Skies darken and the Oriental Overture hits discordant chords and many sour notes.

For almost two years people have been asking me if I’d been to the Mandarin Oriental Dhara Dhevi Chiang Mai yet: “It’s been so hyped, we’re dying to know what you think of it.”

“Not much,” is my answer. Its official opening was Sunday, November 12, but I first toured the property in June and stayed overnight in July. Here is my report:

Software Problems:

Following my publishing a mention of Dhara Dhevi in October 2004, emails were exchanged with the resort’s PR people, the terms of a visit by me were detailed, and I was initially invited for a two-night stay, all expenses (except for travel) to be comped.

Nearly two years later, and changes of PR people, I was “allowed” to visit for one night’s free accommodation, a spa voucher, and a “hosted” dinner. Also, as it turned out, I was not going to be allowed to eat in the restaurant of my choice, and I was expected to pay for the Internet connection, the minibar, and breakfast!

When I arrived last July, I was met by the new PR Director who told me that I would be in such and such a villa, that I would have a free massage, and that at 7 PM, I would have dinner in the Thai restaurant so I could enjoy the entertainment. Busy filling out the check-in form (and complimenting her on her colorful shoes), I hadn’t actually listened to what she said. Then she said she was so busy with the opening of a photography exhibit that she couldn’t spend any time with me.

I said I only had one request and that was to see the Colonial Suites in the morning. She left me in the hands of a nice front desk person to take me to my accommodation.

I called the spa to arrange for a massage. The spa desk said I had already been scheduled for a massage at 6 PM and that it would take a bit more than an hour. Why then had the PR woman scheduled my dinner at 7? I went to the spa at 5 and had an absolutely terrific massage!

I wandered the property on the way back from the spa, went into the French restaurant to read the menu, and went back to the front desk to tell them that I would be eating at my usual hour of 8 PM in the French restaurant, Farang Ses.

(I can’t believe anyone would name it that! Granted, a cultural specialist will tell you that the name means ‘French’ in Thai but the Thais have a very insultingly discriminatory way of referring to Westerners as farangs—foreigners or aliens. I don’t think I’ll ever get used to it.)

The gal at the front desk said she didn’t think that would be allowed because my dinner had been arranged by the Director of PR at 7 PM in the Le Grand Lanna restaurant. I explained that I had been to Le Grand Lanna several times before the Dhara Dhevi even existed and that I had outgrown places that cater to tourists—especially with themed entertainment—many years ago. I walked back to my villa.

The Front Desk Duty Manager called me to say that I could not eat in the French Restaurant! I asked to speak with the PR woman; he said she wasn’t available. I said that he either sorted it out or I would check out and return to the Four Seasons. His reaction was that that would be regrettable but that there was nothing that could be done.

Then the PR woman called. She said that FAM trips are an imposition…

“When we give someone a complimentary room, he must dine in the Thai restaurant.”

No explanation given.

I should have checked out but it was too late to impose on Andrew at the Four Seasons. I told the Dragon Lady that she should have read the file of emails, that my visit had been arranged nearly two years previously, and I did not expect to be treated like a newspaper journalist who was comped Plan A, or a magazine journalist who was comped Plan B. I explained that I’m simply a man who travels and writes about his personal experiences, and that is quite different from being a “travel writer.” I also said that this conversation would be included in my report. Finally she relented and said I could dine where I wanted.

It was 7:45 PM and had started to rain; I asked the Front Desk for transport. I called again at 8:10. The golf cart finally came at 8:25.

I arrived at the restaurant…and had to apologize for being late.

Farang Ses is elegantly decorated in an over-the-top sort of way.

But the décor falls apart when one spies the painted lady over the fireplace. (I could have said “painting of a lady,” but I didn’t.) In the face of that, one might excuse the T-shirted, baseball-capped guests.

The amuse guelle was roebuck and lentils; I had an artichoke appetizer followed by lobster flown in from Brittany. The house wine was a Mersault. All very good!

The Maitre d’ was from Germany…finally, a pro. But then he told me he’s leaving to go to Mexico. Uh oh.

I left to go to bed.

The next morning I packed and checked the guest directory in the room. It says breakfast is served until 11:00. I went to the front desk to check out. The Internet Services came to Bt642, and the minibar to Bt850. I paid by Visa and walked to breakfast.

A waitress came up to me, “Normally we close the buffet at 10:30 but if you need anything else, we will keep it open 10 more minutes.”

The directory had said 11:00; can’t anything go right?

As I was waiting for my taxi, the Assistant Front Desk Manager came over and asked, “Aren’t you supposed to pay for breakfast? It’s Bt1200.”

Stunned, I gave him the money and then enumerated all the things that had gone wrong. He gave me back the money. He was very professional.

