To stay at conference hotel alone

[norfolkbroads]

In a few weeks I am going to a conference/weekend event related to a hobby of mine. It's just over an hour away from where I live with my parents (I'm early 20s) while I'm saving to move out. The event lasts a couple of days and I had originally planned to drive back and forth each day. However, I have now booked a single room in a hotel near to the conference venue as I got a good deal and not having to travel will enable me to get more from the conference.

AIBU to consider staying there alone? I have friends who will also be attending the conference, so I will be with them during it, but they will not be staying with me at the hotel for the two nights. My parents are still pretty involved in what I'm up to (a slight bone of contention on my part!) but I haven't told them about my plans yet as I am worried they will be anxious about it and try to discourage me. The hotel is in a safe area and has good reviews online.

I sit corrected. Comfortably. In a nice hotel bar. With a glass of wine and a book. 😁

I enjoy going to conferences on my own. The evenings are my chance for "me time", I don't have to make conversation at meals, and it just makes a change from home routines. As for the advice not to go into hotel restaurants on your own, nonsense. Take a book with you to read while you wait for your meal, relax and enjoy it.

What? Women are travelling without chaperones now?

Anyone would think this is 2022!

If any of you travel experts really spent much time in the corporate world you’d know that the advice I offer is out there. Some of it may be geared to outside the UK but it’s still common sense to have your wits about you, especially if you are only 22. If you choose not to follow it, that’s fine, but I prefer to be more proactive.

Cue a gazillion more personal anecdotes about “how I travelled sole across China barefoot aged 12 and I was OK”. All of which are meaningless from a statistical perspective - of course you were OK, the ones that weren’t are not posting on MN.

Nobody is arguing against having your wits about you. That is common sense. The measures that you have suggested go far beyond that and park themselves firmly in life limiting paranoia.

You’re the one purporting to be an expert in what is standard corporate practice (based on your own anecdotal individual experience and clear paranoia). As you’ve brought up stats, do please share these stats that back up anything you’ve said.

• Show evidence that what you’ve stated is standard advice. This will require multiple sources, from multiple organisations stating this. However, as it’s ‘standard’, you should be able to locate several with ease.
• Provide stats on women being assaulted in hotel parking lots/restaurants in the U.K.
• Provide stats on women’s hotel rooms being broken into (or, better yet, said break ins being foiled by trusty plastic wedges).

Do please provide some basis for your assertions. We’re all very interested.

Calm down dear, you’re not my boss…but since you ask

www.newsandstar.co.uk/news/16758314.police-appeal-after-serious-sexual-assault-in-car-park/

www.gazetteandherald.co.uk/news/7369267.car-park-assault/

www.gazetteandherald.co.uk/news/7369267.car-park-assault/

That took about 5 seconds. I’ll leave you to google solo travel advice for women and hotels. What’s going on in this thread is so sad. Most of you are so desperate to pretend there is no danger that you are giving a young woman advice that could compromise her safety, presumably based on how you would like it to be.

Be more responsible.

And just in case you didn’t think this was really a thing…

www.amazon.com/Stopper-Traveling-Security-Stoppers-Safety/dp/B08JTXNPC1/ref=sr_1_3_sspa?keywords=hotel%2Bdoor%2Bwedge&qid=1653263157&sr=8-3-spons&spLa=ZW5jcnlwdGVkUXVhbGlmaWVyPUEzNjZVSVdRNzUyQkYzJmVuY3J5cHRlZElkPUEwMTc1NzM5MktMSjZTR1FJUldQWSZlbmNyeXB0ZWRBZElkPUEwNjk4MTE1MTlRTElGNTcwQlFURyZ3aWRnZXROYW1lPXNwX2F0ZiZhY3Rpb249Y2xpY2tSZWRpcmVjdCZkb05vdExvZ0NsaWNrPXRydWU&th=1

I’m perfectly calm, dear. The only hysterical person on this thread is you.

I didn’t ask for incidents - nobody is saying these things never happen, and nobody has said there are no dangers. I asked for stats. Statistics. You must know what those are, as you’re the one that brought them up. I also asked for evidence that, as you’ve claimed multiple times, your advice is ‘standard in the corporate world’.

