This is the second hotel I stayed at in Kiev. I first stayed at Oselya. The room at Oselya is much nicer, cleaner, and has a huge bathroom compared to Express. I chose Express this time because it was supposedly a fairly "new" hotel, it's closer to the city and to the train station. My first impression of the room was that it looked old. For example, the carpet in my room looked weathered, discolored, etc. The bathroom was really tiny, especially the sink. It wasn't exactly what I was expecting especially because I chose the premium single room. But it was OK. As another person mentioned, "it gets the job done", but I definitely recommend staying at an apartment instead.

The first night, I noticed lots of water bugs coming from under the shower. I killed a few of them as they were crawling by my feet (about 5). The next morning, I asked for a different room and instead the staff looked at me like I was crazy and asked me to show them the bugs, and they will clean them. So a member of the cleaning staff that didn't speak any english came to the room and was staring at dead bug guts on a towel that I used for a few minutes. I thought it was a bit strange, she rambled some ukr things, I left the room and when I came back the bathroom smelled like heavy chemicals. OK. It did absolutely nothing to get rid of the bugs. I didn't want to bother complaining again. So I lived with the bugs for the whole week. Overall I killed about 25 of them (sorry bugs).

If not for the major bug issue, this would be a decent hotel. It's a short walk to the train station if you plan on visiting other cities. There's two restaurants - the one on the 16th floor owned by the hotel and the restaurant/bar downstairs Jaardin. A couple of blocks from the hotel is Sunduk pub if you want something tastier. The internet works good - you have to pay like $12 or 12 grivnas.

The following week I decided to stay at an apartment instead. For about $100/night I got a beautiful modern apartment one block from the main street. The bed was much more comfortable, the apartment was huge, and overall I was much more satisfied living there. I definitely recommend getting an apartment instead of trying to find the best "budget" hotel.