The Hostel Toilet Fiasco, HOSTEL TOILET LISTED ON AIRPNP SPARKS OUTRAGE I rented out my university hostel toilet on Airpnp (the toilet version of Airbnb) and almost got into trouble after it appeared on a Chinese newspaper in Singapore the next day. Airpnp was a new start-up and the news about its launch appeared on BBC. I decided to be an early adopter and put up an interesting description about the toilet on my level with a photo I found online. It turned out that I was the first user to have signed up from Singapore, and within a day, someone decided to give a rating of 4.3 to my hostel toilet!! I was so excited…
I rented out my university hostel toilet on Airpnp (the toilet version of Airbnb) and almost got into trouble after it appeared on a Chinese newspaper in Singapore the next day. Airpnp was a new start-up and the news about its launch appeared on BBC. I decided to be an early adopter and put up an interesting description about the toilet on my level with a photo I found online. It turned out that I was the first user to have signed up from Singapore, and within a day, someone decided to give a rating of 4.3 to my hostel toilet!!
I was so excited about Airpnp that I decided to promote it even though Singapore has loads of public toilets. After two days, I was sleeping cozily in my bed when one of the resident assistants came running into my room in her sleeping gown, asking me to immediately remove the toilet and delete my account. I asked her why and we found the online newspaper article which reported Airpnp’s launch and the Singaporean toilet rented out on it for $1. The hostel authorities were furious that someone was trying to make money from the common hostel facilities.
An email was sent to all the residents asking the culprit to own up. Sadly, everyone found the story too hilarious to take it seriously. Some even found the offence too entrepreneurial to be punished. I was relieved that the situation was treated with humor, though it was a close call that made me think twice about unconventional ventures!
