Hostel Stories: Please don’t turn off the aircon

To some European or Western backpackers staying in hostels in Southeast Asia, we know you are all used to the cold weather in your countries with snow and all. So when you arrive here, you really enjoy the tropical climate.

The warm weather is something new to you, so you enjoy it, you savor it to the point that you’re beginning to love those sweat on your forehead.

You don’t usually use aircon right? the cold weather in your country is just enough or maybe too much.

Hostel Life

So when you’re sleeping in your hostel in a tropical region like Southeast Asia, you still yearn for the warmth. There’s probably one thing that you might want to do. You stand up, walk towards the aircon and turn it off.

You go back to your bed, and soundly sleep to your warm and tropical paradise.

But there is a problem, what if you have a local roommate? Or a Filipino traveler inside the same room? like me. 🙂

If having no aircon in a hostel with no window is okay for you, not for a Filipino traveler. We would die without aircon in that situation. Again, we would die. (Bold para intense hahaha!) It’s funny because of the exaggeration but there’s a bit of truth behind it.

One thing you must understand is being in the Philippines  doesn’t necessarily mean that we can stand heat, or we love it. Don’t you notice almost all establishments in the Philippines have aircon? The truth is, we hate the discomfort too much heat brings. We hate it so much that if we don’t have aircon at home we have 4 electric fans ready to give us enough air to lower down the temperature.

I am not here to generalize and stereotype. But staying in hostels in most of my travels, I have experienced a lot of times that a foreigner would turn off the aircon in the middle of the night. And, I almost died. Hahaha!

So please, I am begging you.

There’s a reason why the dorm or hostel room is enclosed and installed with aircon. The aircon has a purpose. Let it be. Let it perform its purpose and just use the blanket. Or maybe just put more clothes on. The clothes will balance it all.

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