower curtain...a very uninviting shower curtain. My shower curtain in my home groses me out, and it is cleaned thoroughly on the weekly. This shower curtain was just not going to do. The shower backs up due to hair in the drain from various "David's Cozy Little Backpacker Hostel" inhabitants. There is a ledge where I am given no choice but to put my shower necessities. There is an old, dirty (just there to go along with the mop and bucket I suppose) sponge sharing this ledge with my shower parafenalia. Because of the lack of ventilation in this room, the door where I've hung my towel is soaked, perspiring actually. Sort of a parallel to me constantly being soaked and perspiring in Europe! The duration of my shower is about 4 minutes, skillfully manuvering (in shower shoes of course) without touching the curtain. I'm assuming nobody else touched the curtain either, leaving it unused and pulled to one side, causing the soaking wet tile floor. I'm all of 5'3" and...okay I just added an inch, I'm all of 5'2" and still I'm towering over the handheld shower head. Thanks to dancing and yoga classes every now and then, I consider myself a "bendy" person however I still cannot bend enough to submerge completely under the water to wash my pretty much dredded hair. So, mind over matter, I grab that handheld SOB and give my hair the shampooing it deserves. The trickiest part of the entire showering ordeal is washing my body. I'm tempted to avoid it altogether but since my body has been on a train for 5 hours, David's "cozy" couch where I ate my cheap dinner and on the questionable sheets I am sleeping on, even I can't bear to leave out this vital step of the showering process. So I use just my finger tips to open the ziplock bag (where I've been keeping my soap during my travels) and take out the bar of soap and pray to God I don't have a typical slippery soap + wet hand scenario. All is well. I even manage to wash off the bar and place it back in it's ziplock without the bag being filled with water (this can be quite the skill). I return the handheld shower head to its perch and lift my feet up and out of the little pool of backed up water that my 4 minute shower has created. As I sigh with relief in conquering this terrible, terrible shower, I see a sign posted on the perspiring wall.
Please wipe down the floor after using the shower room.
(My thought: With my one and only towel that I'm using for 6 weeks? I think not)
Clean out your hair in the drain for all other guests who shower after you.
(...I have no words...)
Next stop the Berlin zoo, where it's probably cleaner and smells better...
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