Ambiance Caliente

So I went skiing last week. No need to tell you how great it was, ‘cos you probably don’t care and this blog is all about moaning and not about the good stuff that happens to me. So let’s focus on the tough times...

As you may have read below, I went skiing for a week with 5 healthy people. We bought our trip through a French organization for (turned out to be) sporty Yuppies who are eager to give up on their comfort for a week and play tough in the snow. I didn’t know about that part though. Luckily nor did my fellow travellers who are as urban as I am and as little prone to “the return to nature” as I am. Good thing.

So when you get to the hotel after a long night bus ride (I was unaware of that part too when I booked the trip), the least you expect is a warm room, a hot shower, a TV and mini-bar. Right?

Well, forget it, ‘cos we’re talking sports dictatorship here. I hadn’t realized I had paid a lot of money to actually get tortured, smile and be thankful.

The scenery around the hotel was awesome, fresh snow and perfect sunshine. But again, no need to expand on that.

The first piece of good news: The gas-heating system didn’t work. Evidently the first thing you’d do is to ask to talk to the manager to find out when the problem would be fixed and logically, how many free drinks you’d get at the bar while waiting for the radiators to start working again. That’s what Barbie-Baby (see below for explanation) and yours truly did.

When you intend to complain about something and if the manager you’re aiming the complaint at is a 55 year-old laconic wart-face mountain dweller, always bring your gorgeous Barbie-Baby friend and she’ll turn him into the most helpful example of customer service. Barbie-Baby’s charm didn’t work on Wart-Face and we were kindly reminded that the main objective of this association was sporting and fresh air and not Hilton-comfort for Parisian sissies.
We were not happy.


Not happy.

So we went skiing. That was good but again, no need to ramble about positive things.

When we came back from our skiing adventures, we were welcomed by a flip-chart in the lobby saying: "The heating system doesn’t work and there’s no hot water. We are not going to be able to fix it for a few days and you’re all going to have to enjoy refreshing ice-cold showers.” With lots of smileys around on the piece of paper.

In order to calm down from these emotions, I needed to light a cigarette at the bar to recover from the shock. At the bar, I started moaning with one of the other tourists who replied that a cold shower had never hurt anyone. That’s when the fire drill went on and I got yelled at by the bar-tender who kindly reminded me that this place was for non-smoking sporty people and not for spoiled Parisian junkies.

I smiled at the bar-tender, whose nice suntan made him look like chewable caramel eye-candy (but definitely no need to be too positive, especially not now) but the analogy I made then between this place and Guantanamo was not very popular.

That took the cake. We decided to call the head-office of the company in Paris in order to complain.
We called the Head-Office

The place was getting colder and colder. I hadn’t taken a shower since I arrived. However when I felt through the cigarette smoke that my armpits smelt of the scent of a porn club’s back room in the summer time, I decided I should take it upon myself and have a shower anyway.

Have you ever taken a shower with water close to freezing temperature in a minus 20 degree environment? Have you ever been so close to having a heart-attack that you just think you’ve just been crashed by a giant iceberg as, for a few seconds, you stop breathing? Well, you get the picture.

The head-office in Paris told us that they had no idea this was happening and that they were going to get in touch with the hotel manager at once. So apparently nobody else from the hotel had complained and either they were really enjoying the cold showers or they were happily bathing in their own after-ski sweat.

Then we went skiing again. Skiing in front of the Mont-Blanc everyday was amazing, having coffee in the afternoon sun was exquisite and skiing down almost empty pistes (off-season) was just the best. But I’m getting carried away here and you may start thinking that I actually enjoyed it all…

The hotel manager didn’t get back to us, the receptionist did. She was in tears saying that she was so stressed out and couldn’t sleep at night because of this gas problem (couldn’t help laughing a bit there) plus we had been so naughty and called the head-office so now the whole local team (hated our guts and was going to make us pay for that) was very worried and concerned.

We finally got our free drinks in small plastic cups. The heat and the hot water came back 2 days later and we could start enjoying the rest of our trip. Went skiing. Lots of sweat. 2 kilos of sweat went away everyday. 3 kilos were added back every night by the delicious cheese-fondues and fine Savoy wines we pigged out on.

Oh and I forgot to mention the Evening entertainment! We had also chosen that trip for the “Ambiance Caliente” promised on the brochure. Ambiance Caliente, in Alpine French, apparently means putting a cheesy looking entertainer on a stage who tells lots of jokes about women being stupider than men and gay men taking it in the ass all the time (“ouch ha ha ha”). That was very funny. Even funnier was the feedback we all left about the “entertainer” on the end of week’s customer survey.

And finally, some more pics that were taken throughout our trip in order to make the whole thing a bit more glamorous. As you can see in all of these pics, I really DIDN'T have a good time!