So, where are your stats? Where is this evidence? If you don’t have any (as it doesn’t exist), perhaps you’re the one who should calm down. And be more responsible about attempting to spread hysteria.

No, this is exactly what hotels are for, and one reason that events are held in them.

Utterly mental. Don’t use the restaurant or the bar alone?

This is what happens when we let women work outside the home…

My staff, male and female often travel for business, and no, we’ve never offered such ludicrous advice to them while travelling in the first world.

I’ll offer advice on which bars are good, or restaurants, but have no intention of trying to induce paranoia in them.

Have another glass of Chardonnay sweetheart.

My workplace does suggest that employees (women or men) travelling alone may choose to take a door wedge IF travelling somewhere it may be necessary. I never have and afaik none of my colleagues have either.

I've never heard the other suggestions, and I wouldn't follow them if I had. Going to a hotel restaurant is very low risk. Why are some women so keen to limit the lives of other women by spreading fear like that?

Do it! It's very empowering!

You’ve never heard of not taking a ground floor room or being careful in poorly lit hotel car parks? Or being wary of men that you meet in a conference situation? Seriously?

I work for an organisation that seems to have a policy for every occasion. They have never dished out any advice about eating in our rooms or travelling with a rubber wedge. I have got to say I have been bothered once when eating dinner despite the fact I was browsing a technical textbook at the time time. I just ended up telling him I had a boyfriend and wasn't interested. Breakfast is probably easier if you are not used to eating on your own.

The one thing I do do in hotels is find where the fire exit is and make a special note of how to get there in the dark in an emergency ie turn left and about a 100 steps. It might be a little paranoid but it takes very little time and trouble to increase dramatically your chances of surviving a fire.

I do echo the advice about alcohol if you are not used to drinking - not that you have to drink of course. I myself had a one drink rule for work conferences. It ensured I went to bed early and alone. You may feel fine having drunk a certain amount of alcohol but within a few minutes you don't feel fine at all so be very slow drinking any alcohol if you are not used to it. Other people who are used to drinking will have more tolerance so never try to match them. I used to have a gin and tonic because I hated the taste so much I could make it last all evening.

I left home at 22 to live in a different city for work. My mother at 21 eloped to NZ to marry my dad. My son at 20 went round Asia with a friend and did things like skiing in Korea. I think you might need to cut the apron strings a bit.

No more so than in the rest of my life. Are hotel car parks more dangerous than all other car parks? Are men at conferences worse than men anywhere else?

I keep my wits about me, but I don't live my life avoiding all hotels, restaurants, bars, car parks, and all other venues where men may be.

Hotel car parks will usually be unfamiliar so yes more caution is warranted. Not ridiculous levels of caution, but be more alert than in a familiar area.

As for men at conferences, I think you must have led a sheltered life, not attended many of them or your comment was a joke. Men I have worked with viewed them as party time away from their significant other. What happens at the conference stays at the conference and all that, plus they are often in a group so they egg each other on. I’m in a male dominated industry and I’m aware of strip club visits (this is a given), escorts joining them in hotels often for group sex, blow jobs in hotel toilets, drunken encounters between colleagues or with people they just met, drug use, vomiting wherever. It goes on…I’m even aware of a delightful pair who booked three escorts each one after the other in adjoining rooms as some kind of sick dare to give them bragging rights.

My view was this was not my business but it did affect me and I left the industry. It also affected my views of safety in hotels, hopefully this context helps understanding of my advice. If you ladies think this doesn’t happen in a conference environment, please think again. Many of these were normal presenting men, mainly married who you would not look at twice normally.

Do you have my parents OP?

I'm sure mine thought I got stuck at 14, I wasn't allowed out past 11pm.

You know your parents better than anyone, what you are doing is fine, what you tell them, you decide.

Enjoy your stay.

@DontBlameMe79 sorry but that is not “standard advice” in the corporate world. I’ve also stayed on countless hotels alone for work. Never ever have any of those things been advised.

And please please please do not wedge a fire door shut (or open for that matter) ever ever ever. It is so dangerous.

Again, as someone used to living alone, I actually feel a lot safer knowing that someone (appropriate) can get in from outside if need be. What if I had a medical emergency or an accident and needed help but couldn’t unlock the door? As others have said, what if there’s a fire? In either case wedging the door could have disastrous consequences.