After a few minutes of panic, we managed to book a flight for the next morning and also booked a room in Sheraton at Malpensa.
Relieved and relaxed, we went out for a good dinner at a restaurant near Cadorna which served Piacenza cuisine.
Apparently they drink wine with a ceramic ball, a bit like Japanese tea ceremony.
I had a dish with minced horse meat and polenta, after mixed salami and ham, both of which were very good.
It is exactly like the scene at the check-in desk at the airport.
Well it is worse, because the queue did not move at all.
We asked that if there is another place to check in for those already booked (majority of the people were sent by EasyJet which was cancelled at the last moment – here it is interesting that Lufthansa avoided the cost of the hotel for the passengers by deciding the cancellation early enough so that passengers should arrange the onward journey on their own).
The receptionists say that they did not have a moment to arrange the separate queues, but after a while another staff turned up and new queue was formed for the booked customers.
The space in front of the lifts is huge, which reminded me of Hotel Kiev in Moscow, though Sheraton’s ceiling was not as high.
We walked around but at first could not find any rooms.
By asking around, we found that guest rooms were all behind the heavy door which looks like an emergency exit.
It is a huge hotel with 400 some rooms, which means you have to walk quite a lot to get anywhere.
Finally we found the room 1109.
The room looks good, but cold.
We pressed the buttons of the heater and tried to close the curtain whose material is like some kind of metal.
And one part of the curtain fell off….Meanwhile the temperature of the room shows 13 degree and not going up very much.
We opened the tab for hot water, but it did not warm up.
There is a strange door on the ceiling which was designed to be kept slightly opened all the time and the very cold air was coming down from there.
We phoned and waited.
We went out to find someone and waited.
In the end a man came and said that we should wait in the bar so that he could find another room for us.
He said ‘ This hotel opened only two months ago and we still do not know what works and what does not’.
Well, after you know all, you should open the hotel, shouldn’t you.
Is this the way of the greedy American companies?
Also someone was complaining that the Internet was not working.
Of course the bar service was slow… by the time I was not expecting anything.
When my Limoncelo arrived, the man came back to say that we were given the upgraded room with breakfast.
Good.
Now it is like a game to fine how many faults I found in this hotel.
Finally we went to bed.
I saw one room cleaning woman went by so asked about this, but she did not know anything.
So we made myself a space at the end of the counter where some foods were displayed and drank cappuccino and had a croissant standing, well, that is the Italian way, isn’t it.
He said ‘Please write and complain to the directors, otherwise nothing will get better’, sounded rather sad and tired.
Actually both this man and the other receptionist last night looked sad and lonely, though in a certain fashionable way.
It can’t be a happy place to work here.
