July 22: More crafts in Manchester

Friday 8 July

Chris, Linda, Rosemary, Trisha, Wendy 

Well for once I'm at a loss for words...

Where do I begin?

I think that I have to start on my short (well as short as it could be at school pick up time!) drive through Manchester from one side to the other. 

We could collect the keys from 3pm so I thought that I would get there earlyish and get organised before others started to arrive at about 4pm.

Off I went, thinking to myself how lovely it will be to see other schoolies and have a nice, relaxed evening of eating, drinking and catching up.  Little did I know how it would all unfold...

As I drove the last few hundred yards to the property I began to wonder where I was going as I seemed to be on the edge of an industrial estate with semi derelict buildings to one side and a high wall topped with barbed wire on the other.  'What have I done?' I thought 'What am I bringing them to??'

But this gave way to what seemed to be a small housing estate and the house was easy to spot - the house number and road name were on the four refuse bins in the front garden 😁

Undaunted I found the lock box, retrieved the key and let myself in.

I stood in the doorway trying to take in what I was seeing - which was lots of mess, lots of trash, dirty pots, food on the worktops and in the fridge.  So I checked the other rooms - unmade beds, dirty towels.. and so it went on. 

To say I was not happy was an understatement.

So i was straight onto my phone and calmly spoke to my airbnb contact Sakina - who it turns out was the house owner - to explain the situation.  She was profuse in her apologies and said that the cleaning team was on its way and that if they hadn't arrived in 10 minutes then I was to ring her back.

Have you had a bunch of men in here I asked.  Oh yes we have she replied - how did you know?  Contractors? I asked.  Yes she said. Hmm easy deduction I replied.

Fifteen minutes later I rang her back.  Slightly less calm.  They were on their way she assured me.  Well they'd better hurry up I said as I have friends coming from various parts of the country who will want to sit down and relax after their long drives in the heat - and they can't do that in this mess.  Just wait she said - they will soon be there.

I waited.  No one arrived except Rosemary who looked round in total disbelief.

Meanwhile Chris had arrived at the supermarket down the road and was sending me texts asking if we needed loo rolls and should she get ice cubes for the gins etc.  I couldn't even think about that so Rosemary went off to find Chris and apprise her of the situation - and buy whatever was needed.

In the next phone call I asked Sakina who else I could talk to about this as nothing was happening and she said she'd get me a phone number so I waited, and waited... and eventually put the phone down.  She then sent me a phone number by text with no explanation as to who it was.  I rang it.  A lady answered and I asked who she was in relation to the house.  The cleaning manager she replied.  Oh I said and launched into the story once again.  More apologies with her explaining that they'd had some cleans which had taken longer than usual that day so they were behind.  Not my problem I said.  She usually helped them when they were busy but her daughter had chicken pox so she couldn't leave the house she said.  Not my problem I replied. You need to sort this out and you need to do it now.  She quietly put the phone down on me.

Back to Sakina who apologised again and said she didn't know what to do and that the cleaners should be there - this was a full hour and a quarter after my original call.  Well they're not I said and I'm not happy.  I want a refund.  Oh how much would you like she said?  How much I said?  Silly question - if you're offering then ALL OF IT!!

It was probably at about this time that Chris, Rosemary and the cleaners arrived (my time line is a little hazy as I was busy roaring down the phone telling her to stop trying to talk over me 😂)  The cleaners said that the job hadn't even been on their list and that they had been called out.  

Sakina said that she would see what refund she could offer and I said that i would be getting in touch with airbnb. She suggested that we might like to go elsewhere - Do you have a suitable property I asked but of course she didn't.  Are you going to pay for six single rooms in a hotel then I asked.  Of course not she replied.  End of conversation.

By this time Chris and Rosemary had organised clean glasses which were suitably filled so we sat out in the sunshine by the bins 😁

The two cleaners did a sterling job - even washing all the plates in the cupboard and the cutlery in the drawers (more of that later 😒) and after nearly two hours we went in to inspect.  We decided that it was acceptable - all the beds had crisp, clean linen and everywhere was as tidy as it could be with even the cleaners agreeing with us that it was in a poor state.  It wasn't the Ritz and was definitely geared towards short stay workers but in one way it made it easier for us as we only wanted to craft so we didn't have to worry about making a mess.

My phone rang again.  'Hello' said a voice 'I'm Raoul from airbnb. I believe you might have a problem?'  Too right I replied 😒  So off we went again.  Turns out Sakina had phoned them (before I did lol).  To cut a long story short we were eventually offered a refund of 20% of our costs paid part from Sakina and part from airbnb.  We were happy with that - it wasn't really about the money but we just wanted someone to be accountable for the whole sorry mess. We'd heard three different stories about why the place hadn't been cleaned - the only one we believed was from the cleaners who said they'd been called out to do it.  But it was sorted and we could finally relax.

Trisha arrived so we settled down to eat, drink and catch up on the goss.  

We heated up our meals - chicken, lemon and tarragon chicken and veg - with similar for Linda but with tofu, all served with dauphinoise potatoes.   Lemon roulade for dessert. Yum!

