text: MGM Grand Hotel Casino is one of the more affordable casinos on the strip and there is a reason why It is pretty trashy Or at least the people who frequent itnnThe outside aesthetic of the hotel makes little sense and has no continuity with the inside of the hotel which at least is nicer The first thing you notice upon walking in is an overpowering scent of roses a very large lobby with no place to sit and a neardeafening noise of casino games and crowds to your left as you try to check innnTRY to check in that is my point to make here My sister and I arrived at around pm the rooms we reserved were booked via our Mother who was flying in later that evening with my Dad to meet us for our weekend Birthday vacationnnWe all share the same last name all our names were booked for the reservations and the INCREDIBLY RUDE woman behind the desk refused to let us check innnWhen asked why she explained it was a hotel policy the cardholder who paid for the rooms be present at check in As frequent travelers we have NEVER heard of such a ridiculous security measure especially since she had our names listed and we had IDsnnAs it turns out our parents flights were delayed and the baggage checkin fee was ridiculously high not to mention we did not trust our bags to strangers handling thousands of bags a day an easy mixup or theft and our trip would be ruinednnSo with no place to sit and the refusal to be flexible mind you rooms are usually good to check in after pm at any other place in the world our room which had the first night PREPAID sat empty while my Sister and I had to KILL NINE HOURS lugging our bags for a place to sit that was not in front of a slot machine where we would be losing our lungs to horrible cigarsnnWe assumed Vegas would be more competitively priced regarding food thinking a sitdown meal or two would kill time such was not the case The prices of places to eat are higher than ever The nearest affordable place we found was a SUBWAY shop In Vegas terms the cost of your predictable runofthemill fast food was twice as much as you would normally pay anywhere outside of NYCnnSo now we are tired hungry and have hours to gonnGetting back to the MGM this is where we really lost our marbles Turns out there is a place within the casino by the pools called Television City You sign up to be part of a focus group and are PAID to watch horrible TV Pilot episodes rate them and in less than an hour it is an easy plus some pretty good coupons for the overpriced Starbucks and Hagaan Daz nearbynnSure you lose some brain cells watching mindless TV but you have a place to sit you get paid you get discounts at other shops in the casino and for us it would have been a great timekiller as we waited for our Parents all day nnBut did the lady behind the checkin desk apologetically mention this to us Not at all Nope We did not discover it until the next day When our parents arrived it was well after midnight before we really checkedin and yes MGM still charged us for the whole night with no apology They have a strict policy against Customer satisfaction No wonder the company is going under and owes a ton of money to Dubai World PropertiesnnThe hotel rooms have NO AIR You can blast that thermostat all you want but the room will not get any cooler You can crack open a window too but that is all they allow you to do is crack it The windows do not open It is not a jam it is seriously how they are designed You can only open a quarter centimeter contraption on the windowsill for fresh air Our view was of the airport WhatevernnThe next day we decided to look for the pool That was one thing we were looking forward to the most it was a vacation so let us relax by the pool and catch some sun yes nnNOnnThe distance from the hotel room to the elevators to the casino floor to the pool line yes you wait in a turnstyle line to get to the pools is ridiculous Not to mention you have to parade THROUGH the casino past the nice restaurants that only have views of the hallway in your swimsuit Hell nonnLuckily we have the sense to not gross out other guests with our nonsuper model bodies in swimwear but that common courtesy is not mutual Almost every girl at the MGM Grand dresses like a trashy hooker minus the trashy hooker body The best word to describe some of the more rednecked guests would be Trailor Trash Spring BreaknnFinally arriving at the pools we realized that our hotel was the WalMart of Las Vegas hotels The more beautiful pools were closed off and two were open and CROWDED The hours were pm or something ridiculous and there was no room to swim Not to mention they were blasting the most horrible collegerocknnDrunk girls throwing up in the water Frat Boys acting like animals children peeing in the pool old people in bikinistotal nightmarennCirque Du Soleils Ka was AMAZING