Hardware Problems:

I was assigned to a two-storey villa with Jacuzzi and piano. Upstairs, the bedroom had a terrace, a small study, and a large bathroom.

In the study there is only one free wall outlet. I need 3: 1 for the computer, 1 for the telephone charger, 1 for the external speakers.

The wireless did not work.

The phone instructions were incorrect. I dialed #1 as instructed and was then told to put in my PIN. I didn’t have a PIN.

Recommendation: Correct the dialing instructions.

I finally was able to reach the front office and asked them to send someone to fix the Internet connection.

The door bell rings. I put on my shoes and go down the stairs. I take off my shoes to go into the living room. I let the butler in the front door. I put on my shoes to go up the stairs. I take off my shoes to go into the second storey, and I show the butler the mess of wiring next to the desk.

Recommendation: When a guest asks for a person to come to his aid, the front desk should ask if it would be alright if the person were to let himself in the ground floor with his pass key and come directly up to the second storey entrance. (At a three storey villa such as at Sheraton Grande Laguna Resort on Phuket, the problem is magnified. That hotel implemented this suggestion.)

The housekeeping staff had not plugged the telephone cable into the wireless transmitter. The wireless transmitter still did not work, so I plugged the cable directly into my computer. Below: that’s my own, red, recoilable extension cord. Without it, I would not have been able to power up.

Recommendation: Provide a short extension cord with multiple outlets and add an item to the housekeeping check list: “Check Internet cable and wireless device.”

Remember the D2? Much less costly than Dhara Dhevi and everything worked! (See page 7 of this article)

Above the bed were hooks to hold mosquito netting, I assume.

Recommendation: Either install the netting or remove the hooks.

Above the easy chair was a down-light built into the ceiling. It is focused not on one’s lap but on the ottoman, forcing the guest to slide the chair away from the wall in order to be able to read. (Of course, housekeeping slides it right back, so you have to keep moving it and…making marks on the floor.)

Recommendation: Refocus the light.

I mentioned to the Butler that I was surprised there were no mattresses on the sun beds on the deck. He said that as it was the rainy season he would have to call housekeeping; it would take about 20 minutes. I said never mind.

Recommendation: Use the same plastic covers that you use on the sun beds at the main pool. The guests can remove them if they want to.

The TV is in a tall cabinet. It rests on a typical sliding and swiveling tray. I opened the cabinet, had difficulty sliding out the tray…then it jerked out as though suddenly released. I swiveled it to be able to watch from the bed…and the TV wouldn’t work. It took me 15 minutes to move the entire cabinet so I could plug the power cord back in. You can see in the photo I took that the cord is too short—the cabinet could not be properly centered on the wall with the tray pulled out and swiveled. Had no one ever tried to watch TV in this room before?

Recommendation: Install a longer power cord. Also, put the cabinet on casters so housekeeping can move it to clean behind it.

An hotel room is supposed to be at least as comfortable as one’s own home. Therefore, I was surprised to see that there was no headboard on the bed, and no bedspread, etc. covering the pillows. (The turndown service had not as yet been done.) Also, the bedside lamps were useless for reading.

Recommendation: I’d use a local-artisan-carved, wood, Lanna-style, padded headboard with a Velcro-attached, daily-changeable, linen or Thai silk cover.

Regardless of the practicality and convenience and general acceptability of covered duvets, this resort property should go the extra mile and use a magnificent bedspread that would extend to cover the pillows. Who knows how many journalists were shown my room that morning before I arrived and sneezed all over the bed and pillows!

If the manager had slept in the room, he would have discovered that the bedside lamps were not suitable for reading, and perhaps would have had halogens built into the ceiling (as in my home).

The marketing material boasts of the individual thermostatic controllers for air-conditioning and humidity; instructions as how to set them would have been useful. Mine were all set at 21o—cold!

Recommendation: Provide written instructions and have whoever takes the guests to the room upon arrival show how to set the controls. (Of course, if she also bothered to open the TV cabinet and show how the TV can be pulled out, etc. someone would have discovered two years ago, that the cables were too short.)

At home I use coasters to not only protect my antiques from drink rings, but also to absorb the condensation so it doesn’t drip into one’s lap when one picks up the glass. There were none in my villa.

Recommendation: Provide some of the beautiful coasters the tourists buy in your shops or in the local market. I bought 12 picture frames in your Vila Cini shop; it also sells things that would make nice coasters.

The second-storey entrance door has an anti-intruder peep hole. One needs to be 183cm (6 feet) tall to be able to see out.

Recommendation: Reinstall it lower.

I helped myself to a banana on the fruit plate on the dining room table, but couldn’t find a garbage bin in the kitchen into which to throw the skin.

Recommendation: Provide a garbage bin with disposable plastic bag in the kitchen.

