Living in perfect harmony isn't easy at a feng shui hotel
by Beth Teitell

Wednesday, July 26, 2000

It was a hot Saturday afternoon in the city, and I wanted to feel some sweet feng shui.

And who wouldn't? Practitioners live in harmony with their surroundings, energy works for them, not against them, and hey, if it's good enough for the likes of Donald Trump and Catherine Zeta-Jones, it's good enough for me.

Besides, as someone nursing a pinky toe stubbed on a coffee table with so many angles it might as well be one of those ``poison arrows'' feng shui-ers are so afraid of, the ancient discipline - or whatever it is - was sounding pretty appealing.

So I was looking forward to checking into what's being promoted as Boston's first feng shui hotel, in Chinatown. I figured I'd spend $175 or so and stock up on enough good ch'i - that's energy in feng shui - to get me through the week.

Sure, the hotel was an un-fengy sounding DoubleTree, and it was located in the old Don Bosco Technical High School, and it faced New England Medical Center (hospitals are yin city), but when you're trying to do feng on the cheap, you can't be picky.

Well, I guess I should have checked my feng shui horoscope for July 23, because my visit didn't get off to an auspicious start.

Having only a vague idea of exactly what feng shui is - like pornography and the words ``per se'' it's easier recognized than defined - I asked the desk clerk.

He smiled nervously. ``It's supposed to be some sort of energy or something.''

He looked around for someone who might have a better grasp of the hotel's mission. Another employee was equally unsure, and the ch'i threatened to get really negative until a Gen X guest sitting nearby, her hair dyed a bright fuchsia, her every finger beringed, enlightened the group:

``It's a way of orienting objects to put you at peace,'' she explained.

``Thanks,'' the first employee said. ``Would you say that again? I want to write it down.''

I had read in the press release that while Western hotel lobbies are ``typically organized with confusing seating patterns . . . at DoubleTree, the layout of the floor tile creates a welcoming path from the entrance to the reception desk,'' so I sat down and tried to soak up some welcome.

I'm not sure if I was sitting in the wrong direction for my kua number (3), or if I was simply disappointed that the bar had yet to open, as this was the hotel's first night in business, but I felt nothing.

Maybe the room would be better. The press release, after all, described a feng shui fest. The combination of colors (plums, chocolate browns, berry reds and subtle greens), textures, patterns, materials and artwork would create a ``well-balanced harmonious environment.''

Give me my card key and let me in, baby.

I opened the door, and yowza! Yeah, yeah, the TV was hidden in an armoire, and five major elements of nature were represented, according to feng shui dictates, but under the desk was a rat's nest of wires: from the phone, a lamp, the coffee machine. That's a feng shui no-no. It said so right in the release.

Needless to say, I spent an unharmonious night - it was the hotel's first night open, and there was no room service, no minibar and the ice machine was on the blink. When I got to work on Monday I called the interior designer to ask her about the wiring.

Kathy Corcoran was a sweet woman with a true interest in feng shui, but even she had to admit the whole living-in-harmony thing could only go so far.

``Part of the Doubletree standard is that they market their hotels as business hotels,'' she said, ``so we need to show people where they plug in their computers.''

So that's what's behind the push for wireless communication: feng shui.