I flew all the way from Kerala to Kolkata to conclude my India trip and end it with a bang by staying in a 5 star hotel.
I chose to stay at the Oberoi Grand hotel due to its prime location. As I was bedridden in Kerala for days with flu I had time to do a bit of research on Kolkata. I explored the city with Google Maps to find the general area that I'd want to stay and from there tried to decide which was the best hotel in that area.
Every time I say anything negative at all about a hotel in my videos I get a dozen comments saying "Why didn't you do research before you booked?" or "If you wanted luxury, you should have stayed in a 5 star hotel!!!!!"
Well, you bunch of self righteous nincompoops, you'll be glad to know that I checked on TripAdvisor and this 5-star hotel's rank based on traveler reviews is 6 out of 529 hotels, with a 5/5 average rating from 2,800 reviews.
Happy now? Well maybe you won't be because I still managed to have at least one thing to complain about. Nowhere is perfect. However I spent 3 nights in the hotel and overall had an excellent experience.
The bed was as comfortable as it could be and I enjoyed 3 nights of perfect sleep that were followed by delicious breakfast feasts. The buffet selection was a little bit on the small side relative to the size of the hotel but it really was a case of quality over quantity.
The hotel is a heritage property so there are some pros and cons that go with that. It's an obvious cliche but I have to say that "they don't make 'em like that anymore." If a hotel was built in 2020 it would be very different to one that was designed and built over 100 years ago. You have the chance to live inside a piece of history.
The downside to that is that they're not allowed to make any major changes to the building. Having a small en-suite bathroom may have been considered a luxury in the early 1900's but nowadays guests come to expect one of a decent size in a top hotel.
I paid ₹10,000 rupees per night (£104 GBP / $132 USD) for my room, which is actually pretty good value for staying in one of the best hotels in the center of a major city, with breakfast included.
There were balcony rooms available that look over the pool / courtyard area. It would have been nice to wake up to that view but they were around 15,000 per night, 50% more expensive. I couldn't justify paying 5,000 a night extra just for the luxury of a small balcony.
Overall I thoroughly enjoyed my stay at the Oberoi. The 5/5 rating it has earned on the review sites is deserved. What I liked most was how good the staff were. Everyone from the receptionist, to the housekeeper, to the pool boy, to the waiters, to the chefs showed the highest level of hospitality even when they were under the stress of being extremely busy.
The hotel has a policy of not encouraging the handing of tips to individual members of staff. This is perfect as it takes away a lot of awkward situations. Sometimes when staying in a low or medium standard hotel you don't know if the staff member is going out of their way to help you because they're expecting a tip in return or they're just genuinely showing you good hospitality.
In this hotel their policy was, if you felt that you wanted to, you could put some money in an envelope and leave it in a box at reception to be shared by all the hotel's staff. I left 3,000 which is 10% of what I paid for the 3 nights. It seemed appropriate to me. Maybe some Americans are reading this and are fuming "Tips should be 25% minimum!!!!" and maybe some other nationalities are reading this thinking that I was generous.
The point is I didn't have to worry about what anyone though of the amount I tipped or the fact that I did or didn't tip at all. Nobody saw how much I put in the envelope and nobody saw me put the envelope in the box. I just did what I thought was appropriate and gave it no further thought, until right now when I'm writing about it. :)
I only made another 2 videos in Kolkata. I had planned to use the last day to film 3 separate vlog ideas but it rained hard from morning until evening so I had to write them off or at least postpone them until my next trip to Kolkata. I guess that will be sometime in 2021 at the very earliest.
On the plus side, I think the 2 videos that I did make were awesome so let's just pretend that I went for quality over quantity. ;)
***** TIMESTAMPS *****
00:00 Luxury Hotel Strategy
01:24 Oberoi Grand Hotel
06:00 In-room Check-In
11:19 Room Tour (Likes / Dislikes)
17:33 Swimming Pool
20:21 Hotel Gym
21:55 Breakfast Buffet
41:20 Turndown Service
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