My freshman year of college, I got accepted to this Emerging Leaders program. I was going to school in Tallahassee, FL at the time, and the company flew me to NYC for this program. My ex-boyfriend was going to school in DC, so of course I was going to use this as an excuse to get to see him.
The company hosting the program paid for my flight/hotel for the duration of the program (Thursday-Saturday). The hotel was super nice and chic, and they paid for my dinner, Ubers, and everything — I was living the dream hahaha.
Instead of choosing a flight for Saturday night, I chose a flight for Sunday (which is to this day one of my favorite corporate trip hacks) and just had to pay for somewhere to sleep for the extra night. My ex-bf and I planned for him to come up for the night so we could hang out and explore NYC.
For the plan to work, I had to find somewhere for us to sleep Saturday night. So I found this nice private room Airbnb in Brooklyn? (I think). Honestly, I can’t even remember. I knew absolutely nothing about traveling or NYC at that point; but of course, I was looking for something not too expensive. It was close to an MTA station, and that’s all I really needed lol. It started off great, and then turned sideways very quickly.
The Airbnb self check-in was simple and easy. The apartment itself had 4 rooms on my floor that were all being used for Airbnb. Two of the four rooms weren’t occupied when I arrived and I was able to figure out which room was ours very easily. After my train ride and short half a mile walk with my luggage and business purse, I was a bit tired. I had some time to kill because his bus wasn’t scheduled to arrive until around 7:30pm (it was 5 at the time), so I laid down and rested until it was time to go meet him at the Megabus dropoff spot.
Quick side story for added context: My ex-bfs phone ended up dying on his way to NYC so I didn’t know his bus was delayed 🙄. He was supposed to text me when they got to a certain place so I could know when to go meet him. But he never texted me, and my calls were going straight to voicemail. I ended up leaving the airbnb around 7:30 and getting to the drop off area around 8. I see mad Megabuses pull up and unload, but he’s not on any of them smh so I start getting a bit worried. Finally around 10, his bus pulls up — and by this point I am EXTREMELY irritable.
He gets off the bus and I’m like “wth where have you been!? I’ve been calling you!” That’s when he tells me his phone died, his particular bus route was delayed, and the outlet by his seat wasn’t working. Mind you, Megabus was leaving from DC to NYC every 30 minutes; but apparently Megabus wouldn’t allow them to just get on a different bus 🙄 so they just had to wait hours until they’re scheduled bus showed up (if only I knew then what I know now about travel, but I digress). Me being me, y’all know I had a whole plan for what we were supposed to see that night. But after these shenanigans, I was cold, frustrated, and irritated — so we headed straight to the airbnb.
Before leaving the Airbnb to meet him, I grabbed the key on the nightstand and locked the door to our room (remember it was a shared floor with other guests). Rookie mistake: I didn’t double check to make sure that was the right key. So upon arrival back to the Airbnb, I found out IT WAS THE WRONG KEY!! (Irritability and frustration are rising...) The key that was on our night stand fit in the lock, but didn’t actually turn it. I thought I was tripping, so I had my ex-bf try... he couldn’t get it either. I don’t panic yet, I just decide to call the host and get this all figured out.
But plot twist: the host never answers. I literally call at least 40 times over the course of the night and NEVER get an answer. I texted the number, messaged them on Airbnb, and emailed them... nothing. Tbh, that was six years ago and I don’t think I ever got a response back from that host. An hour of calling and waiting and trying the key goes by, and now we’re both starving. We leave to get food, hoping that we would get an answer from the host on what to do by the time we came back... but still nothing.
Remember I said when I checked in earlier that day, there were two rooms open — the other one had bunk beds. It was now after midnight, and that other room was still wide open. I called the host a couple more times before we made the executive decision to just sleep in that room and deal with the key situation in the morning. And yes, all of my stuff was still locked in our actual room.
Finally we picked one of the bottom bunks and tried to rest. After being so amped up trying to get into the room, we both just needed to calm down a big before falling asleep. Everything wasn’t good, but at least we’re warm and could go to sleep... or so we thought.
At 2am, guess what happens? THE PEOPLE WHO ACTUALLY BOOKED THE BUNK BED ROOM SHOW UP. So they turn the lights on and are wondering WTH we are doing in their room. They are loud (probably drunk) and kind of aggressive, telling us we’re in their beds and we need to leave. 🤦🏾♀️🤦🏾♀️🤦🏾♀️ (I’m getting annoyed all over again while writing this blog post).
We get up, put our clothes back on, and profusely apologize to them for being in their room. And just like that.. kicked out of the NYC Airbnb bunk bed room at 2am.
Ciao for now,
DejaTheExplorer ✨
P.S. If you’re wondering what happens next and where we actually end up sleeping, click here to subscribe to my blog to get early access to part two dropping later this week.