Hidden Gem City Studio

I gave it two stars because the kitchen and washing machine were useful. Otherwise, the bathroom clearly hadn’t been cleaned in a long time. I had to clean the toilet as soon as we arrived, one shower door was missing so water splashed outside, and the owner’s solution was to leave a mop there. The bathroom fan didn’t work. The washing machine shook its way around the room during the spin cycle, and the stove had no ventilation. The apartment is in a built-up area people call the “screamed out” area, and the surroundings were dirty, with garbage, razor blades, and syringes lying around. The view from the window was of a construction site, which isn’t the owner’s fault, and a growing private “landfill” below it. Sounds came through the entrance door, from the hallway, and from the street. Around five in the morning, people in the building left for work and woke us; you could hear them on the stairs and cars on the street. The double bed had a smaller, springy mattress laid over it. It hurt my back and creaked so much that turning over woke me or the person beside me. I ended up sleeping on the mattress on the floor for about eight nights. When I moved the bed, I found a used condom, dead cockroaches, and bedbugs. I was too shocked to take a photo of the condom. Luckily we weren’t bitten, but there was pest spray in the line, so the owner knew about the problem. Without the kitchen and washing machine, I’d have given it one star.

A wonderful place.