Standing on my terrace, I glanced at the villa next door. The roof tiles were falling off, and the drains were breaking up.

Recommendation: Fix everything.

Bottom Line:

Look kids, I waited for almost two years before visiting this place. If they haven’t got it right by now, they never will.

First of all, what is it?

In the press kit, the conceptual designer is quoted. “There was no master plan, it was more like one big jigsaw puzzle.” he admits.

It still is…and with many missing pieces!

Construction started in 2001, millions upon millions have been spent, and work is still going on.

In my opinion, it is no more than a wonderful community project that has brought employment to hundreds of people in and around Chiang Mai, but it sure isn’t a 5-star resort.

At one point the press kit says, “The resort’s design references are borrowed from authentic Lanna structures, etc.” I think the whole thing was borrowed from the nearby Four Seasons Resort and Spa from the architecture right down to the rice paddy and water buffalos. They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery but in this case, it’s nothing but a bad imitation.

The original - The Four Seasons Resort & Spa

The copy – Dhara Dhevi

The original - The Four Seasons Resort & Spa

The copy – Dhara Dhevi

The original - The Four Seasons Resort & Spa

The copy – Dhara Dhevi

At Dhara Dhevi there are wonderful but fake, palace-like structures housing the spa and the lobby. Disneyland anyone?

Phony, over-size, gilded pavilions rise out of the swimming pool calling attention to how small and poorly located it is.

There is even a fake “art and craft village”—an insult to the real ones that fill the valleys surrounding Chiang Mai.

The press kit raves on about “offering some of the world’s most spacious and exclusive accommodation.” I felt I was spending the night in a disingenuous, gated community on a Hollywood lot with gate crashers as neighbors.

The whole place is pretentious—all show and no go. It’s perfect for the posturing politicians who strut their stuff in this part of Asia, or show-off “CEOs” who inherited daddy’s business and don’t know the difference between costly and expensive, nor guilt and gilt.

Here hospitality is not understood and therefore doesn’t exist.

The only people I saw with smiles were the groundskeepers, not the ‘guests.’

There are wonderful places to vacation in Chiang Mai, but in my book, you’d only stay here as a last resort.

My life mainly consists of being an incognito, full-paying guest in hostelries, spas, and restaurants all over the world to provide the unvarnished truth to you, my readers. Over the years, I have become known as an expert, and individual hotels and resorts as well as some of the largest hotel groups in the world constantly invite me to come and stay as a non-paying, incognito guest to make an inspection and tell them what’s right and what’s wrong. The managers look forward to my reports. You see, guests rarely complain—they just tell their friends how terrible the experience was, and they don’t come back.

(Many years ago, Billy Baldwin—the gentleman jockey from Philadelphia who became the doyen of interior design and did up the apartments and houses of hundreds of the world’s richest grandes dames including Jackie Kennedy in the White House—and I were asked to Kitty Miller’s New Year’s Eve party. Kitty, a typical Baldwin client/friend was the only daughter of Jules Bache, the New York stock broker, and had houses in New York, London, Kent, and Mallorca. She travelled with her French maid, 18 pieces of individually numbered Louis Vuitton—bras in No. 7, fur collars in No. 9, shoes in 11, 12, & 13, etc., and her chauffeur. Depending upon her mode of travel, her Chrysler limo was either in the ship’s hold or the plane’s baggage compartment. As one of the automaker’s largest shareholders, she got a new one each year, and never went anywhere without it.

Where is this sidebar going??? Well, during cocktails that New Year’s Eve, the light went out over the Gainsborough Red Boy (Kitty usually lent it to the Metropolitan Museum but hung it at home in New York for special occasions). Billy, all five foot one of him, in stocking feet, standing on the sofa trying to screw in a new bulb, turned to me and said, “One has to know how everything works…have you slept in each of your guest rooms?”)

As an inspecting consultant, over breakfast the morning after my first night’s stay, I have been debriefed by some of the best GMs in the world, anxious to get my opinion. But before I begin, the first thing I ask is,

“Have you slept in every room? Do you know if everything is in the right place and working properly? Do you know how the noise of the peacocks (Nairobi), motorcycle traffic (Bora Bora), staff (Geneva), or wild animals (Little Governor’s) sounds in each room?”

Managers staying overnight in every room will eliminate 90 percent of the problems I find. God is in the details.

But I never had the opportunity of discussing my problems at Dhara Dhevi. Not surprisingly, the GM never even sent me the typical “handwritten” welcome note, let alone calling to arrange a meeting. I never met him, and…was never shown the ‘Colonial Suites.’

Mandarin Oriental Dhara Dhevi Chiang Mai – a last resort.
You won’t need any contact information, just go to the Four Seasons Resort Chiang Mai for a treat instead of a treatment. It costs less too!

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