In the end, it was memorable only because I had to shift the dates, and got too tired to shift it a second time when it got affected by no dine-in rules. 

Traveloka were running a lot of promotions on a weekly basis to catch people who still have not utilized their $100..which was a smart move. People rushing to meet the deadline (although it eventually got extended). But in the end what they didn’t see coming was the outbreak suddenly losing control and so they had a lot of work to do to handle all the reschedulings, refunds and what not, precisely because they attracted a lot of customers during this period. 

So I was one of those who got enticed by the low prices. On one fine day when I managed to secure a club room at Oasia Downtown for just over $80, without even needing to utilize the $100, I thought I had won. 

Then a couple of weeks before my stay…well. You read what I had written above. 

In my mind, when there’s already so limited things that can be done on a city hotel staycation, no dine in and closure of club lounges to be confined in the hotel room made no sense so I wanted to reschedule it. Granted, the terms for the promotion meant that there were to be no rescheduling or refund but the platforms made an exception, so it’s either a refund or receive a voucher to be used at the particular hotel. I cancelled, received the voucher, and duly used it to rebook 2 months down the road..pretty safe, I thought. 

For a while it seemed so. Businesses reopened as planned, numbers came down…then suddenly another spike sent us back to P2HA, this time just one week before my planned stay. By then I got fed up and decided to just go for it because there doesn’t seem to be any guarantee that another reschedule won’t be met with similar issues. That, and me wanting a break. 

Slightly different to the last staycation is that I chose to check in on a Sunday and check out on a Monday, so took one day of leave. Which I needed to clear anyway. Didn’t try asking for early check in this time but decided to just show up early at 1230pm to see if they will let me in, which they did. I imagine rooms were not full coz people would have been rescheduling left right center. 

Service was brisk at best. Didn’t feel any love sigh, not that I tried very hard (for instance asking for upgrades) to begin with. Was informed on the happy hour arrangements, bookings for club level pool, and also ordering the next morning’s breakfast. Half tried to ask for two servings (since it’s free breakfast for two) but was denied unfortunately, sigh y’all really can’t be bothered to get into customers good books. Then off to the room I go. 

So I basically spent the whole afternoon lazing around in room, watching Olympics. Something I can easily do at home but let’s not go there hahaha. Until my pre-booked pool slot at 5pm. 

Pool rocks. First it’s an exclusive pool for club room guests only, then there’s only that many club room guests during this time so other than a couple (who left shortly after I came), I had the entire pool to myself. Not that I can swim but it’s still nice to splash around and try to float without having anybody around to judge lol. 

Back to room for happy hour. In normal times this would be in the club lounge with canapés served but now it’s a roving bar going room to room, and they will visit each room twice. Mine came at close to 7pm, which I snapped up snacks and their (very limited) assortment of hot food, and drinks of course.