Ah, The Tendernes of the Human Touch. By Yeoh Siew Hoon Wednesday, 11th November 2009

Yeoh Siew Hoon takes a respite from technology to dwell on all the human touches and details that make a difference to our travels and sometimes, our lives.

The wall art at Hotel Nostalgia

For the last month or so, I have been immersed in the world of high-tech – talking online, sleeping online and dreaming online that there were times when I felt I was floating away on the land of the Long Web Cloud.

It was therefore such a breath of fresh air when, after the completion of WIT-Web In Travel, I received an email from Giovanni Angelini, a hotelier who lives and breathes people, asking me, “With so many important topics discussed at WIT, where do we put people who take care of the customers in the hotels? My favourite topic.”

Well, Giovanni, it is one of my favourite topics too and I want to dedicate this column to the little human touches and details that make any trip memorable.

One, the staff at the Taj Mahal in New Delhi – an attentive room service telephonist who realising I was nursing a sore throat and cough took the initiative to offer me a glass of warm toddy with my room service order.

From then on, word got out that Ms Hoon needed her toddy and there was always a glass of this soothing, warm concoction waiting for me at breakfast, breaks and even cocktail parties. Who cared that they got my name wrong – what they got right was looking after a customer in need.

Two, the concierge at InterContinental Hong Kong who went out of her way to ensure I received a package that was due to be sent to me from The Peninsula – there was a small complication because I was not a registered guest at her hotel but she overlooked it and called me on my mobile when the package arrived.

Three, the Hong Kong taxi driver who drove me to the airport – when he heard me coughing and hacking my lungs out, he offered me a fresh bottle of water. “It’s new, not yet opened,” he said.

Four, Khun Tal, the villa manager at Miskawaan, Samui, who looked after me so well I didn’t even have to think about anything. She was always there but never intrusive. (See Take Me There)

Five, the little details that make Bangkok Airways a rather special airline in these days of low cost, you get what you pay for, culture. Its meal tray, which had brown rice and fish, came with a little note telling me the brown rice I was eating was called “Khao Hom Sukho”, “a special strain of organic rice produced by the Sukhothai Airport Organic Agriculture Project in affiliation with Bangkok Airways”.

“When well cooked, this rice has a fragrance and contains high nutritional qualities including antioxidants such as iron and zinc.”

It made the rice taste just that much sweeter.

And if you’ve ever been at Samui airport, then you will know that it has the best-looking bathroom in the world. Love the aquarium.

Bathroom at Samui airport

Six, back at home, I popped into a new hotel in the fast-becoming-hip Tiong Bahru area – Hotel Nostalgia – and curious about the beginnings of this 50-room place, I asked the receptionist as many questions which he answered admirably well. I found out it was built by a New Zealander who then sold it to an Indonesian Chinese. I love the wall art in this funky and charming hotel – very nouvelle Peranakan.

Seven, I had the opportunity to meet a few of the finalists for the Singapore Experience Awards by the Singapore Tourism Board.

One young man stood out – Gerald Lu, a sommelier with Forbidden City, part of the Indochine Group and a finalist for Best Customer Service – Food & Beverage. Gerald said he knew very early on that he wanted to be in a job where he could be with people, “so it was either tourism or the army”.

He studied hospitality management in Temasek Polytechnic and after he graduated, chose food & beverage. “It’s so exciting. I get to work with so many people from different cultures.”

For him, good customer service is a multi-sensory thing. “You sense it from the way people talk, they way they dress. You understand why he’s here – is he lonely or does he want to be left alone?

“In school, they teach you the hard skills but on the job, you learn the soft skills. You create an experience for someone because no one wants to be processed.”

It was one particular experience though that gave Gerald the drive to prove himself. When he was at school, an industry professional came in to talk to the students. It was Peter Knipp, the man behind the World Gourmet Summit and who's known for speaking his mind.

Said Gerald, “I recall him asking, ‘how many of you think that right after you graduate, you’re going to be a manager immediately? So I and many others put up our hands and he said, ‘Well, s…. you. That’s not going to happen.’ I was a bit surprised and that made me determined to come out and work hard and prove I could do it.”

So Gerald, thank Peter for lighting the fire in your belly. We all need a human touch like that in our lives.

Yeoh Siew Hoon, one of Asia's most respected travel editors and commentators, writes a regular column on news, trends and issues in the hospitality industry for 4Hoteliers.com.

Siew Hoon, who has covered the tourism industry in Asia/Pacific for the past 20 years, runs SHY Ventures Pte Ltd. Her other writings can be found at www.thetransitcafe.com

Get your weekly cuppa of news, gossip, humour and opinion at the cafe for travel insiders.

4Hoteliers is the "Official Daily News" of WIT09 - www.webintravel.com