Off we went to set the table only to find that there were only four forks.  FOUR FORKS in a house that was supposed to accommodate 14!!

We were resourceful though and we'd all been in the girl guides so we devised a spoon rota with Chris taking first turn 😊 

Our spirits had not been cowed by the lack of cutlery - in fact we found it very amusing and added it to the fast increasing list of items lost/missing/needed etc.  (No tea towels?? - more improvisation using a bath towel 😂)

We declared the drinks bar officially open and had a lovely evening.  Chris had a beautiful box of light-up christmas chocs which we enjoyed.

We wondered why we were feeling tired and were quite surprised to find that the time had shot round to 1.30am so off we went to bed.

Saturday 9 July

A leisurely up-get with Rosemary cooking us all a delicious breakfast - not sure whose turn it was on the spoon rota 😄

Then it was time to start some crafting.

The weather was hot and sunny so we decided to work outside - sensible really as there was only a small table in the kitchen/dining area - (not sure where the other 8 guests would have eaten if the place was full 😁)

Chris had bought her camping table so after a light (!) pruning of an unwieldy bush we were able to bring it in through the side entrance into the private back yard (complete with disused washing machine, bits of broken glass and beer glass full of cigarette butts).

The yard was big enough that we could ignore its shortcomings (Butt Alley, Washing Machine corner and Cracked Glass walkway)

.. and we had a lovely time in the sunshine with most of us doing beadwork and Linda trying her experimental gesso transfer printing.

We had a picnic lunch outside.  It really was very hot - even Rosemary was down to just two layers! - and we had to keep moving food and glue into the shade to keep them out of the fierce sun.

Rosemary opened a bottle of prosecco with a loud POP and we all went quiet half expecting to hear a siren responding to reports of a gun being fired 😟 

I'd just like to say at this point that although we made lots of jokes about the area that we'd found ourselves in - in actual fact it was pretty quiet with few people out and about and it was absolutely fine - we just like a bit of drama!!

Then it was back to more crafting.

Trisha had to go as she was off to a concert that evening - this is what she made..

It will look even more gorgeous in its deep box frame.

Rosemary made pieces using her mum's jewellery - a tree with a cameo in the centre as her mum loved cameos - and a bejewelled 40 for her ruby wedding anniversary..

Chris and I concentrated our efforts into making pieces for her local charity.  They give her many of the costume jewellery pieces that don't sell and she returns some of them as pictures that they CAN then sell. 

We were working on her Christmas collection - well apart from the owl.  Chris's pieces...

My efforts..

Linda had gone in a completely different direction to experiment with gesso transfers.  A slow process which then has to be rubbed very carefully but so very worth it for the wonderful results (I'm already thinking of how I can use it!)  How amazing do these pieces look..

We were all quite rightly pleased with what we'd done.

We eventually prepared our evening meal of a delicious meat and/or veggie chilli con carne with jackets and garlic bread - and a lovely starter of cheesy nachos.  We may only have been a small group but we still ate well - and frequently!

As we settled down to eat we realised that we were only four people as Trisha had gone - and that we could have a fork EACH. Hurrah!.

The thing was though that we'd been for a little walk and bought another four forks en route - just in case they were needed!

We decided to play games in the evening. Rosemary had two - the first one involved guessing the answer to four different clues and then trying to find the link between them.  We soon discovered that by the time we had listened to the fourth clue we had totally forgotten what the first one was (and if we'd guessed it) so it was an endless round of 'what was the third clue?' etc which would then eventually give us four words (if we knew all the answers) which we would parrot on repeat so that we didn't forget them again.  If we couldn't think of a link then we were given a clue - which sometimes helped and sometimes didn't 😕 

We decided that it would have been better with more of us as a team game where we could write things down and we ended up just reading out the questions and all guessing together.  But even that was fraught with problems as we spent ages puzzling over a clue that Linda gave us trying to think of a word for a detective that rhymed with malty (I think).  After a lot of head scratching and wrong answers Chris took the card from her, rolled her eyes, sighed deeply and said 'it says defective Linda - DEFECTIVE not DETECTIVE and the answer is FAULTY'!! 

We laughed like loons - and gave up to move on to the next game.

We could manage this one.  It was simple.  Everyone had a set of cards with the same colours.  All answers were colours so all you had to do was put down the card (or cards) which related to the question eg What colour is GO on a traffic light and you'd put your green card face down, then you'd see the answer and turn your card over to see if you'd got it right.  You gained points from the mistakes of others.  

Nice and straightforward for late on in the evening but even that game had some tricky answers.  For instance how many colours were on the fruit pastilles lollipop?  You are not told how many cards to put down and we all put the same four.  Clue: there were five!!

They were both silly games but we had a lot of fun with them.

I'm really not sure at what point I should mention the shower - of course we did not see this until we were actually in the cubicle.  i will say no more..

Sorry about that - we're a hardy bunch but we either went without showers or used the low pressure dribble of water in the upstairs bathroom.

Once again we didn't let it spoil things for us and we ignored the bad bits.  

