Where I come from originally is kind of a remote place, that relies on tourism. We already have a huge problem with everyone buying their second holiday homes there and pricing the locals out of buying homes (which is a big part of why I moved.) Anyway, during COVID, because it’s remote and sparsely populated, it had one of the lowest COVID rates in the country. As soon as the travel restrictions lifted, everyone descended on the place. There were mayors of towns on TV begging people not to come. But they came anyway, wrecked the place and left garbage everywhere, caused a huge COVID spike (in an area that has one hospital and a lot of elderly people), and when people complained about it we were told we should be grateful that the tourists are there spending money.
Luckily my family that still lives there were okay (you get good at not being where the tourists are after a while) but still. It’s an area that’s perpetually underfunded and neglected, and when it was at it’s most vulnerable and just needed people to be just a tiny bit considerate for a moment, they trashed the place, used us as their disposable COVID bunker and then made fun of us for being unhappy about it, not to mention putting my family directly in harm’s way.
The world seems to have largely moved on from that whole time now, but I will not forget this.
I agree. Since covid I lost my long held belief that humans are basically good.
Where I come from originally is kind of a remote place, that relies on tourism. We already have a huge problem with everyone buying their second holiday homes there and pricing the locals out of buying homes (which is a big part of why I moved.) Anyway, during COVID, because it’s remote and sparsely populated, it had one of the lowest COVID rates in the country. As soon as the travel restrictions lifted, everyone descended on the place. There were mayors of towns on TV begging people not to come. But they came anyway, wrecked the place and left garbage everywhere, caused a huge COVID spike (in an area that has one hospital and a lot of elderly people), and when people complained about it we were told we should be grateful that the tourists are there spending money.
Luckily my family that still lives there were okay (you get good at not being where the tourists are after a while) but still. It’s an area that’s perpetually underfunded and neglected, and when it was at it’s most vulnerable and just needed people to be just a tiny bit considerate for a moment, they trashed the place, used us as their disposable COVID bunker and then made fun of us for being unhappy about it, not to mention putting my family directly in harm’s way.
The world seems to have largely moved on from that whole time now, but I will not forget this.