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May. 7th, 2008 10:54 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lolabobsHoliday things:
Gran Canaria - has spots of beauty, the palm trees are lovely, the skies clear and the sun brilliant. But where we were was like some kind of surreal township. Or in fact the exact opposite. There was no evidence of reality, of real life. Of homes or people or day to day living. The only buildings we saw were holiday complexes and hotels, entertainment/shopping/restaurant centres and tourist shops. It is the first tme I've ever stayed in a holiday resort like that, so perhaps it's normal, but it seemed so funny. The map we were given is evidence, absolutely nothing marked except the hotel sites.
The people we spoke to, the waiters and restaurant folks (I wanted to say restauranteurs but I know that's not how you spell it!) were great, and full of chat and cheer. One man told us he had met people from 60 different countries and spoke with them all. He asked us where we come from and in between serving went and looked us up on the map and came back to talk about the surrounding area. He also talked to us about the bible and what it meant in an academic sense to him. All the 'staff' like him that we spoke to appeared so friendly and outgoing and happy in their jobs. (And I know it's a job and that's what they're menat to do, but I only have to think to the serving staff in the local restaurants here to know that that means nothing!)
Our hotel was slightly out in the middle of nowhere (travel agent miss-sell, the '10minute' walk to the beach was a 20 minute bus ride, and the only entertainment or restaurants were 20 minute walk away - taxis only 3 euros though,so we managed).
Once you reached the 'centres' competition was so strong that every restaurant had a man outside to lure you in, chat and cheer and flirting constantly. You walked nowhere without being regaled with "Hello Honey!", "Beautiful Lady" and the like - whch was nice actually. All tongue in cheek and non offensive and quite cheery.
The hotel was nice - we had a self catering bungalow, with seating and a kitchen (although the kettle took over 35 minutes to boil even when contaning only the tiniest amount of water), I slept on a mattress on the floor as P couldn't contemplate sharing a room and this way gave us a little privacy and space.
Erm, the beach was massive, there were sand dunes and palm trees and parrots and lizards and it was pretty.
Gran Canaria - has spots of beauty, the palm trees are lovely, the skies clear and the sun brilliant. But where we were was like some kind of surreal township. Or in fact the exact opposite. There was no evidence of reality, of real life. Of homes or people or day to day living. The only buildings we saw were holiday complexes and hotels, entertainment/shopping/restaurant centres and tourist shops. It is the first tme I've ever stayed in a holiday resort like that, so perhaps it's normal, but it seemed so funny. The map we were given is evidence, absolutely nothing marked except the hotel sites.
The people we spoke to, the waiters and restaurant folks (I wanted to say restauranteurs but I know that's not how you spell it!) were great, and full of chat and cheer. One man told us he had met people from 60 different countries and spoke with them all. He asked us where we come from and in between serving went and looked us up on the map and came back to talk about the surrounding area. He also talked to us about the bible and what it meant in an academic sense to him. All the 'staff' like him that we spoke to appeared so friendly and outgoing and happy in their jobs. (And I know it's a job and that's what they're menat to do, but I only have to think to the serving staff in the local restaurants here to know that that means nothing!)
Our hotel was slightly out in the middle of nowhere (travel agent miss-sell, the '10minute' walk to the beach was a 20 minute bus ride, and the only entertainment or restaurants were 20 minute walk away - taxis only 3 euros though,so we managed).
Once you reached the 'centres' competition was so strong that every restaurant had a man outside to lure you in, chat and cheer and flirting constantly. You walked nowhere without being regaled with "Hello Honey!", "Beautiful Lady" and the like - whch was nice actually. All tongue in cheek and non offensive and quite cheery.
The hotel was nice - we had a self catering bungalow, with seating and a kitchen (although the kettle took over 35 minutes to boil even when contaning only the tiniest amount of water), I slept on a mattress on the floor as P couldn't contemplate sharing a room and this way gave us a little privacy and space.
Erm, the beach was massive, there were sand dunes and palm trees and parrots and lizards and it was pretty.
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no subject
Date: 2008-05-08 07:43 pm (UTC)I've noticed that in places like this, there comes an invisible line (a street, certain building, tracks, etc) where suddenly it switches from resort-land to real-life land.... and you feel like you've been yanked from Disney to the ghetto in like 2 seconds....
no subject
Date: 2008-05-09 11:27 pm (UTC)So strange and quite sad really.