I’ve always heard good things about hostels—how they are super fun, everyone is friendly and outgoing and you meet all these awesome travelers. So I was looking forward to staying in my first hostel while I visited Scotland. It was very cheap, near the center of the city and had great reviews, so I wasn’t worried at all. My friends and I arrived in Edinburgh, Scotland, and we navigated our way to our home for the next 24 hours. It looked quaint and the people at the front desk were really kind, so I thought we were off to a steady start. The concierge showed us to our rooms and gave us the grand tour of the kitchen, the one bathroom in the whole joint and the “chill room,” which consisted of two unbelievably comfy couches and a gigantic TV.

At this point, I was super pumped about it all. We had arrived in the beautiful city of Edinburgh and were paying less than 20 euros to stay in a pretty nice hostel. After the tour, my friends and I were getting changed in what we thought was our empty mixed dorm room, when we heard someone tossing and turning in their top bunk bed across the room. We were all startled, but then realized that it was just some woman sleeping in her bed, and so we went about our business. Suddenly, the woman jolts up and starts murmuring to herself—something about how she couldn’t believe she had dozed off, along with other gibberish. She proceeded to get out of bed and started talking to me and my friends, which is normal, you would think.

In this case, we were dealing with a very strange, possibly drugged-up woman who started grilling us about where we were from and what we were doing in Scotland, unconventional small talk stuff like that. She looked as though she had been using hard drugs for several years, and I started to get a little panicky. Eventually she left the room, and we didn’t see her again until later that night. Strangely enough, the next time we saw her was when we came back at midnight to find her in… my roommate’s bed. Huh? She obviously knew where her bed was located, since we had seen her in it several hours earlier.

I thought the worst was over until the next morning when she, once again, started grilling me and my friends. The worst part was that she was only staring at me when she was talking to “us,” and it was mad strange. She once again asked me what we were doing in Scotland and where we were from. She then proceeded to ask me what my name was, so I told her, “Chloe…” And then she asked what my last name was. At this point, I thought she was going to knife me or something, so I quickly answered “Jefferson.” All she said to that was, “Thank you.” (What the hell?!)

My friends and I felt a little creeped out for the rest of the day as we headed to Glasgow, Scotland. We prayed that our next hostel would be better than the last, which we assumed it would be since we were staying in the alleged “Best hostel in Glasgow.” I was confident that all would go smoothly, but this confidence was quickly shattered when we walked into our mixed dorm room to find nothing but an old man eating cottage cheese in his underwear. I think it’s safe to say that my outlook on hostels is forever tarnished, all thanks to two abnormal human beings. Thanks a lot, Scotland!