Adrian. Thanks for sharing this feature which is supporting evidence surrounding the importance of the well known National Tourism Host Programmes implemented by The Bahmas and Jamaica over 30 years. We spend a lot of time in Barabdos on product ( plant) without equally addressing the other equally important component of the product (people).

I used to work for a company years ago as an interpreter. Duing that time, one of the things i gleaned was that there was a category of tourist that wanted according to the Americans to “embedded” in the tourism plant

In a sentence, an the few of you who know me know how impossible that is, a few of the tourists wanted to go native not in the derogatory fashion, the wanted to stay with Bajans.

In 1997, several years later I fashioned this concept into a proposal called Heart of Barbados, (long before the current product, but this is another story) met with *** and discussed how it should roll out

In brief HOB (i) effected an outreach to specific communities in the island (ii) vetted and enrolled specific homeowners and housing stock (iii) upgraded such housing sock where necessary e.g. Mama Maycock Bush Hall (now deceased) would have here house revamped to living standards so that (iv) similarly vetted tourists (one did not want pedophiles in your home) could come stay in Bush Hall with the respected Mama Maycock and (v) for a period of x days which the tourists who opted into this Heart of Barbados experience would decide, it would transfer the authentic, non duplicatable experience of meeting and living with a Bajan.

Besides the obvious benefits of increasing/improving tourism tourism housing stock and permitting $$ to get to community denizens, I sought to promote an intangible yet integral component for tourism.

I will make up a word for that intangible now, “We-ism”

What “We-ism” was/is spoke to creating an ethos/sentiment that permitted the tourist (s) to reside within the grass roots communities, in accomodation that was conquerable to a hotel, in the home of Miss Maycock (or any similar individual) whom the fellows under the Tamaring tree at that time, respected.

They are the “white people” staying as Miss Maycock would parlay into a lot more integrated an experience than dem is staying at Hotel X.

That was 1997 when the Bajan reputation for friendliness was intact.

Like is said the name issue is another story for which i still have the written correspondence just in case someone wants to level a defamation lawsuit. I neither have the resources of MP ** nor the legal skills of MP ** to ward of a lawsuit.

Can a Heart of Barbados programme work now in this global recession, coupled with changing diluted bajan values experience, I doubt it, what I do know is that tourists, after a while, develop friendships in the community and seek to venture out of the hotel into our community.

I envisioned creating a particular experience for a cadre of tourist who wanted “more’, some 17 years ago.

One thing that our collective destinations must pray for is that Cuba continues to be excluded from the tourism market place by the US because once the embargo is raised from them, officially, we really going to see what ethno-historic experiences, friendly citizenry, beautiful beaches and superlative tourism plant is going to do to our tourist throughput, Barbados Island Inclusive notwithstanding.

It seem like the people among us, who love our country so much and find it hard to sit idly by and let Barbados become another failed state, become the ones that this system seems to fear the most and then employs all the tools at its disposal, to destroy.

@ David [BU]

Please check your confidential mail

On another end….The NISE campaign launched by those, incld. Ms. Kim Tudor …with this big able PINK fella in a top hat called PERCY plastered on sign boards all ova BIM smacks of racism and demeanour and is derrogatory to Bajans. Now everyone knows I am not one for being huffy ….. BUT c’mon Ms. Tudor are we Bajans BIG Tall PINK PIGS pretending to be of English gentry all for a tourises dollar?……Now I dun know the color changed had passed the mind….and PO to unna too…

David,

March Long Stay Arrival Figures.
Sadly, the decline of 9 per cent in both January and March plus a poor December (2012) is going to take a lot to recover from. Not just the numbers but the higher revenue generated in the critical 4 winter months. It was encouraging to see the UK come back with an increase of 5.4 per cent but the USA (down 10.4 per cent) and Canada (down 4.1 per cent) is very troubling, especially when Canadian economy is relatively strong and the climate has been favourable for us.
Even if the new BTA initiative, Barbados Island Inclusive, generates an additional 15,000 visitors, it will not make up for January and February, either in numbers and certainly not in revenue.
Quite how close we are to ‘getting the right people’ and ‘the right systems’ in place, which the MOT stated were his objectives, I am not sure.
In my humble opinion, summer is going to be tough.

ADRIAN LOVERIDGE

Forget about Rob Barrett.

I hope that you are not suffering from Amnesia, but do you recall Payne telling you ADRIAN LOVERIDGE that you are not indigenous enough to represent hotels in Barbados or words to that effect?

Soon after that he was removed from his post, I don’t know if you had something to do with that, but that is not the point.

How do you feel about this case between him and Hinkson? And who are you backing?

Adrian

Are you backing Hinkson?

A good reason to be mindful of letting tourists, who are really strangers, mix with the local populace and sleep in their homes……….one time i remember a school giving an assignment to it’s female students to go on the beach and survey tourists, i was appalled at the danger they were exposing these girls to, tourists are also criminals, pedophiles and the worst kind of predator to unleash on anyone……………this news story is now epidemic in the US, everyday you see another predator charged and they are all female………..these are the kinds of tourists who visit the islands.

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/santa-fe-teacher-allegedly-raped-student-18-article-1.1335989

Well Well
A man your age should not be shocked by this.

Even in the Hotel they interfere with the MAIDS especially. Also the Waitresses, Front desk clerks.

When they cant get what they want they claim that the staff steal their things. When we do checks of their luggage we find the same items that they claim were stolen.

Both men and women.

Many of them come down here looking for pussy of one type or another.

If you cant take the heat stay out of the kitchen!

