You get out of bed at the first sign of light. You can't stop feeling hungry. The only thing you ate for dinner last night was cabbage soup with a single potato. You can't stop thinking about a big English breakfast with eggs, sausages, bacon, baked beans with mushrooms, and fried bread. But you don't eat breakfast because you haven't had any food in your house for months. You put on your old, worn-out clothes and a hat, and then you leave your simple house and walk toward the docks.
The First World War and the crash of the U.S. stock market have both hurt Great Britain's economy. When you get to the docks, the foreman tells you that he only needs 10 people to unload the few ships that came in overnight. He moves his head from side to side to look at the sea of tired, almost hopeless faces in front of him. After quickly pointing and picking the first nine men, he looks you in the eye for a few seconds. The foreman then raises his arm to show where the last worker for the day is. Does this scene seem too sad? Even though the Great Depression seems like a long time ago, cheap hotels in London remind us of how important it is to be thrifty.
Pennies for bad weather
Even though not many of us can really say we lived through the Great Depression, we have all been through some of its effects on a much smaller scale. We have been hungry. We have looked for work. We haven't had enough money to buy everything we wanted. Also, we've heard sayings like "A penny saved is a penny earned," "Save for a rainy day," and "Waste not, want not" that show how hard it is to be in a bad situation. But how often do we think about what these sayings mean? By staying in one of London's cheap hotels, we can put the money we saved toward other travel costs.
How about thrifty?
Do we look cheap because we save? One of England's best poets and essayists, Samuel Johnson, once said, "Frugality is the daughter of Wisdom, the sister of Temperance, and the father of Freedom." We use the word "cheap" more often in everyday conversation than "frugal." People who are cheap, like Ebenezer Scrooge from "A Christmas Carol," should either enjoy their money more or give it back to the community. The words "frugal" and "cheap" have very hard meanings. A person who wants to save money for his child's college will buy an economy-sized tube of toothpaste from the store. A cheap person will buy low-quality toothpaste from a dollar store, even though he could buy a chain of dollar stores with the money he saved. If you stay at one of London's premium budget hotels, you can save money and still get the service you want.
The Best Budgets
Is it really possible to find a place to stay in London, which is one of the most expensive places to live in Europe, that is both cheap and nice? Yes! There are cheap hotels in London that can do that without making you say "Blimey!" when you see the bill. These hotels have a helpful staff, a good location, and all the amenities you want, all at a price you can afford. When you stay at one of the best cheap hotels in London, no one can say you're cheap.
Because we don't know when the next "rainy day" will be, times like the Great Depression show us how important it is to be thrifty. But if you stay in a cheap hotel in London with good service and low prices, you can make every day sunny, even if it rains in London.
