Hostels are a fine thing in theory, but…

Of all the things I’ve written about this old world of ours, and all the heat I’ve taken, sometimes for being wrong, sometimes for being right, I never thought I’d take one in the kisser for being unkind to the hostel “experience.”

I wrote last week that “Maybe (Coun. Donovan) Cavers genuinely enjoys staying at hostels. If so, he’s surely the only person I know who does.”

This brought a polite rebuke from Blair Acton, manager of the Squilax General Store and Hostel.

“I am sorry that you don’t know anyone who likes staying at hostels. It might be worth your while to expand your horizons.

“I know Kamloops has hostels for homeless but most hostels around the world are for travellers. At the hostel I work at, our guests vary from families, youth travellers, to retired.

“Many retirees enjoy hostels as it is a chance to meet other people and keep cost down (since there are kitchens at most hostels) if they are travelling for a few months.”

He wasn’t the only one.

“I always liked staying at hostels,” reporter Mike Youds informed me after reading my column.

“Did I ever tell you the story about the time a cockroach the size of a hockey puck chased me down the hallway at the Hong Kong Y hostel?” I offered.

Christina Mader likes hostels, too: “I have done so around the world for 30+ years. I do this because you meet such interesting people. Young and old,” she wrote in an email.

“Now that I am old, it is no longer because it is an inexpensive way to travel — in our senior years we can afford a hotel. In fact, if both my husband and I go there, the hostel cost is equal to a hotel stay.”

I agree hostels are a fine idea in theory, but here’s where I have a confession to make: I have a thing about sharing bathrooms with strangers.

When in “the room,” I like to be able to take my time. I don’t want to worry about a lineup out in the hallway, pacing and panicking. The reverse is also true.

We recently stayed at a lovely, remote B&B for a few days and had a great time, but shared a bathroom with four others — a married couple in one room and two brothers in another.

I spent much of our time there listening for the opening and closing of the bathroom door and planning my next sortie down the hall.

But the real reason for my phobia about hostels is the aforementioned cockroach. Many years ago, Syd and I were in Hong Kong and sweltering in our unconditioned room at the Y. One evening as I was emerging from the communal bathroom there he was — the roach from hell.

If you’ve heard me tell this one before, I apologize. Anyway, I leaped over the beast and ran down the hallway. It gave chase, making that terrifying clacking noise that they make.

In a panic, I yanked open the door to our room, rushed in, and slammed it shut.

“What is it!?” Syd said, thinking I must be escaping a serial killer.

“Cockroach!” I wheezed.

And Syd calmly took a towel and stuffed it under the crack in the door.

And now you know.