Carson………………i know the tourist have been allowed to run rough shod over the hotel workers and citizens, Sandy Lane is a good example, with their scam artists for foreign managers (one they had to get rid of after the union debacle) ran great scams with their compadres acting as tourists in the hotels, while the local workers were labeled thieves……………..tourism continues to be a double-edged sword.

By the way Carson………………..i am all female, just like to call things as they are without delusion or pretense.

Well Well

Happens all the time.

I can give you another story.

There is this guy who runs an upscale Restaurant here in Barbados. He came down to Barbados as a beach bum. Hardly any useful skills at all. He could not get a job in America, believe it or not.

This is important, he is a White American, remember this.

While here the man gets a pick at a restaurant with no restaurant skills at all. Rapidly he moves up the ladder at the restaurant climbing up on the backs of black workers who were there for years keeping the restaurant afloat. Then lo and behold he becomes the General Manager of the place.

Beach Bum, never worked in a restaurant in his life. Now he is living the good life. Well appointed expensive apartment paid for by the restaurant, Audi car, medical insurance, trips back home, all paid for, etc.

I saw him only last week and I had to say to myself, it is wonderful to be White in Barbados.

Where else but Barbados can one rise from Beach bum to General Manager in short order.

That would never happen to a black person no matter how qualified.

Carson………………you have to remember, the blacks on the island continue to allow this to happen with their complacent attitude to others, but a downright snake like attitude to each other………………gotta change that mentality and move away from backstabbing each other.

“I recall one old years night the restaurant put on their usual old years night dinner, the F&B Manager wanted to charge $100.00 for dinner. but he(Beachbum) said no, make it $350.00 and you will see how this place fills up with locals wanting to play important.”

This is also a huge problem on the island, ordinary humans trying to play more important than other ordinary humans, people like that foreign manager will always see a way to capitalize on stupidity and ignorance……….in the bigger countries, these want to be more important people are correctly categorized as wannabes.

Well Well | May 6, 2013 at 10:54 AM

Tell me about it.

Adrian

Are you aware that Delta airlines is making its last flight out of Guyana today? Or is this the sort of information you like to keep quiet about?

@Carson,
It is no wonder the man became manager. He was able to assess the types of people his establishment could attract and the prices they would pay, and if the place made money out of it don’t BLAME anybody. It is good management.

all wunna got to do is get rid of the annoying begging ,hustling ,bothersome ,negroid,but then again they are practically the same as the low class scum that come to barbados to holiday and stay drunk the whole time.
i keep telling you the hassle, noise ,high prices,poor service,
a person can go somewhere much more beautiful and not be intimidated by the local scum.
good luck.
hope your dollar dont get devalued soon.
would be a pity. and i hear canada looking at stopping the off shore tax havens barbados offers.
too many people on a tiny island.=== nasty,
Adrian for governor of the world bank.lol

@ Carson C. Cadogan | May 6, 2013 at 1:06 PM |
“Millertheanunnaki: Since when is defending one’s race “cussing”?”

Sorry to play the ‘Race’ card, CCC, but don’t you find it unexplainably strange that you have to stoop so low as to try to defend a group that make up over 90% of the population? What or whom are you defending them from or against? The bogey irrelevant white man aka white shadows in the spectre of the JADA boys? Is it the BLP or the IMF?
Or do you see them the black ‘sheeple’ as a bunch of fools easily manipulated and controlled and greatly in need of your protection and beneficent guidance?
If you are the representative and defender of the majority in Bim then they are certainly well cursed and may God have mercy on their souls. Attacking people of other racial backgrounds will not save your sorry asses.
Just remember CCC, before you can help someone else you must first liberate your own self both in body and mind. Like the safety instruction on the airplane in case of an emergency you must first put on your oxygen mask before trying to help others struggling with theirs. Bajan blacks need to don their economic oxygen (forex) masks very, very soon. Are you prepared to help or do you want to see them suffocate along with your asphyxiation from the lack of imported material sustenance and victuals?
You don’t want to see your man Sinckliar having to make a forex rationing choice between paying T&T for fuel and importing food to stock the shelves at Cost-U-More, do you now, CCC? Then get of your lazy stupid butt and save the tourism industry from further collapse. Sugar is dead and international business has a date with the Canadian Tax Executioner. Maybe Hants, the Sergeant and Alvin Cummins can use their well-heeled connections and arrange for a stay of execution.

@millertheanunnaki if I had well-heeled connections I would not have time to be blogging.

However the Harper government is probably more concerned about the members and financiers of their own party so they will give them enough time to do damage control.

There is also another problem for Canada and that is the dominance of their major banks in low tax jurisdictions.
That is the reason for a possible stay of execution.

@ CCC…Ban all dee ” White Devils” from Bim.. we en need dem money anyway. You en know we is the hardest in the the world…We can mek it wid out no blasted tourists…dem duz ask for drugs & duz be bothering dee maids in dee hotels for sex & ting… stupse.. we had enough of dat Sh*te…
Carson you dee mann !!

Love it …CCC When people like Rosalina think you make sense it is time to worry. So a black woman from Jamaica is allegedly touched by black people from Barbados pitting two black govts against each other in a court system that is presided over by black judges and somehow it is the white mans fault. I nobody can figure out why your country is screwed up?

That is what i admire about the owner of Crane, he goes out there and looks and finds his own tourists, same with Royal Pavilion, Sandy Lane, always full to capacity because they made a name for themselves in the international area, without welfare from taxpayers. Players who have been in the business for more than a decade have absolutely no excuse.

Adrian Loveridge quotes somebody who mentions “a better arrival experience.”

That person, obviously, should be fired immediately because that person, obviously, is a dunce who’s spent much too much time reading rubbish marketing material.

I do hope you’ve enjoyed “engaging” with me in this “online experience”.