Hospitality

Mum and I just returned from a weekend in Salzburg, where we stayed at a charming little family-run hotel for the 4th time. Both the young couple who owns it and their staff go out of their way to make guests feel at home and we will certainly be back. It's the little things that make all the difference. One of the things I like about this hotel is that you can help yourself to (a nice selection of good quality) tea or (very decent) coffee outside breakfast hours. Not terribly costly for the hotel, but much appreciated by guests who like a hot beverage when they return to their room (which does not have a kettle). We know how the psychology of hospitality works: people want the - perceived - best rate and are not willing to pay extra for things such as drinks or snacks on board of airlines. Raise the ticket price for 5 EUR and give them a cheap snack and they are happy and think they made a good deal. We want to feel "special" and like a valued guest.  Maybe I'll sell my precious insights as a seasoned online shopper ("buy one, get one free!", "spend X, get free shipping and a sample size of Y while stocks last!") and traveller ("get a free night for every 10 nights you book with us!") as some kind of hospitality industry consulting service when I'm retired...

 

Status Quo

Recently, a half-Iranian content creator, who had been asked why she did not comment more on current political events in Iran explained that she tried to be cautious in order not to cause relatives (even though they all lived abroad) any problems. Sad, but not surprising as you never know what totalitarian regimes are capable of and expect the worst of them. Speaking of totalitarian states, I noticed that I have been self-censoring by not asking any of the questions I am itching to ask my foreign-born friends who live the US. They have all legally lived there for years, decades even, are married to US citizens and some of them are citizens themselves, they pay taxes and have contributed to society not just by producing more tax payers and yet...you just never know and I do not want to cause them any problems for voicing their honest opinion. This caution on my part might be completely exaggerated on my part and it might even be considered tasteless to mention this in the same context as Iran, but to me it has been a shocking realisation that there seems to be little difference between a well-known "villain-state" you expect nothing but the worst of and another that in the not-so-distant past was the symbol for freedom and democracy, but now seems to be just as predictably unpredictable...

Snow Days

There's no doubt that I have long reached the age when you glorify everything in the distant past, such as childhood winters always being white with all types of winter sports being possible during the whole season. If I think about it a little harder, I do remember one particular ski week with school that began with most of us ruining the surface/wax layer of our skis because there was so little snow, until there was heavy snowfall on the fourth day or so. 

For what feels like decades it has been mostly like this: first snowfall in November or early December on a random week day when nobody has time for outdoor activities and/or ski resorts are still closed, followed by weeks of mild weather inevitably resulting in very little snow (in particular for the amount of hopeful skiers) on slopes despite artificial snow during the Christmas vacation. Then, just as everyone is settled back into work in the first or second week of January, the perfect amount of snow magically appears and you have your desired Winter Wonderland...for about 5 minutes until chaos breaks out in the city and car exhausts render it brown and slushy. There's only one conclusion unless global warming eliminates snow for good until then: provided I am fit enough as a retiree I won't have silly things like work commitments preventing me from heading to the ski lifts immediately on a random Wednesday when conditions are perfect and the won't be any crowds. Obviously, glorifying the future works just as fine for me...

What If.

 

I have never been a notorious risk-seeker, but recently I noticed I have become one of those OLD PERSONS I would have rolled my eyes at in my teens and twenties. One of those people who always thinks of the what ifs, even though she tries hard to keep most of them to herself. When I watch Highflyer's sons skiing, racing downhill at breakneck speed, not a care in the world, I inwardly flinch and think of all the things that could happen and that I know can actually happen. Recent horror stories of friends and friends of friends who had nasty accidents, some of them even fatal, while skiing or snowboarding don't help and my own accident that resulted in an injured knee has made me a lot more cautious and I know only too well that I am unfit and therefore more prone to injuries. Call me boring, but I don't really want to add to some statistic, nor do I want to end up in an operating theatre.