Marconi

The check-in directions sounded straightforward, but the parking address pointed to the other side of the street. We had to work out which gate to use from the photos, so it was misleading. The host had asked us to message ten minutes before arriving, which I did. When the gate wouldn’t open as the instructions said, I called and was rudely told I should have messaged earlier. I had, and the response felt pretentious. I’ve stayed in many places around the world and haven’t encountered a host this impolite before. Two people contacted us separately, so I’m not even sure who the actual host was. The room we got didn’t resemble any of the photos. We booked a “deluxe room,” but it was far from deluxe. It looked unfinished, as if renovation was still going on: door frames were missing, the bathroom door was a flimsy sliding panel, parts of the plaster walls hadn’t been painted near the bottom, and missing glaze had been filled with concrete. It was usable, but disgusting. There seemed to be a bathroom lock planned, with hardware fitted to the sliding door, but it didn’t work. The walls between apartments were thin plaster, so we heard everything from next door. The bathroom was right across from our bed, and we could hear the shower and toilet instead of sleeping peacefully. The listing also mentioned a seating area and terrace, but neither was in our room. It was packed with beds and had only one small piece of furniture with a TV. We were lucky not to have much luggage because there was nowhere to put it.