Lost my Airbnb virginity

Lost my Airbnb virginity this week during a work trip to Malacca, Malaysia, where I was involved in a film production. Malacca is a city where the hotel market is still in its infancy. There were no Hilton, Marriott or SPG properties in Malacca at all, which was rather shocking, considering they have a combined footprint of over 10,300 hotels worldwide. There was a Novotel, an Ibis, a Holiday Inn and a Ramada though, but none of them could fit the 16-man crew we had, as we needed a common area at night to plan for the shoot the next day (unless of course we got the presidential suite which was way out of our budget), hence we had to settle for an AirBnb apartment.

The AirBnb options in Malacca that could fit 16 people could be counted with a single hand, and so I just chose the one that looked the nicest from pictures. One habit I have before booking hotels would be to scroll through the pictures uploaded by travelers of that particular property on TripAdvisor, but with AirBnb, I did not get that luxury. In fact there was no information I could find with regards to the property at all other than a few reviews left by past travelers. Given no choice, I had to take the blind leap of faith and book the apartment.

The apartment turned out not too bad after all. It looked exactly like the pictures, so there was no false advertising there.

It was definitely not as fancy as Beyonce’s mansion during the Superbowls but it was no frills.

There were a total of 7 rooms on 3 levels with 1 or 2 queen-sized beds in each room. Nothing special. Toiletries were not provided so we had to get them ourselves. Towels were thin. Bed was soft. Air conditioning was decent. Overall a very unmemorable stay. I would liken it to a stay at a Quality Inn. Basic but liveable. Will I be back, definitely no. With the new Doubletree by Hilton Melaka opening next December, I will hold off whatever stays I need to make there till it opens.

Also during the stay I realised that Airbnb has become way too commercialised and is no longer what it claims to be - a platform where people can list their space and book unique accommodations around the world. In the welcome letter, there was the company logo of the organisation that owns the terraces, which I forgot to capture. The row of terraces that we stayed in was obviously bought over by an organisation who renovated all of them and marketed the accommodation as a "Home Stay". We have seen Airbnb evolve from something where people can make a little bit of money from their spare room, to something where people make real money from renting their houses, hotel style. I just feel like Airbnb monetized the whole home rental ecosystem. Back in the days when I was still couchsurfing, people willingly opened their houses to guests for free with the intention of exchanging cultures and letting tourist experience a country via a local's perspective. Nowadays it is so hard to Couchsurf because people would rather rent their spare rooms out. I am not thrashing Airbnb, because i believe there are still users who genuinely rent out their place because their believe is in line with Airbnb's, but generally the trend seems to be moving towards commercialisation. Well who am I to say, but if Airbnb fits your travelling pattern and budget then by all means.