some things in life really ARE free

Even if it's not on purpose. I booked a hostel for a weekend trip to Hangzhou for Rod and myself and when we got there and they showed us the room, they were literally putting the bed together right then and there. There were wood shavings on the floor and tarps on the other furniture; I'm pretty sure they had just finished building the room 30 minutes before we arrived.

When I'm traveling I try to be really easy going, more so than I try to in my every day life because I know that nothing ever happens the way you expect it to, and fighting against small changes can lead to lots of frustration. It's easier to just give in and ride the wave than try to swim opposite the tide. In this case, though, I was totally not feeling the barely-completed room so I asked to be moved to a smaller room if they had something available, which serendipitously led to me and Rod 2. Accidentally scoring a free night in a hostel.

They took us to a twin room and told us we'd need to check out the next morning and switch to another room because it was already booked for the following day. Ok, I thought, I can work with that compromise. Well, the next day when I went to the front desk to switch rooms, they told us not to worry about it...but we had only paid for one night! When we checked out on Sunday (after staying a total of two nights), they never asked for the payment on the second night so we totally scored a free night!

There's no such thing as a free lunch...but if your waiter happens to forget to charge you for something, I say consider it a gift from someone up above and roll with it. And leave a generous tip.