SINGAPORE: A TikTok user who came to Singapore in November claimed to have encountered a bedbug while staying at a hostel in Chinatown. In a video, the woman, Olivia, shared that she stayed in a self-check-in hostel with a private room in Chinatown as it was “not cheap” in Singapore.
Hostels typically cost less than hotels. She said she placed her bags as far away from the bed as possible as a precaution against bedbugs, but the room was too small to make much difference. She went out for a few hours, and when she returned to the room, she noticed something moving and saw it was a bug. She caught the bug crawling on camera and took photos to send to her friends. She also decided to google the bug she saw. While she initially thought it was an ant, but after researching online, she said it was “definitely bedbugs”.
Olivia then said in the video that she immediately left the hostel and added in her captions that she could get a full refund for her accommodation. She went to a laundromat and threw her fabric belongings into a dryer at 60 degrees to “try and kill [the bedbugs]”. She also checked her bags thrice to ensure she found no bedbugs, and she threw away some of her items, including her sneakers, because of the bedbugs. She added that she had to stay in the airport for the next 24 hours until her flight out because she had “nowhere else to go”.
@olivia_from_space Found bed bugs in a private room in a hostel in Singapore’s chinatown area. If you travelling to Sinapore, leave your bags outside of your hotel/hostel/airbnb and do a thorough check of the mattress and furniture before unpacking. If you suspect it, just leave. It’s not worth the trouble and potentially spreading it. I was able to get a full refund from my accommodations but they gave me no details on if and how they were dealing with the issue. #bedbugs #bedbugsinhotel #singapore #travelnightmare #bedbuginfestation ♬ original sound – Olivia