He lived through two wars and turned his obsession with an old lady into a grand passion - Yeoh Siew Hoon of The Transit Café listened with rapt attention to Kurt Wachtveitl as he accepted the HICAP Lifetime Achievement Award.
When Kurt Wachtveitl got up to receive the HICAP Lifetime Achievement Award in Hong Kong last month, he called himself a dinosaur from the old European school.
He said he asked himself this question for the first time – "How can someone stay in a job for 40 years without losing passion and enthusiasm?"
The general manager of the Oriental Bangkok for the last four decades then shared his life story. He grew up in Germany after World War Two. He knew poverty and hardship. He watched his parents kill his pet rabbits, one after the other, to feed the family. His parents instilled discipline in him.
He was drafted into the German military. Twelve years after that, he had to flee the country to escape.
He arrived in Thailand in 1965. Nothing was a surprise, he said. It was like he had lived a previous life there. He worked in the Nipah Lodge in Pattaya. There were no tourists then. Eight people sometimes slept in one room, most of the time, the hotel was empty.
One day, the American embassy booked the hotel for a year. The B52s bombers were carrying out their missions during the Vietnam War. Once again, he saw military service but from a different angle. From then on, the hotel was full.
Another stroke of luck took place when the Oriental Hotel was put up for sale. Jim Thompson disappeared somewhere in Malaysia, and Italthai which owned the Nipah Lodge bought the Oriental.
His first question was, where do we start? He renovated the French restaurant because "love goes to the stomach". A French chef showed up from Paris. He had told his wife he was going out for cigarettes and went instead to the airport.
When Mandarin Oriental took over the hotel, Peter French, the general manager of the Mandarin Oriental Hong Kong was the only one who said, "give the young man a chance, he is obsessed with the old lady".
And the secret to his success? "I listen to the guests. The spa, the restaurants – none of them were my ideas."
He then went on to share the ingredients of a great hotel.
- Go for consistency – having a general manager who stay for a while is not healthy; it takes three to five years to earn trust
- Inhabitants of great hotels are the most pampered customers. They need great staff to serve them – staff who have knowledge, good heart and sincerity.
- Be different and have integrity
He said one of his life mentors was veteran hotelier Walter Schynder, known for his individual style. He hasn't changed. He's now 100, living in Lausanne and when Kurt and his wife Penny visited him last December, he came out to the front steps to greet them "as he has always done".
"Today, human beings have become machines. That's why young people are leaving the industry. Perhaps one day we will teach robots how to smile and say, have a good day," said Wachtveitl.
He said he had been incredibly lucky to have a life partner, Penny, for 39 years. "Pray everyday that your wife does not run away and that your wife has a regular job elsewhere. Send your children to boarding school quickly."
And when will he retire? It depends on one's health, he said.
"I have reached full maturity. It's great to meet the rich and famous but when the moment comes when I have to retire, I would study history, art, literature, philosophy and keep basic values like honesty and respect for others.
"To give pleasure is the most serious business."
The SHY Report
A regular column on news, trends and issues in the hospitality industry by one of Asia's most respected travel editors and commentators, Yeoh Siew Hoon. Siew Hoon, who has covered the tourism industry in Asia/Pacific for the past 20 years, runs SHY Ventures Pte Ltd. Her company's mission is "Content, Communication, Connection". She is a writer, speaker, facilitator, trainer and events producer. She is also an author, having published "Around Asia In 1 Hr: Tales of Condoms, Chillies & Curries". Her motto is ‘free to do, and be'. Contacts: Tel: 65-63424934, Mobile: 65-96801460Yeoh Siew Hoon's other writings can be found at http://www.thetransitcafe.com/">
