English, or the lack of it and other Beijing, China Hotel/Accommodation Reviews

We just returned from a 3 week visit to Beijing. We stayed the entire 3 weeks at the Wangfujing Hotel. We had made the, as it turns out now, very naive assumption that this hotel would have at least ONE concierge who has a command of the English language, but we were wrong.

Every day was a new adventure in the use of sign language, 'Pidgen Chinese' and broken English with whomever was assigned to the concierge desk. In addition to having no one who could speak English intelligently, we found that the 'concierges' placed on duty were totally oblivious to such obvious things as bus schedules, locations of China Post mail boxes (we finally found out ourselves that there is one directly across the street from the hotel), and subway schedules.

You would think that an established hotel such as this one could spring for the extra yuan needed to hire someone fluent in English to handle the non-Chinese-speaking guests, but, sad to say, that is not the case. If they don't address this problem, they are going to have a terrible backlash from the 2008 Olympic visitors who will be left to fend for themselves if they stay at this hotel. If you aren't fluent in Mandarin, you might want to consider staying somewhere else during your visit to Beijing.

Also, forget about the so-called 'No Smoking' rooms. We were supposed to be on a 'No Smoking Floor', but every day we would see Chinese people on our hall, inside their rooms smoking, with their doors open (to get rid of the smoke, for God's sake), and the hotel administators just laughed at our complaints, as if to say, 'Don't you know that this No Smoking &^%$ is just a joke'.

Unique Qualities: Geographically speaking, one can't find a better located hotel in Beijing. Within walking distance of Wangfujing pedestrian zone, bus stops (but NOT subway stops), Forbidden City, National Art Museum of China, Oriental Plaza, and Tiananmen Square. It has some very dedicated employees, such as Kelly Bai and Ricky Cheng.

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Theme: Hotel
Comparison: more expensive than average
Prices: US$120-180  » Currency Converter
Phone: 861065221188
Address: 57 Wangfujing Avenue Beijing 100006