Sunday 10 July

A breakfast of lovely scrambled eggs cooked by Rosemary before she had to shoot off home.  

Shortly after she'd gone Carole arrived so she only just missed her!  Carole had been in touch with Chris to see what we needed for lunch.  'And do you need forks?' she asked 😂

We sat down and had a lovely catch up chat with Carole.  And we sat some more.  Then some more - until we said ooh is it lunchtime?  So we adjourned outside to eat - all thoughts of crafting forgotten in the heat and humidity of the day.

We had all decided to leave at about 4pm so we did a bit of packing and sorting out and then all slumped back down again for a final cuppa - it was so hot that any movement resulted in instant fatigue and beads of sweat!

After a final tidy round (yes we did it but maybe not as thoroughly as we would do normally lol) and the usual grand 'emptying of the fridge' finale we locked the front door for the last time, got into our car ovens and set off on our journeys home.

We may not have had wine glasses, forks, tea towels, place mats, proper shower gels (we had one small individual size shampoo, the same in shower gel and a tiny, tiny soap in both bathrooms - for potentially 14 people), lots of power in the upstairs shower, missing knobs and stuck drawers etc, etc but despite the trials and tribulations of the first evening and all the minor inconveniences we'd still managed to have a great weekend with loads of fun and laughter.

The place had had decent reviews on airbnb (with a few saying it could be cleaner but nothing major) and had been quoted by several as being an ideal place for family gatherings (as long as they weren't bothered about being squashed like sardines onto one two seater and one three seater settees) and others saying it was great for groups (as long as you ate in shifts round the table big enough for 6 - on the 10 chairs!)  but this is all with the benefit of that wonderful thing called hindsight!

Once the refund was in the bank I wrote a review.  I was not kind..

You can leave a private review for the host offering suggestions for improvement...

There are many suggestions I could offer you Sakina but the main one would have to be to ensure that you can offer what has actually been specified on the booking.  To arrive at a house and find it FILTHY after having had contractors staying there for the week is totally unacceptable.  I know that you apologised and then told me that the cleaners would be there in 10 minutes but it took an hour and a quarter and several phone calls (being told different things each time) before they arrived.  Your cleaning manager (once I ascertained her role as you just sent me a phone number with no explanation as to who it was) told me a different story too so perhaps that is something else you need to investigate.  It is of no consequence to me that she was unable to help clean or that some of the prior cleans took longer than expected - not my problem and you should have measures that can be put in place for these situations. All I can say is that the cleaners Victor and Anna who arrived both worked very hard to do as good a job as they could under the circumstances.  You also need to check your 'fully equipped kitchen' as I can assure you that it is not - not even for 6 never mind the 12 or 14 (depending on which bit you read in your descriptions) - you need to correlate your info there.  If you are offering this house for groups or families then it needs to be fit for purpose - if I had known that your main business comes from contractors as it seems to then I would not have booked it.  Broken glass, cigarette butts and old washing machine in the yard renders it unsuitable for family use.  Or for a group who wish to socialise there.  I read some of the reviews before booking but perhaps I should have looked at them more closely to check out the 4.62 average that you claim as I find that surprisingly high.  But thank you for the refund - and I hope that you find some of my comments useful.  Regards, Wendy

Then I was able to write a general review...

I arrived at the house to find that it had not been cleaned!  It was not just a bit untidy but FILTHY as it had obviously been used by contractors over the previous days. After several phone calls, each promising that cleaners were on their way, and one and a quarter hours (by which time my friends had arrived to witness the squalor) two cleaners did arrive.  They worked quickly doing the best that they could under the circumstances.  We (a group of ladies in our 60s - not high maintenance) were happy that the beds now had clean, crisp linen.  The mess in and around the fridge had been sorted and thrown, every pot in the cupboard and all the cutlery had been washed, the carpets hoovered as much as they could be and disgusting messes cleaned up. We thought it was all ok.  We were wrong.

The house is advertised as suitable for 12 (or 14 depending on where you read) the table seats 6 (ok for us we were only 5 at the time) there were 10 chairs and one three seater and one two seater settee.

As for the fully equipped kitchen - there were only 4 forks - ONLY 4 FORKS!  No wine glasses just basic thick tumblers and again not a full set of them.  Same with most of the other things - no tea towels, or place mats for the table.  The fridge freezer was covered in dents where it looked as though it had been used with a dart board.  Broken glass, cigarette butts and broken washing machine in the yard.  All in all not a place for a family.

But the worst thing was the absolute grime and mould in the shower.  This was not evident until you were actually in there but it was quite sick making - once again I will say that the cleaners did what they could but it really was disgusting.

I could go on but basically this is a house for contractors or workers who need digs.  If I had known that then i certainly would not have booked it.

Oh by the way - we left a present - four more forks which we had to go out to buy. 

So that was it. Unfortunately I was not able to add pictures. I think that we will remember this schoolie trip for a long time - for all the wrong reasons 😂  

But one thing I know for certain - it won't put us off and we'll soon be out and about again..