At the check in desk you have to sign some papers and give
them a credit card, even though everything is paid for they still want the card
for incidentals. You also have to sign agreeing to a $250 charge if you smoke
in the room. They gave us a paper listing all the things that are included with
the room because we are surgery patients. This includes, free wi-fi, two
bottles of water a day, three cups of broth a day, and popsicles.
After finishing up with the front desk we were escorted up
to our
room by a porter with our bags. We were on the fourth floor and in order for you to activate the elevator you have to have a room key (this would be an inconvenience for us
later). Arriving at our room the porter showed us around, told us that in order
for the lights to work we had to have the room key in a little box on the wall,
and set the air conditioner as cold as it would go. He unloaded our
luggage and we tipped him three dollars before he left.
Finally alone we were exhausted so we just stripped off and
hopped into our beds for a nap. Sometime during the afternoon Raul called, we
were still half asleep but the gist of the conversation was that he
would call us around noon the next day. We had managed a four hour nap and the
sun had set by the time we got ourselves motivated to do anything. Ally
decided she wanted to go in the pool so she changed and we went to hunt for it.
Going down to the main level we looked for any indication of
a pool and had no luck. Asking someone was fun because the people we asked
didn’t speak English and we don’t speak Spanish. After some pantomime we
finally figured out that you have to walk through the restaurant and down a
ways. It was uncomfortable walking into the restaurant, especially for Ally in
her swimsuit and cover-up, while people are eating and it was worse coming back
when she was wet.
The pool itself while small was really pretty and blue.
There were palm trees, large umbrellas and lounge chairs around the pool. I brought a book with me to read while
Ally was in the pool although the lighting wasn’t very good so I could barely
read. Ally went in and soon discovered that the pool wasn’t heated and was very
cold. She didn’t last in there very long and we were soon on our way back to
our room.
At our room we decided that we needed to start drinking more
and make sure to get in the chicken broth we are supposed to, so we go out our
sports drinks and broth. Looking up the location of the ice machine Ally left
to go got some for our drinks and returned quickly having discovered that our
room key would only activate our floor and the lobby in the elevator and there
was no way to get to the other floors that had ice on them. When we called the
front desk to inquire about getting to the other floors they just said that
they would have some ice sent up to our room and twenty minutes later it was
delivered.
Since we were using chicken broth we brought with us we had
to heat it up ourselves. There are no microwaves in the room and we couldn’t
ask the hotel to heat it for us because they have a “no outside food” rule. We ended up using the hotels in room coffee maker to heat it up. Washing out the pot we
poured in the broth, placed it on the heating element and turned it on. It took
a while but we got it heated and into mugs to drink. We both had a mug of
chicken broth and half a bottle of green sports drink each.
Surfing the television channels we were able to find about two that had some English programing on and we watched Criminal Minds and CSI:NY before calling it a night and going to sleep.
The next morning Ally insisted that we be up and dressed
early because housekeeping would be coming to do the rooms. We were up and
dressed by ten and she was in a panic because she thinks we should have been
ready by eight. They didn’t show up until half past two although they were very
fast and through. I requested that they put an extra comforter under my sheets
(Ally’s bed already had one) because the bed was as hard as a rock. It only
took two of them twenty minutes to do the complete room and we tipped them four
dollars.
By this time we were wondering what was going on as Raul
still hadn’t phoned like he was supposed to at noon and we had no idea how to
get a hold of anyone (Note: if you are going to a foreign country to do your
surgery make sure you have multiple contact numbers for people in the country).
We decided to email our patient coordinator Cathy (she is in the states) and
requested that she get a hold of Raul and tell him to contact us. She texted
him and he called us ten minutes later.
When he phoned he didn’t tell us why he didn’t phone when he told us he would. He just said that there is paperwork that we need to get and fill out for tomorrow and he would get someone to drop it off to us later. After we asked what time he was going to pick us up he had to phone someone and ask what time we needed to be there (this is something I think they should have already had figured out. They didn’t seem very organised to me.), and then phoned us back to tell us to meet him in the lobby at quarter to seven in the morning.
We then went to the pool and when we came back the paperwork had been slipped under our door with instructions to fill our and bring with us to the hospital.
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| Television and Mini Fridge |
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| Vanity and Bathroom Area |
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| In room Safe |
XOXO, Evie & Ally
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