Hostel Environments in New York

Here is an article from the Washington Post about four New York hostels. While not terribly informative, it’s an interesting opinion piece about the hostels that the author visited. I think it also demonstrates the popular stigma that is still attached to hostels for so many people.

Some places received rave reviews:

Exploring the hostel, I discovered a basement theater with sofa seating where local comedians perform several times a week. The nearby kitchen, bustling with a dozen people, featured eight stoves and cafeteria seating. Most hostels have kitchens, but I'd never seen one this grand.

The author’s experiences at other hostels were less than stellar:

Finally fed up, I left the room to shower. The bathroom near my dorm was occupied, so I went to another. I flicked the switch, but no lights came on. Hmm. A large window let in enough natural light, so the extinct bulb wasn't a problem. But the shower had no handle. Hmm. I went upstairs to a vacant bathroom, where I couldn't get any hot water. Hmm. I proceeded to another very dark bathroom, with no window, and flicked the switch. No light. Arrgh.

While the point of the article was to shed a positive light on hostels in general, I can’t say that this was my favorite piece on the subject. I’m sure that the final lines were intended to be humorous, but they emphasize how far we still have to go in our fight to improve the image of hostels in the public eye.

Standing in line to get in, I chatted with two jazz students from New Jersey and mentioned why I was in town. Well, as it happened, they were planning a trip to New Orleans and were going to try out the hostel thing. Did I have any tips?

"Watch out for the bedbugs!" I quipped.

Ugh, they said.

"I'm just kidding. Hostels are always clean," I assured them. "They're much better than you think."

As I can attest.

Even when trying to dispel a misconception, the idea is reaffirmed: hostels = bedbugs.