Hotel Opatov: you are my socialist nightmare!
Written: Sep 28 '01
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Product Rating:
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Pros: A marvel of socialist hospitality
Cons: which means that every sane person devoid of masochistic tendencies should stay clear
The Bottom Line: The next best thing to a real-life GULAG experience.
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| pprintz's Full Review: Prague |
I can still remember that fateful day in late November. Our family’s plans to spend the New Year’s Eve in beautiful Prague were about to fall through. “It’s hopeless,” our travel agent in Prague told me repeatedly. “I am telling you – every five-star, four-star, three-star, name your lucky star hotel, hostel and brothel is booked. What do you expect? People are here to celebrate the new millennium!” Soon my calls and emails went unanswered and we all but given up on the idea of sampling the reportedly digestible food on CSA, the Czech national airline. Before we had a chance to storm the airline’s offices to demand a refund of our plane tickets, I received the following email: “URGENT!! Due to last-minute cancellation, we have a SUITE available for you at Hotel Opatov, a modern three-star hotel in Prague close to city center and subway station. The room rate is only US $60/night. **Reply immediately!**”
Whew! We finally had a hotel room in Prague. And it was a SUITE for only US $60! A heterosexual male that I am, my emotions were running so high that I swear I would have hugged and kissed that travel agent guy from Prague given the chance. After all, he managed to dig up this fabulous deal for us at the very last moment. I wasted no time in finalizing our travel arrangements and very soon we were on our way to Prague.
Arrival at the airport... the customs... waiting in line at a currency exchange kiosk... These were our first exciting but stressful hours on Czech soil. At last we were in Prague!
Dazed by travel fatigue but eager to get to our hotel room, we exited the Opatov subway station which was probably the last stop on our subway line. Even at first glance it was apparent that we were nowhere near the city center and probably very far from it. The landscape around us consisted of open undeveloped fields, power lines, a busy highway and several large gray apartment buildings of like shape and size. As our senses were adjusting to the cultural shock of Czech suburbia, we asked for directions to our hotel. We were told that first we had to climb over a hill via several flights of icy stairs. Fully loaded with luggage, we were ill-prepared for this type of Alpine adventure and heartily congratulated each other upon safely reaching the plateau.
And there it was – Hotel Opatov! One could make no mistake about it. This tall, orange-colored cement structure was a standout among its gray surroundings. Exhausted, we rushed toward the hotel building. To our surprise, the check-in procedure was by far more grueling than going through passport control at the Czech border. The stone-faced hotel clerk scrupulously examined our passports and my credit card. We were then told to wait a few minutes until our SUITE got “cleaned up.” Before we were allowed to go upstairs, she advised us that they will keep our passports for “further review and notification of authorities”. As we dragged our bags to the elevator, we were contemplating the ominous meaning of those words. To our relief, we got our passports back the following day.
Duct tape holding down loose ends of the carpet and exposed piping were definitely in vogue among Hotel Opatov’s interior designers. As we walked into our SUITE, an odor of fresh paint was in the air. Holding our breath, we surveyed our Spartan accommodations. Two cots separated by a nightstand were glued to the wall. Looking at the narrow frame of my bed, I felt uneasy about the prospect of a nighttime rollover accident. A paper-thin mattress and pillows that felt like cement bags would of course ensure that sleep will be short and torturous. Other furnishings in our room included a desk and two stain-covered armchairs which have obviously seen better days. A SUITE is not a suite without another room to fool around in. The second room in our SUITE was absolutely empty except for a single cot without linens placed in its far end.
Taking a shower after a long trip was refreshing. However, mistaking shower gel for shampoo in our dimly lit bathroom – both of which we quite thoughtfully brought with us – was another bonding experience for members of my family. In the best of European traditions, the toilet apparatus was placed in a closet of its own, apart from the bathtub. Our SUITE was blessed with a toilet closet measuring roughly four square feet in size. Squatting down with your knees pressed hard against the back of the closet door, no one needed to worry about forgetting to lock it. Flushing the toilet became a daily exercise in futility.
