Ingela was welcoming right from the start. She was detailed in giving me the directions to her place from various train stations, and gave me a good preview of the location and neighbourhood.

Unfortunately for us, our arrival was not so smooth. Ingela had already told me that she would be out of town during our stay, but that her housekeeper would be kept in the loop on our arrival. However, when we arrived, no one knew where we should be placed. It's a good thing though that Ingela is well-known in that apartment block. It seems everyone knows her. People saw us looking lost we our luggage near the courtyard and asked if we were Ingela's guests. One kind man then ran up to look for the housekeeper, who came down after some time looking confused. She didn't know which apartment we were supposed to go (as it seems Ingela has quite a few units there). Luckily I had saved a photo of the aptm in my phone and that helped. Then came the next bad news: the one and only elevator in the building had broken down and they were trying to get it fixed after lunch. Another lady working for Ingela offered to let us store our luggage in the ground floor room that she was cleaning until our room was ready at 3pm. I was really hoping to get the room earlier than that.

Do note that the elevator (a newly-addded feature to a very old building) only served the top-most floor, which meant that if you stayed on any of the middle levels, you wouldn't have an elevator arriving at your level, which would be a problem for any wheelchair-bound persons, or elderly, or families with strollers. This was not clear since the listing indicated that there was an elevator in the building. My 75-year-old mother-in-law was travelling with us, and I have a two-year-old toddler. So, as it turned out, the elevator was not repaired until the last day of our stay when we were checking out, which meant a lot of very tiring climbs for my MIL and me (carrying the toddler).

While the apartment was really close to the subway station, it was quite a long walk to the Palace. With my young kids, I think we took about 20mins. The building is really old, and the neighbourhood is not the most ideal. It seems to be a mainly middle-eastern enclave (though I might be wrong). However, Ingela's beautifully renovated and modern apartment was a real relief and welcome. Things worked well and the apartment was comfortable and spacious. One of the bedrooms has a double bed and also a bunk-bed which provided much entertainment for my two girls. Even though she was out of town, Ingela was as responsive and warm as she could and truly apologetic about the elevator hiccup. To her credit, she's really a great host!