4.12.2006
Mytravel Journey started with 45 minutes delay. Passengers were mainly white British package-holiday tourists. I got a feeling that most of the people were accoustomed to this sort of tours. At the plane, there were very few children. Mytravel, as it states, sells “flight seats”, which explains the range of services included into and excluded from the ticket. On board, apart from a cheap, really bad lunch and a slice-of-greasy-pizza dinner, everything is subject to purchase. For instance, to be able to use multimedia screen I had to buy headphones for ₤2.5. 300cc water was ₤1 and a small can beer was ₤3. Through out the journey, air-stewards constantly promoted consumption by cutting-off the audio-video services and promoting duty-free products and lottery tickets.
As soon as arriving to the Punta Cana Airport, Dominican girls with funny fruit basket hats, whom I thought to be working for Mytravel tours, welcomed tourists. At the arrival door, couples and families posed with the girls to a digital camera, which cheerfully and officially started their “holiday in the egzotic paradise island”. Being the only single passenger, I had to pose alone in the middle of two girls. One of the girls, with a sexy and over-exited tone, whispered to my ear “welcome to the Dominican Republic baby”, which I thought was a reference to the widespread sex tourism.
Tourism is one of the major economic sectors in the Dominican Republic. All-inclusive holiday resorts constitutes the bulk of this activity. Western tourists buy their holidays from their home-countries through a non-dominican tour operator, such as Thomas Cook, Mytravel etc. They take one of these charter flights, stay in one of the segregaded resorts for a week or two, which are mainly owned by transnational holiday companies. Usually without contributing to the local economy directly, they enjoy the beautiful sun-sea-beach trio and go back to their countries. Through out this cycle, they can survive without spending a peso. Thus, real benefit and added-value of tourism for a lower class Dominican (or anyone living in a tourism country) is very low. Construction of holiday resorts have detrimental environmental, social and cultural implications. To built resorts, many people are forced to evict their homes. These resorts consume excess amount of resources such as water and energy, the latter being extremely scarce in the country. They contribute to the de-forestation of native species such as mangroove forests. Service sector jobs, with being over-time and under-paid, have tremendously explotative working conditions. Sex tourism is an integral part of this business, both men and women from West come to the paradise in search of “love”, which I will share my own experiences soon.
Mytravel Journey started with 45 minutes delay. Passengers were mainly white British package-holiday tourists. I got a feeling that most of the people were accoustomed to this sort of tours. At the plane, there were very few children. Mytravel, as it states, sells “flight seats”, which explains the range of services included into and excluded from the ticket. On board, apart from a cheap, really bad lunch and a slice-of-greasy-pizza dinner, everything is subject to purchase. For instance, to be able to use multimedia screen I had to buy headphones for ₤2.5. 300cc water was ₤1 and a small can beer was ₤3. Through out the journey, air-stewards constantly promoted consumption by cutting-off the audio-video services and promoting duty-free products and lottery tickets.
As soon as arriving to the Punta Cana Airport, Dominican girls with funny fruit basket hats, whom I thought to be working for Mytravel tours, welcomed tourists. At the arrival door, couples and families posed with the girls to a digital camera, which cheerfully and officially started their “holiday in the egzotic paradise island”. Being the only single passenger, I had to pose alone in the middle of two girls. One of the girls, with a sexy and over-exited tone, whispered to my ear “welcome to the Dominican Republic baby”, which I thought was a reference to the widespread sex tourism.
Tourism is one of the major economic sectors in the Dominican Republic. All-inclusive holiday resorts constitutes the bulk of this activity. Western tourists buy their holidays from their home-countries through a non-dominican tour operator, such as Thomas Cook, Mytravel etc. They take one of these charter flights, stay in one of the segregaded resorts for a week or two, which are mainly owned by transnational holiday companies. Usually without contributing to the local economy directly, they enjoy the beautiful sun-sea-beach trio and go back to their countries. Through out this cycle, they can survive without spending a peso. Thus, real benefit and added-value of tourism for a lower class Dominican (or anyone living in a tourism country) is very low. Construction of holiday resorts have detrimental environmental, social and cultural implications. To built resorts, many people are forced to evict their homes. These resorts consume excess amount of resources such as water and energy, the latter being extremely scarce in the country. They contribute to the de-forestation of native species such as mangroove forests. Service sector jobs, with being over-time and under-paid, have tremendously explotative working conditions. Sex tourism is an integral part of this business, both men and women from West come to the paradise in search of “love”, which I will share my own experiences soon.
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