Tokyo Business Hotel

Good for a budget stay in Shinjuk. Comfortable small room for a single traveller, shared bath down in basement was only small inconvenience. Five minute walk to the centre of the entertainment area.

Second stay here, place went downhill since my first stay last year. There was a very friendly foreigner at the front desk when I checked in, which was a nice change, but everything else was worse. They now have a curfew of 1 am and don't own again until 6 am (at a hotel? In kabukicho?! Really?!?!) - when I explained that this is exactly the time slot when I expect to be back, there was a lot of umming and urring, at the end of which they graciously let me in on the "back door secret" - meaning, if I go to the back door Andrew info the intercomm ("be patient, because the night guy might be sleepin"), I may get lucky ("if not, ring our phone number, he should hear that and come to open for you"). Elevators and corridor were smelly and dirty, and aforementioned night guy is a horror - argued with me when I asked for an extra tooth brush set ("but you have one in your room" - "yes, but I ran out of tooth paste" - passive aggressive "oh...ok..." - and when I came in with a friend to change clothes and asked him to come upstairs with me for five minutes, that same guy bounced out from behind the reception counter to demand that no one go up with me even for a minute, because they haven't paid ("they have to wait in the lobby!"). I felt like I was in a Thai hostel, not a Japanese business hotel. Not coming back.