The Real Tales of a Housekeeper

1. The British Invasion

It was one of those brutal summer months in Canada and the hotel was hot and sticky. The air conditioner did nothing to stop the rising heat.

The hotel I work at has a pool with a water slide in it so, I've found, lots of people come around for that.

And man, the guests sometime drive me up a freaking wall. Before that moment I never wanted to scream at someone so much in my life.

Last summer, while I was in my first few months working as a housekeeper, we had a group of British guests come for a two-week stay and man were they hell.

There were seven of them in total occupying two rooms on either side of the elevators. One was a mother of two children and the other a mother of three.

I had heard from other staff just how bad their rooms were but when I first got my go of said rooms, what I saw I couldn't even imagine.

Garbage and toys were like an explosion throughout both rooms. The towels were stained with juice and so were the sheets. The carpets were ground in with food and dirt.

There were even times that the sheets were coloured on with marker. MARKER! And they were never stopped from doing it!

As a rule of thumb at my work, we are not allowed to touch a guests stuff at all. If we were caught doing so and a guest lost their items, I could only guess we would be donezo. Bye bye job for life.

So when I saw the duel beds filled with expensive toys and clothing, I stayed as far away as I could, even as I saw the stains. I wasn't aware of any exceptions.

Like I said, I was new at the time and when they got back from their outing my head was chewed off due to the stained sheets not being changed.

Of course, I could only smile and offer my apologies as I told them I would go back and change the orange stained sheets for them. In my mind I wanted to sass her right back. I feel sometimes I have the patience of a saint.

I was later told by a co-worker that if the sheets were stained I was in fact allowed to remove the guests items from the bed so I could gain access. In my opinion, that should still not be allowed. I don't want to be held responsible for the loss of an important item.

While in a separate room on the same day, the other of the two British mothers came out waving the extra glass I gave her for her child. She was angry, her voice carried across the halls of the floor, "WHO GAVE ME AN EXTRA CUP!" Sadly, I know I shouldn't have, but I ignored her. One chewing was enough for that day.

As I was cleaning the room I was currently in, another housekeeper told me she had been having a hard time not laughing at me as I dealt with the two British women.

I was so angry, I wanted to feed her to those women and call it a day.

This was not the only time I had gotten their rooms. The next day, I was given their rooms again.

I was dreading it, putting them off until last if I could help it so I could avoid becoming behind or maybe slip away as soon as I was done so if I so happened to make a mistake, I would be told by my boss and not by said guests.

But it could not be avoided. An hour into my shift, they requested my service. I finished the room I was doing and made my way to theirs with a fast-beating heart. I thought I knew what to expect, but this time it was worse.

The handprints of small children were smeared across every mirror in the room. Again, the sheets were drawn on in a blue marker. Crayons crushed along the floor with candy and the desk all stinky. There was even a small toy arrow stuck to the full body mirror pointed straight out.

I got to work, falling behind as I thought I would. Dodging luggage and toys and sour candies. The only upside to the room was that they had left the rooms with nothing on the beds. I wouldn't have to move anything.

As I should have the time before, I changed the sheets. I did my best in the rooms and I could only pray that nothing bad would come of that time.

Thankfully, nothing happened.

It was now Sunday, I had not been informed that their rooms had been transferred, so I thought when I saw the rooms as checkouts on my board we were finally rid of them. But I was dead wrong.

I cleaned the ever messy rooms of the two British families and struggled to remain ahead of my set goal time.

I was off to a good day after recovering from my earlier set back until I knocked on a guest's door.

And the first British mother opened up. On that day, I had their new rooms AND their old ones. I was shocked for a moment.

The mother did not look happy to see me. But what could I blame her, I was the newbie that messed up everything for her.

"Hello, would you like service for your room today?" I asked as I always do when talking to a guest. Polite and to the point.

She looked back at her room and towards me again, "No, I can clean my own room today. I just need sheets so I can change the bed."

Say what now! I was very surprised to hear that. I blinked before moving into action. I had still not learned the rooms by heart yet so I accidentally gave her queen sets instead of a king.

I was waiting for it to happen. The screaming the yelling at me, but it never came. Instead, she came out, with a snooty tone she told me the sheets didn't fit and I was quick to fix my mistake.

Relief filled my heart when her response wasn't as bad as I thought it would be and I was for sure in a good mood when her friend had refused service as well also only asking for sheets. (I might as well add their kids had wet the bed and they were too embarrassed to have me clean it... BONUS!)

And that was the last I saw of them as they finished their stay at the hotel until I was asked to help clean their room with another housekeeper. I was in commons that day so I was responsible to help with odd jobs.

The glass shower doors were covered head to toe in baby oil, broken inexpensive toys looked haunted as I went to work on the, again, very messy room.

This woman had left a lot of stuff behind. All of it was nothing of any value aside from the looney that was stuck in the fold away bed.

I wasn't too pleased to learn that her friend had stayed behind for an extra day with a husband that appeared from nowhere. Again, I was fortunate enough not to have to deal with their room as a checkout.

A year later, I learned that their staying at the hotel was a yearly thing. Coming in the summer, staying a few weeks and wreaking havoc the whole time.

It didn't take too long before they were finally banned from coming back. Nobody wanted to do it anymore.

This news was the highlight of a very boring and tiring day.