Las Vegas: Allure or Abhorrence?

Imagine this: your spring break is coming up and you can’t wait to get out of town for a little while. Your parents have kept where you’re going a secret and finally the day you’ve been looking forward to for months has arrived. The possibilities of where you’re headed are racing through your head, all while one thought persists: please let it be warm! Anywhere from Disney World to Mexico sounds like heaven. Then, your parents drop the location. All of the excitement builds up and you realize you’re headed to the glamorous, exotic…Las Vegas.

As a kid, you don’t know much about Las Vegas other than adults really like it there and it gets hot. Disappointment starts to stir inside of you. Your parents show you where you’re staying and at least it has a giant roller coaster on the outside (see picture below for reference).


Your parents reassure you that it will be great; you guys will shop, see all of the cool hotels, maybe even see a show at night. Unsure, you board the plane and begin your journey to the magical oasis that is Las Vegas.

Upon landing, it doesn’t seem so magical. The McCarran Airport is filled with Starbucks and slot machines, nothing unusual to the city that is Vegas. The cab ride to the hotel is the most fascinating. No matter what time of the day it is, it’s bright on the Las Vegas strip and you gaze in awe at all of the people and lights. The trip ends up being better than you expected, but looking back on it now, why do people bring children to Las Vegas?
The core idea of Las Vegas is inappropriate. Gambling and booze mixed with sex and capitalism. It is every parent’s nightmare. Why is Las Vegas so attractive? As Joan Didion said in “Marrying Absurd”, Las Vegas “seems to exist in the eye of the beholder” (Didion). Is it that adults find Las Vegas more entertaining purely because they can do more than people under 21 or, are adults more easily drawn to the allure of consumerism that Vegas brings?
All I can say is that when I went to Las Vegas for spring break, the most alluring thing to me was M&M’s World. Although I was younger, I don’t think I could have gotten lost in M&M World as adults so often get lost in the bright lights of the Las Vegas strip.




Comments

  1. Murryum FarooqiMarch 17, 2019 at 1:25 PM

    I really loved the style you wrote this in, it was very entertaining to read.I haven't been to Vegas, but like any main tourist attraction it seems to be based around consumerism. From your description, I'd even say like an adult Disney land where it's kind of flipped. Since in Disney land it's always the parents complaining about how "they just want to take all our money!" and in Vegas where you say you were the only one that noticed how consumerist it was haha.

    ReplyDelete
  2. molly capelliMarch 17, 2019 at 5:27 PM

    woah maddy, what an amazing job you did with this blog, props for using a crazy personal experience to DIRECTLY relate to the piece! Great job!

    ReplyDelete

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