Peeking outside our hotel window, one could not help feeling like an urban pervert. Directly across the street, some fifty feet away from us stood one of those gray apartment buildings. It was early in the evening as many of the building’s residents were coming home from work, turning on the lights in their tiny rooms and going about their daily chores. We stared at them with quiet fascination and they stared back at us, often getting the upper hand in this cross-cultural staredown by unilaterally drawing their curtains. This was especially true since the curtains in our SUITE were only big enough to cover about half of our window – really not that big of a deal as we quickly learned to pull the curtains from one side to the other, depending on which side of the room we were predominantly occupying at that particular time.
Having halfway addressed our privacy concerns, we next explored our entertainment options. Placed against an otherwise barren wall, the 15-inch Grundig COLOR TV set must be a big selling point for Hotel Opatov. Just about the only appliance of western make in our SUITE, Grundig became one of our most valued possessions. Despite our affection for this marvel of Western technology, it was hardly a source of any useful information. The four channels were either in Czech or German, neither of which we could speak, and the TV picture was way too blurry to figure out any of the weather forecast graphics on an evening news show.
Still guessing whether it will rain, snow or shine tomorrow, we headed down to the hotel lobby. I must confess that the trepidation with which we each time crossed the hotel’s doorstep can be best compared to what it must have felt like scaling the Berlin Wall in the old times. “Wait!” we heard someone shrieking from the direction of the reception desk as we made our way toward the exit. Cautiously we approached the hotel clerk. “Your keys!” sounded almost like an order. “You must surrender your keys before leaving the hotel.” We complied and offered our apologies for failing to inform ourselves about the hotel’s policies. “That’s ok,” the hotel clerk consoled us. “Everyone makes this mistake on their first day.” Right. We made sure never to make that “mistake” again or do anything else that might potentially offend our sensitive hotel staff.
Several days went by and, despite prohibitively cold winter temperatures, we made every effort to spend as much time as possible in the city, outdoors, anywhere far and away from our SUITE. Our stay at Hotel Opatov culminated in a banquet dinner on the New Year’s Eve. Having pre-paid $125 per head for the banquet tickets which were, incidentally, required with our reservation, we knew we had to go or we would never forgive ourselves for throwing away that much money for nothing. And a feast it was. For starters, we were offered sliced ham and some pickled vegetables. We had no say in choosing our entree dish and had to settle for pork loin, a chef’s special, which tasted a lot like turkey. There was some ultra sweet desert and to top it off we could each have a glass of red wine or champagne (with a strictly enforced one glass per person limit, of course).
With our stomachs still half-empty and our taste buds numbed by bland food, we anxiously awaited the commencement of the special “entertainment program” of the evening. After all, of not the food this must be where all our dollars went into, we reasoned with some reserved optimism. A band of pensioners were warming up the public with some accordion polka music. The band stopped playing when a middle-aged couple dressed in glittery silver clothes appeared on the impromptu stage. It was then announced that these were the winners of the 1987 national salsa dancing competition and were here for an exclusive performance for Hotel Opatov’s guests. Although obviously past their prime, the former champs gave it everything they had and barely avoided overturning a couple of dinner tables placed next to the stage. The sudden thrust moves left the pair gasping for air as the intoxicating Latin music fired up the crowd. A group of young men from Switzerland who had consumed more than their allotted amount of alcohol, were especially moved by this display of age-defying agility. They proceeded to lift a mini Christmas tree which stood in the center of the banquet hall off its base and engaged it in a provocative lambada dance of their own. The stone-faced hotel staff turned blue and spent the following ten minutes pleading with the fun-loving Swiss guests to let the Christmas tree go. At that point we decided that we had seen enough and went back to the city just in time to see the fireworks. We checked out the next day and flew home.
One of these days I may attempt to write a review about Prague itself as this fabulous city deserves every accolade imaginable. Until then you will hear me singing:
Oh, Hotel Opatov
You are my socialist nightmare!
Thee I shall not forget!
Oh no, I’ll never forget ya!
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www.bolero-tour.ru/images/pr_opatov2.jpg
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Recommended:
No
Best Time to Travel Here: Never
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Epinions.com ID:
pprintz
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Location: NYC
Reviews written: 5
Trusted by: 0 members
About Me:
27 yrs. | male
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