Woman 'sweating and shaken' after hotel's failed tribute to son
A woman was left “sweating and shaking” to find hotel staff had created an effigy of her friend’s dead son in a failed attempt at a tribute on what would have been his birthday.
UK woman Karen Baker was staying at a Jamaican resort with friends Faye and Andrew Stephens, whose 22-year-old son Alex died in 2014.
The couple from west London have made an annual tradition of celebrating their son’s birthday since he died from a fall while on a trip to Barcelona with friends.
This year on his birthday the couple was on holiday with Mrs Baker, who is Alex’s godmother, so she arranged for workers at Royalton Jamaica Resort to decorate their hotel room with balloons and a cake. But what she found was a horrifying sight.
When the woman arrived at the room ahead of the couple, she saw the staff had created an effigy of the young man lying on the bed, made with of clothes from around the room.
On the bed beside the dummy were flower petals and leaves spelling out the words “We miss you Alex”.
Mrs Baker told BBC she was “utterly horrified” at the sight and took the effigy away before her friends arrived.
“Staff had gone through my friend’s wardrobe and stuffed the clothes with towels to make it look like a body on the bed. They even put tears down the face and a can of lager in his hand,” she said.
“I was absolutely horrified – as you can imagine I was sweating and shaking. We just didn’t want our friends to see it.
“I can’t believe somebody thought to do that”, she said.
A spokesperson from UK travel company TUI apologised to the family and said they investigated the incident with the hotel in Jamaica and believed it to be a “misunderstanding”, the BBC reported.
The family received a full refund after revealing the incident on the BBC Three Counties’ JVS show.
