Hotel Victorie in Amsterdam

I had the worst check-in experience of my life at this hotel on April 10. I arrived at 1 p.m. from a long overnight flight and was very jetlagged and feeling ill. I had been told I could check in at 2 but when I arrived the young woman at the reception told me to go away until 4 and do some sightseeing as I wouldn't be able to check in for 3 hours. I very politely mentioned that I had been told by email that I could probably check in at 2. She immediately raised her voice at me and said "YES BUT THE EMAIL DOESN'T KNOW WHEN THE ROOMS ARE CLEAN!" (Um, yes, email doesn't know anything but presumably the person who wrote the email knows?) I asked if she could please have the cleaner prioritize the room I'd be in since I was there and jetlagged and really not feeling well, and she said absolutely not, there was only one cleaner and he would clean the rooms in whatever order he wanted, and she would not make any requests of him. She seemed to think it was outrageous on my part to inquire about a slightly early check-in. I left the hotel for an hour but was too exhausted and nauseated to do much and said I would just wait in the lobby until the room was clean. She had friends visiting her in the lobby and was talking at this point, not at the reception desk, and after about half an hour I noticed that the cleaner came in and tried to get her attention, but she was too busy socializing to notice, and so he left, and walked off down the road, clearly done for the day, so I knew my room must be ready and stood up but I couldn't get her attention either. I went and stood at the reception desk, gathered my suitcases, hoping to get her attention, but she was clearly ignoring me, talking to her friends nonstop, so I couldn't even interrupt. I stood there at the desk for 15 minutes with her ignoring me, and finally I did interrupt and said "excuse me but the cleaner left a while ago so can I please get the key to my room?" She was absolutely outraged that I had interrupted her conversation and raised her voice at me again, denying that the cleaner was done or had left for the day. She phoned him in a huff to prove to me that my room wasn't ready, but of course it was, so she resentfully gave me my room key at that point. If I hadn't interrupted her, I am sure I would have waited for more than another hour until 4 p.m. unnecessarily. I then had to drag my suitcase up the steepest, narrowest flight of stairs I have ever seen in my life. The stairs are only a few inches wide, half the width of a foot, and people have to walk up and down them sideways hanging on to the banister to not fall, so it was a challenge to get a suitcase up and down them. Fortunately I didn't see that staff member again until the day I checked out at breakfast, when she was rude again, offering bread to everyone else but not to me, but in the other three days that I was there and didn't see her, all the other staff were very professional and friendly and helpful, so it's just this one employee who is unprofessional and rude. The room was cute and clean with a van Gogh theme, although small and a bit quirky. For instance the automatic sensor for the bathroom light would turn on while I was in bed, but turn off when I was in the bathroom, so I'd have to wave my hands around to get it to turn on, and the smoke detector goes off if you don't shut the bathroom door while showering. There is also no coffee machine in the room, so you have to wait until they have breakfast downstairs at 8 a.m. I appreciated that the breakfast was vegetarian, although there wasn't much for a vegan (no fruit). The location is good - walking distance to the museums and near plenty of restaurants, but a bit away from the tourist mayhem. I would not stay at the Bicycle Hotel again but only because of the one staff member, who really made my check in miserable for no apparent reason.