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James' Forum
Re: Sunday Morning
Posted By: James In Response To: Re: Sunday Morning
Date: Sunday, 30 January 2005, at 11:00 p.m.
(MilwaukeeMike)
Mike,
When you think about it, going on vacation to Jamaica is like going to a neighborhood where most of the folks live way below the poverty level, like some of the worst neighborhoods in Chicago or Los Angeles...
So why do tourists who go to Jamaica want to go back and work there running some cozy resort or similar business?
Worse, they don't even think of the local workers they would displace...
I once thought that I would enjoy working in Jamaica but I've been cured of that bit of fanciful thinking.
Especially in Negril, where I've noticed the whole tourist support industry is dog-eat-dog. Nobody appears to be talking to anyone else for fear that they might let slip some vital trade secret, like: "How they stay in business?" slip out.
Nobody in Negril seems to like trading information about anything.
In truth, things are changing in Negril, they always have been. If the Jamaican government was less corrupt and the police could be trusted to keep law and order, Jamica would have had a fair chance of attracting a large number of well-off retirees from Europe and North America, but it hasn't happened and probably never will.
Jamaica just has not put out the welcome mat for ex-pat retirees. Negril has plenty of places where small developements of retirement housing could be built. Lots of these retired folk could easily have paid taxes and even afforded local domestic help for cooking and cleaning and property maintenance, but now prices in Negril are at the same level as they are in Miami or any other Carribean destination.
Every day that goes by Jamaica loses a little bit of the magic that makes it special.
What a downer.
Here's breakfast at Home Sweet Home.
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