Royal Caribbean: Party on in Haiti

Considering the smell that is mentioned over and over again by every journalist down there, I'm guessing the passengers on the ship weren't too happy.

 

The guy in the photo wishes he went on the golf excursion instead.

 

Oh, probably not. Labadee is 80 miles away from Port-au-Prince on Haiti's north coast.

It's kind of an oddity --- it's exclusively leased to Royal Caribbean, employs 300 people, allows another 200 craftsmen and artisans to sell their wares on the premises, has contributed the largest portion of Haiti's tourist revenue since the mid-1980s (including but not limited to a $6-per-tourist fee paid to the government, bringing in about 7,000 people a week, which adds up to over $2 million a year) and is completely fenced off from the rest of Haiti. Allegedly, when Royal Caribbean first opened the resort port they didn't even tell visitors they were in Haiti.

http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0125/p01s02-woam.html

 

That's pretty sad/funny.

Disney has a couple of "private islands". I guess this is their equivalent.

If it's just an empty beach, it could be just about anywhere.

 

Haiti's PM says the more tourists the better:
http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/Tourists+welcome+Haiti+Bellerive+says/2481994/story.html

 

That story has a quote that's extremely relevant to the way this thread started:<blockquote>There was criticism earlier from some well-meaning types that it was indecent for cruise ships to continue docking at Haitian resorts untouched by the killer earthquake and tourists to frolic on beaches their beaches.

For Bellerive, such concern is sadly misguided in that the tourists inject money into the shattered Haitian economy at a most critical time and show the world that not everything in the country is devastated.</blockquote>Hondo? ... Hondo? ... Hondo?

 

Not kidding, this just showed up in my email:

 

I want to respond:

Dear Adam:

Thank you for thinking of me. My main concern, at this time, is your obsession with the ownership and usage of the word 'Labadee®.' Perhaps if the Haitians were this diligent, they could get out of this mess...if they charged a buck every time someone made reference to Haiti®, they could probably pay for an entire water filtration plant by next Thursday. It's good to know you are closely monitoring the this trademark situation.

Also, I left pair of flipflops in the closet on my last voyage, if you find them please return, I am enclosing postage just in case.

Regards,
21®

 

I'll be on a Royal Caribbean ship in five weeks and I've been to Labadee two or three times before on cruises. It's far away from the earthquake devastation and not stopping there for a couple of months would seriously hurt the local economy. There's absolutely no harm in stopping there and there's plenty good that comes from stopping there.

BTW, my cruise this year is not scheduled to hit Labadee, which is at or near the bottom of my list of cruise ports.

 

I'm dyslexic. Every time I see the word "Labadee", I think of ...



... Larabee from Get Smart.

 

I think of Lumidee.