It was the legendary Victor Uwaifo, who famously used his song to advise that guitar boy, and perhaps anyone else: “if you see mammy water o,” to “never run away, never run away.” I surely won’t, if at any time I do come across any “mammy water.”
However, if you’re hoping to get away and spend a night or more in Peterborough or elsewhere for that matter, please run away from booking any ‘apartment facility’, except you’re happy for unpleasant surprises. Besides, don’t, in any attempt to be penny wise, become pound foolish like me.
As it turned out, as part of preparations for Mrs O and I to attend the golden jubilee birthday party of Temi, wife of a fellow old Igbobian, Dr Remi Karimu in Peterborough on the third Saturday of last month, yours truly checked out Booking.com and then paid for this particular ‘apartment’ for us to stay the night.
Despite seeing global brands of hotels, including: Holiday Inn and Radisson, I wanted to strike a bargain.
That made me settle for this apartment, which didn’t even come cheap at sixty quid, £60. The branded others ranged from around ninety quid to three figures. I thought saving a few bucks and coupled with, for the first time, staying in an apartment would be a home run.
Party day came and on arriving in Peterborough shortly after 3pm; we were hoping to unwind before heading to the venue. Of course, we needed to get to the said ‘apartment’ on Park Road. Firstly, on seeing the vicinity, Mrs O wasn’t impressed, even though it was around the city centre.
To make matters worse, it turns out it was going to be one of the buildings having a kebab shop, barbing saloon and things like that in its neighbourhood. Yours truly convinced her to not judge a book by its cover and that we should at least move closer and see our apartment.
Well, when we stepped into the narrow path separating the building from its noisy neighbours, I pressed the buzzer of the lousy apartment and even managed to poke one’s head in the backyard. That even told its story, as it had an uncovered refuse bin. That was after getting no response from inside the facility. We saw some of our neighbours loitering around as you would expect on a street with a hairdresser on a summer Saturday afternoon.
By then, I wasn’t surprised when Mrs O. said “I’m not staying here with you.” Long story short, we walked away and jumped in the back of a black cab, who then took us to Premier Inn North. Thankfully, the receptionist said there was a vacancy. It didn’t take forever logging to the group’s website and snapping up a room for the son of man and his wife to lay their heads.
We had time to shake off the dust of the apartment from the soles of our feet and unwind briefly before heading to join Temi and Remi Karimu and the party crew at the Cresset. We definitely lived happily ever after.
Guess what? Yours truly won’t be doing any apartment booking for the foreseeable future. Moreover, I would rather pay top dollar for known brands than try to save a few bucks.
Folks, as Uwaifo advised , “if you see mammy water o,” please “never run away.” But as earlier mentioned, do a runner when an apartment comes up in your search for a getaway night in Peterborough or elsewhere.
Tunde Oyedoyin is a London-based personal finance coach and founder of Money Intelligence Coaching Academy, a specialist academy of personal finance. He can be reached as follows: +447846089587 (WhatsApp only); E-mail: tu5oyed@gmail.com
