Disclaimer: In Real Life is a platform for everyday people to share their experiences and voices. All articles are personal stories and do not necessarily echo In Real Life’s sentiments.
In a hotel, the employees are the ones who keep things moving, and the guests are the stars of the show.
Unfortunately, the guests who star in the stories, memories, and anecdotes of the employees are rarely there for a good reason, as these four curated tales from the back-of-the-house will reveal.
A Dead Serious Party Goer
I was the front desk officer for a large hotel in Subang Jaya, and we had a lot of guests staying with us who were partying it up at Sunway Lagoon.
It was a Saturday night, about 11:30pm, when the guest in question managed to stagger into our lobby. He seemed a little unsteady but waved off assistance and made his way to the lifts.
A few minutes later, we had team members on the 5th floor responding to a collapsed guest in the corridor. He received CPR, and security even had to shock him with the AED (Automatic External Defibrillator). We restarted his heart, and an ambulance took him to Subang Jaya Medical Centre.
I don’t know how the guest got out of the hospital, but he was back at the hotel barely an hour later, with his IV still in his arm! His friends were waiting for him, and he was treated like a king when he waltzed through the glass doors with a massive smile,
Stock image used for illustrative purposes.
He looked at his gathered friends and shouted, “Who wants some tequila?!”
His friends cheered him on, chanting, “BODY SHOTS! BODY SHOTS! BODY SHOTS!” as all ten of them piled out of the lobby and into several waiting Grab cars. Destination? Unknown.
They returned to the hotel in time for breakfast and checked out without incident. That guest was a dead serious party animal.
He Checked In To Die
I used to work the overnight shift at a boutique hotel in Damansara Uptown. We were a smaller property with 30 rooms just off the LDP. I thought nothing of it when a guy came in, paid cash for the night, and only had a small suitcase.
He was an elderly gentleman, his hair white and thinning, but he carried himself well.
His steps were measured, and his pace was slow. He also looked like he hadn’t slept properly in a few days. He was reticent, polite, and soft-spoken. He declined a room service breakfast and WI-FI.
Stock image used for illustrative purposes.
He was oddly focused on our housekeeping, repeatedly asking to confirm that we cleaned all of our rooms daily. I reassured him they were, but his booking was for just a one-night stay.
The night was quiet, and I went home when my shift ended. I only learned what happened the following evening: housekeeping had found him lying clothed on top of the mattress.
He had stripped the blankets, sheets, and pillows and folded everything neatly on the writing desk. He was lying on a blue plastic tarp he had brought with him.
“He had left a note on the table and a copy of his medical records: He had terminal cancer; his wife had passed a few years prior; and they had never had children”.
He had no siblings or other family members, and I was the last of his friends. He apologized to housekeeping and the “nice young man who helped me check in and showed me to my room.”
I don’t know why he was not in a hospital or getting any treatment besides some powerful painkillers – I don’t know if he overdosed on purpose. But what struck me was that he wanted to make sure that someone would find and bury him accordingly when he died. So he chose to die in a hotel room.
It was creepy but sad. No one should end their life like that.
Right Permit, Wrong Window!
A couple checked in for three days and were given a parking permit to display in their car window. We gave out the permits because the hotel only had three allocated parking spots and the lots were sold with advanced reservations.
Others have to park on the streets and display the permits so they don’t get parking tickets.
Stock image used for illustrative purposes.
On their second day, the wife came in, furious. She started complaining to the receptionist that she’d received a parking ticket and that the permit we had given wasn’t working. We asked if she had the permit. She did. We scanned the QR code and found that it was valid and working.
Our manager asked if they had displayed it in the window as instructed at check-in.
She said that, of course! She’d put it in the window as soon as she got to their room, overlooking the street. That’s when we realized she had displayed her parking permit in their room, not the car window.
I don’t have a husband.
I checked the guest at almost midnight as per her booking and was minding the front desk. A man walked into the hotel about an hour later and approached the desk.
He was asking about “Ms. Hilton”, who I had indeed checked in with a little earlier.
Something seemed strange to me, as I rechecked the booking details and saw that it was a confirmed booking for one pax only.
I asked the man to wait a few minutes, citing some ongoing system maintenance that would take me a few minutes to arrange a keycard for him.
Stock image used for illustrative purposes.
I went to the back office, called up to the guest’s room, and confirmed that she had NO IDEA who this guy was and that she wasn’t even married. I alerted security to detain him and called the police as well.
Stock image used for illustrative purposes.
The moment security walked into the lobby, he made like Usain Bolt and was out there. The police came, and I pulled the security footage for them. The guest identified the man as someone she had sat next to on the flight from KL to Langkawi.
The world we live in is unusual
There are some crazy people out there, and hospitality staff have no doubt seen more than their fair share of the craziness in the world. Here’s to a pleasant and peaceful stay at the next hotel you visit.
Know anyone with an exciting story to share? Drop us an email at hello@inreallife.my, and we may feature the tale!
For more stories like this, read:
10 Years Ago, We Made Contact With A Spirit On Halloween & It Ruined Our Lives
We Got Diagnosed With Breast Cancer In Our 20s & We Survived
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