Asia City Hotel – Comfort With Limitations

Usually when I visited Istanbul I stayed in apartments. It was because of few reasons:

·        I didn't want to depend on any rules.

·         I needed oven, where I could cook my own food, from any products.

·     I wanted to wash my clothes by myself, in wash machine. After to iron and to wear it without waiting one day and one night.

However wih a time I changed my mind. I realized that in the hotel it is possible to feel even more relax than in the apartments. Cooking will take much time. Even shopping for products will take time since it is Istanbul: there it is difficult to find even place for parking (I keep silence about regular traffic on the road!). About wash machine, iron and other manipulations with my clothes... Yes, I had some doubts because of this point, but Asia City Hotel changed my mind. Since I stayed in this hotel more than 1 week, I required them to wash our clothes. I gave to the laundry service almost all dresses from my suitcase. After 4 hours I got cleaned and ironed clothes. I paid about 30 USD for this, and was praised.

Although Asia City Hotel has some negative moments for me it will always be a very-very special place. The reason I prefer to keep in secret…)

About location. Asia City Hotel is located in the Asian part of Istanbul, in Atasehir region. I couldn't find a race to the hotel long time: it was hidden between the narrow streets. Hotel has its own parking, but it's not underground parking.

In 5 minutes by walking from the hotel there is Esthetica clinic, Acibadem hospital. Very often patients from "Esthetica", which are specialized on hair transplantation, stay in Asia City Hotel. To find such visitors easily: they have black bandage on their heads, they are bald, and their skins on their heads are red (because of blooding).

Honeymoon suite. View from the window

Not so far from my hotel (10 minutes by car) was Palladium - huge and attractive Mall. I went there for shopping, for dinner, or just to watch around.

About rooms. Before making reservations I checked all rooms in Asia City Hotel. Besides honeymoon suite each kind of room can offer its visitors almost empty mini-bar (there were just 2 bottles of water), gel for the shower, shampoo, slippers. That's all. I couldn't find there conditioner for the hairs, lotion for the body, cotton swabs or cotton sticks. Honeymoon suite was the most attractive room in this hotel. It was located on the last (9th) floor of building. There it was possible to smoke, but conditioner system was bad. If there was a balcony, it would be much better for visitors, but, unfortunately, Asia City Hotel can't offer any rooms with balconies.

Round bed and round mirror on the ceiling gave honeymoon suite special sharm

I choose honeymoon suite because of Jacuzzi and mini-bar, which was full of cold non-alcohol drinks, and chocolate snakes. Jacuzzi was completed with 4 small bottles of blowing agent, which had nice aroma.

For that room I paid 130$ per one night. For Istanbul's hotels, which were in the Asian part, such price was normal.

The main limitation of the honeymoon suite is bad insulation. Every day I woke up at 7 a.m. because of terrible sounds from outside. The sound of a jackhammer in the morning was one of the reason, why I changed a hotel.

Just beside the bed was Jakuzzi, which was operating uncorrectly

About food. While making reservation I had two options: breakfast included or breakfast not included. I preferred first option. Menu for the morning meal was almost the same every day: three kinds of cheese, two kinds of salami, few kinds of bread, greenery, boiled eggs, and sweets. I didn't like their salami. It definitely was not fresh, but I could solve it by complaint to head chief. She welcomed me every morning in the dining room and asked about quality of food. Just she seemed so cheerful, that I didn't want make her sad...

On the left side from the reception dining room was located. I've never seen there lots of visitors in the morning. Maybe people prefered to eat in more attractive places. Or maybe they didn't like quality of products in Asia City Hotel...

Asia City Hotel also has a restaurant, which is located beside the reception. Food in this restaurant was tasty, but menu was not varied. In two days I tasted all dishes in that restaurant, and I got bored from the same food.

Restaurant in Asia City Hotel was also not popular between visitors. It is easy to understand from the picture

Not so far away from our hotel (10 minutes by car) there were two attractive restaurants: Foca and Cesme Dalyan. I organized dinner in those places. I liked Cesme Dalyan very much because of perfect service and incredible tasty octopus. Foca has more varied menu, but staff there were  not polite.

Time to eat ... Room service of Asia City Hotel

About alcohol. While my staying in Asia City Hotel there wasn't served alcohol, but it was allowed to drink it in the rooms. They didn't have license for selling alcohol drinks. Visitors could buy alcohol in the store, which is in 1 minute away from the building. However, that store worked till 10 p.m., since after that time in Turkey forbidden to sell alcohol to anyone. Sometimes such limitation of the hotel annoyed me very much.

To make comparison for different kinds of rooms in Asia City Hotel I also stayed in deluxe room. That room was so tiny, so uncomfortable after honeymoon suite, that I couldn't stay there more than one night. Generally speaking, Asia City Hotel is not a place, where people can find luxury rooms. I didn't like a behavior of administrator: very rude woman. However, guys on the reception, staff in restaurant were very cheerful, and all time tried to help me. Will I back to this hotel again? Just if honeymoon suite will be available, and when workers in the adjacent building will finish to make sound!