Traveling through work: San Francisco

We applied for the program HI Connect, which is designed for HI staff and volunteers, who want to experience life and work at another hostel in more than 15 different countries. As participants in this program, we were granted a two-week stay at HI San Francisco Downtown Hostel. Since this wasn’t our first HI Connect experience, we had rather high expectations. Our first stay through the program was at HI New York City Hostel, where the HI mission was more than accomplished. The San Francisco team had therefore a rather difficult task.

Downtown Hostel is not the only HI hostel in San Francisco. There are three unique hostels in the city and two in the surrounding area, located in coastal parks. We were lucky to explore all of them, even though we were pretty satisfied with our own hostel, where we had a private room with the view over San Francisco’s busy city center. Indeed Downtown Hostel has a five star location, being just a block from Union Square and close to some of the city’s finest attractions. The management also gave us a 490$ stipend for food, which was very helpful considering the exorbitant prices in the city. Since you can walk pretty much everywhere in San Francisco, we didn’t need a public transport pass.

By now you’re probably wondering if there was any work involved in the program. The concept of HI Connect is to accommodate volunteers who in exchange help at the hostel, learn about its operations, and embrace the new environment, while also sharing the professional practices of their home countries. Our work schedule was planned by friendly and flexible Liam, HI sales manager of the North West region. Liam ensured we became acquainted with different aspects of hostels, planning very diverse and fun activities. Our schedule normally included one item per weekday, lasting from 2 to 5 hours, including guided tours of the City by the Bay.

At first, we were given tours of all three HI hostels in the city so we could see how each of them offers a unique type of experience for guests. We will write about the hostels in the next Issue of Globetrotter. Josh, the education manager of the NW region, brought us to HI Marin Headlands Hostel, located in Marin Headlands National Park, where many locals go for an easy weekend escape to wooded mountains and scenic beaches. He took us on a hike to show us a typical program he runs, called Outdoor Hostel Adventure or OHA. OHA involves guided activities for people of all ages to explore the marine flora and fauna and learn about outdoor ethics. We learned more about HI environmental practices when exploring Café Franco, part of HI Fisherman’s Wharf Hostel, and the admirable efforts its management makes in order to keep the café as environmentally-friendly as possible.

Like all HI hostels, Downtown Hostel also puts a lot of emphasis on activities and events to provide its guests with a very enjoyable and fulfilling experience. Our job was to help organize some of the events; in holiday spirit, we beautifully decorated the hostel, served drinks at the Christmas party and assisted a storytelling jam. The latter is part of a partnership between HI USA and Beyond Borders Storytelling club, who perform every week at a local bar – a must see for all San Francisco visitors.

Our duties also involved some customer service and marketing work. We helped at the front desk and even managed to check in/out some guests on our own. The marketing department of the NW region asked us to make a short video about our hostelling experience. They say a lot of young or inexperienced travelers have very distorted ideas about what a hostel actually is and are consequently missing out on all the advantages a hostel has over a hotel. To that end, we also gave a short presentation for San Francisco hostellers about the HI mission and our roles as participants in HI Connect. Many of them were thrilled to find out their country was part of the network and they too could enjoy the benefits as HI members.

Finally, after two weeks of learning about HI and San Francisco hostels, meeting with the staff, and presenting ideas, we got a pretty good grasp of how hostelling works in this part of the USA. We had plenty of free time to pursue more touristy goals: admire the Mission District street art, get incarcerated behind infamous Alcatraz bars, and measure up against the towering redwoods. Through our conversations with HI staff and other local people we were able to get a glimpse of San Francisco’s lifestyle and the open-minded and easy-going character of its less than one million inhabitants.

Once again, the goals of HI Connect were achieved and we feel incredibly grateful to HI USA, HI Slovenia and of course the San Francisco team for having the opportunity to be part of such an immersive and rewarding experience.