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Across the Fence: Disneyland Is Somewhere Else

January 18, 2019 By Susanne Bacon

Only recently we traveled to Las Vegas, Nevada, to celebrate my husband’s round birthday. I have been there three times before within the past 12 years, always on business: as a trade show reporter, as the leader of my magazine’s reader’s trip group of 40 persons, and as a business consultant for a trade show association. Now was the first time on an entirely private basis – and I expected a different experience. It was to become one, indeed.

Maybe it was because of the time of year, between Christmas and New Year’s Eve. I remember the Strip and adjacent areas as way quieter and more walkable during November or in early February in past years. Above all the Las Vegas Boulevard between the Mandelay Bay Hotel and Circus, Circus used to be dominated by grown-ups. It was what most Germans know from TV and from the movie theaters – a city of business, beautiful architecture, and artful design, with entertainment targeted towards adults.

Las Vegas is definitely a dream for architects and designers – and a playground for adults.

I was never prepared for what we walked into during the last days of December 2018, though. Las Vegas seems to have become more up-front with adult entertainment than ever. Huge photo billboards advertising “Girls to your room” (not leaving open to what purpose) were circling on truck beds up and down the Strip. Every ten yards on the sidewalk men were pressed cards into their hands, presenting naked girls and phone numbers. Hotel lobbies were featuring large advertising for burlesque shows. The air was reeking of marihuana smoke and cigarette smoke, inside malls and casinos as well as outdoors. People were openly drinking alcohol in the street, carrying colorful yard-long glasses along the sidewalk. Burlesque dancers, shivering in their revealing outfits, were accosting anybody passing by about photo opportunities. Through each and every single open door music was blaring to drown out the neighbor business’ sound machines.

And in the middle of this circus: dozens of families walking with strollers, dragging tots, reining in wide-eyed teenagers. I saw at least a dozen little toddlers throw tantrums on casino floors after ten at night. I watched two teenage girls shrink into themselves at a slightly bawdy magic show; their attention-seeking mother had wanted the lime light for herself – instead the kids took the brunt. I noticed children blocking out the noise by pressing their little palms against their ears. Sure, I also heard the excited cries of a little boy when his family was approaching the “Excalibur” with its magnificent castle architecture. I just wonder what he must have thought when instead of finding a beautiful princess inside there was just another large casino with pubs and other rather grown-up amusement.

Burlesque dancers in “full” costume amble along the Strip every few scores of yards, offering photo opportunities.

Don’t get me wrong. None of the gorgeously designed hotels with their malls of shopping-enticing eternal late-afternoon illumination, glamorous show cases, and intriguing eateries have lost their magic themselves. But they are definitely no playground for kids – they were not meant to be that in the first place. And when mothers sit down on a casino floor with their kids and start drawing pictures with them on a piece of paper spread across the carpet – I’m not sure whether they wouldn’t have been happier in a different place altogether.

How do you explain this to your kids?

Not my children, not my business? Near the end of the Strip we found a billboard recruiting “Little Darlings”. It made me wonder about the mindset of parents taking their kids to a place that still is mainly a playground for adults and not gainsaying so. It made me reflect the after-show collection for helping addicted high school students in Las Vegas. And whether Disneyland wouldn’t have been a better choice for some families out there. After all, Snow-white and Cinderella will still hold more magic for little ones than the bare bosoms of female strangers and the endless ka-ching of slot-machines.

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About Susanne Bacon

German-American journalist Susanne Bacon is also the author of the Wycliff novel series (available in local bookstores or on Amazon). The latest, published in 2020, is Suddenly Snow. Her Suburban Times column “Home from Home” is also available as a book now. Its German title is “In der Fremde daheim". She lives with her husband in Lakewood, Washington. You can contact her at Facebook. If you are interested in an express delivery of Susanne's columns, subscribe to her Bacon's Bits email, delivery free to your inbox. Click here to sign up.

Comments

  1. Sharlene says

    January 19, 2019 at 9:05 am

    Thank you for your well-written assessment of Las Vegas. I, too, have been there several years ago and wasn’t comfortable then either. This should be a warning to some of just how far we humans can and have strayed from making decent entertainment choices for adults and children. As long as we buy it, “they’ll provide it.

    • Susanne Bacon says

      January 19, 2019 at 3:07 pm

      Thank you, Sharlene. Indeed, you have to compartmentalize if you want to enjoy Las Vegas. There are fun shows, the architecture and interior design are mind-blowing, and the desert plateau is awesome. But parents should think twice, indeed, why they want to bring there kids there and whether there are not more suitable places. Makes it a lot more fun for everybody.

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