Desmond HenryTREASURE BEACH:
I HAD to go back to Montego Bay last weekend. My nephew Andrew Henry, who resides in San Francisco got married, and along with his new bride Kristin, brought the entire affair to the Half Moon Hotel. It was typical Half Moon style - classy, first-class, memorable.
All the first-time guests who came in, raged non-stop about the country's beauty and the hotel's exquisiteness. I told them that such performances were "par for the course" with the Half Moon. Many vowed to extend their say, or come again.
Andrew, a stockbroker in the San Francisco stock exchange, is typical of a bright young breed in the US. Upon graduating college a few years ago, one of his aims was to become a millionaire by the time he was 30. I have no reason to believe he has let himself down. But all was not sweetness and light.
Driving into Montego Bay from the western end, I was able to bypass the residential filth in the city centre. So far, so good. I had, however, to deal with that stretch between the end of the airport runway and the Half Moon entrance.
That's the heart of the town's resort centre. I'm not sure which was worse the road surface or the highway landscaping. Both are in need of urgent attention, repair and rehabilitation.
Especially the stretch between Ironshore and the Holiday Inn.
Is there not someone in the Parish Council or Public Works with a sense of what constitutes acceptable highway appearance in a major resort centre. When for example, verges and roadsides are cut by a cutlass wielder, and the residue thrown back on the roadside to dry and rot; this might be acceptable for a roadside in Johns Hall, but to meet the visual test in a prime resort centre is just not good enough. And these road side trimmers are they ever instructed or taught what to do? Or are they among those who are "too big" to be taught? Must we just accept their own interpretation of 'bushing' without any understanding of visual harmony or environmental order? And then those overhanging branches that are either too long, or too many. Are they to be trimmed with a pattern in mind, or are they all just bushes to be chopped? Who discusses roadside symmetry or approves landscaping options? Where's the supervisory vigour that directs all of this? Who's in charge of highway beautification?
To the casual eye, it looks as if what passes for Christmas work on all of our Jamaican roads, is practised to the same extent in most of our resort, stylistic centres. And while to those who believe that bushing is bushing, deserving of no better artistry than that of chopping grass; to that extent our resort highways, verges and roadsides remain a constant shame on our country's competitive face, and no one in our main resort centre sees anything wrong with disorder, chaos and a lack of beauty in MoBay. In many ways our showpiece capital is close to being a national embarrassment.
When the late Vernon James was head of the country's public gardens and horticultural centres, Hope Gardens and the roads leading into and out of it, were an inspiration to every Jamaican. Many went home and copied what they had seen at Hope.
Today, we have 'butu-ised' almost every area of outdoor charm and glamour. Nothing is pre-eminent anymore, especially in areas of class, style and picturesqueness. Well, you know what? Those are precisely the qualities that matter most in the countries where most of our competition resides. Show me a tourist centre outside of Jamaica, and I will show you a well-landscaped city, with graceful palms along its highways, numerous beds, of everblooming foliages, clean streets, ample sidewalks, green verges, wide spaces, and a prevailing spirit of human pride and freshness.
We have no such attributes in our resort centres anymore, and if we don't hurry and do something about it, those who come to my nephew's wedding at the Half Moon might in fact return, but only to find that the other half of the moon that they loved so much, is nothing but a doomed, disharmonised crater.
THE BOTTOM LINE:
The best cure for drunkenness, is to have a good look at a drunk while being sober.
Desmond Henry is a marketing strategist based at Treasure Beach, St. Elizabeth.
