‘Mate, found this real deece looking place on Trivago for like 37 bucks a night!’ Ben Devere (22) had told his friend just three weeks prior, having done absolutely no research into what turned out to be an absolute shithole.

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It was just moments after entering the Grand Patel Hotel in Melbourne’s inner-west - located just a two minute walk from the local train station and a vast array of strip clubs - that Matthew Clare (21) came to the stark realisation that he’d just entered what he considered the dankest place on earth.

Having typically spent most of his holidays with Mum and Dad in, at the very least, 4-star establishments (with a buffet breakfast and wine list all too common a sight), this was a foreign landscape for the young aspiring lawyer.

So it came as quite a rude shock to Matt when the elderly Vietnamese manager of the Grand Patel, instead of guiding him to the onsite concierge, handed him a lamp and goggles, gestured towards the end of the dimly lit corridor, and whispered with a toothless grin: ‘good luck’.

The Grand Patel, which admittedly did smell a bit like the Aspley Retirement Village, had many more surprises in store for young Matt: the soap situation left him outraged, he was incensed at the itchy bedsheets, the cockroaches scampering across the floor caused raw fury, and the breakdown in the mechanics of the decaying elevator shaft simply left him defeated.

On reflection, Matt realised he probably shouldn’t have left complete oversight to his notoriously unreliable mate, Ben ‘Bluey’ Devere, in finding them a place to stay for the 4 nights - a quick search on google would’ve revealed that the Grand Patel was recently described as a ‘PLACE TO AVOID NEVER COME HERE’ by a recent vacationer.

Welcome to the real world, champ.