“All We Need is a Great Big Melting Pot”

(I thought about giving all my blog posts song titles, but then got a bit slackaroony about it).

I love the big multi-ethnic gene pool I find myself in at this hotel. In particular, I love seeing people in all shapes size and colours pass by- the giant Germans and  Eastern Europeans, the tiny Asians. The children who are interesting mix of happy, inter-continental unions, half-Thai toddlers carried lovingly in their French, or Australian, or German  father's arms; Russian women from Tartastan and beyond,  who look more Asian than European. Thai tourists formt he north taking a break down south. And all the well and fashionably-dressed Singaporeans and Malaysians.

 Lisa the Malaysian is a blowsy, curvy girl with Betty Boop eyes and a healthy appetite for breakfast . Her hair, like mine, goes to frizzy ringlets in the humidity. Her husband is a good-looking chap of few words and short, chunky nugget stature. He appears to understand everything I say, but is more tentative with his spoken English, so she is the more likely to respond.

Then there is the sweet Thai breakfast waiter, who has the narrowest hips I’ve ever seen on an adult male. I suspect the smart uniform accentuates this, elongating his body and making his legs look short, but he is of a type seen everywhere- gentle, unpretentious, slim Thai men who nod in graceful sawat dee.

This morning as I head poolside after breakfast, I watch a young Muslim couple, perhaps honeymooning newly weds, in  one of the downstairs ‘pool access’ villas across from mine. He is already in the pool, skylarking and singing silly songs in Urdu, which makes her laugh from her balcony sun lounger. She is wearing a bikini on her curvy, full-breasted body, over which she had thrown a filmy, deep blue modesty dress. He is tall and beefy, clean-shaven, so apparently not orthodox, though somewhat hirsute of chest. He keeps trying to coax her into the water, but she is clearly unsure. I pass him doing my ‘morning constitutional laps’ (the pool  is easily big enough), his arms flailing in an exhibitionist show of unskilled freestyle bravado.

 I’m reminded of my times in Paris, where I saw many Muslim women in full burka, out with hubby buying risqué lacy things in the lingerie shops I visited to find my own larger cup lace bras. There is such a disparity between the private and public worlds of married Muslim women. If I were a Muslim woman travelling in a Buddhist country, with such a tactile, laisser faire husband, I reckon I’d abandon the burka in favour of a bikini, and pretend for a while.

I wonder what they make of this free-spirited Aussie woman whose breastroke and  ‘crawl’ are quite expert? I have taken to feeling self-consciously busty in my 1950s-look bathing suit, so I’m instead wearing a gym top and a sheer skirt over knickers, a more minimizing two piece arrangement, in the pool which at any rate dries more quickly.

One of the funniest scenes I’ve witnessed since being here is that of a Russian man approaching seven foot, being swept along the road by a crowd of Japanese women, like Gulliver being carried aloft by the Lilliputians. Perhaps it is sea-faring travel that inspired the Gulliver story- maybe Viking Norsemen or Slavic explorers, who found themselves on island full of comparatively diminutive natives?

On the island tour, the Australo-New Zealand fifty-something  couple who become my travelling companions for the duration, agree with me that the Russians are the rudest. I try to refrain from cultural stereotyping ,  but I’m quite shocked at the antics of the Russians I’ve crossed paths with, such as  the family who sits opposite us on the ferry. The Father is okay, but the mother, teen daughter and twelve year old son repeatedly push roughly past me, and queue jump in order to be first to everything. They cling tenaciously to ‘their’ seats that ensure they will stay dry, are the ones who demand the best life jackets, eat the most pineapple slices, and knock back the most bottles of coca cola, provided along with water as complimentary on-board snacks. I swear my son will never get away with such disrespect. I surmise that perhaps it’s a recent memory of fighting over the last potato that causes this behaviour among well-dressed, middle class Soviets who are now free to sail the seven seas? My equally aghast companions nod in pensive agreement .  

We have all found that certain Asian people, too, for instance Chinese mainlanders and those from Hong Kong, tend to be friendly and conversationally polite, ever willing to take  a photo…yet seem oblivious to queues and ‘first in first served’ etiquette. I suspect that being acclimatized to population density (Hong Kong is the most densely populated place in the world) anaesthetizes people to things like personal body space and evokes a kind of survival of the fittest response. In my case, it is sometimes a group-against-one thing: they seem to consider that, as I am but one woman travelling alone, my rights to the table or bench or chair are forfeit to their mob rights. There is no point working myself into a lather by or arguing the toss, so I usually end up relinquishing.

I guess when you have thousands and thousands of foreigners passing through your place of employment, you earn the right to sterotype. As in Bali, The Thais, including the friendly bubbly ‘modern girl’ tour boat tour guide Yaya, once they feel safe to drop their guard a little, confide that they like Australians and Kiwis. We are apparently perceived  as easy-going, open and friendly, unlike Russian and French people, who are aloof, disrespectful of local customs (such as shoe-removal), impossibly demanding , and view the staff as their personal slaves.

But surely this  place must look and seem like paradise to your average apartment-dweller in many Russian cities, or indeed Paris, so I’m baffled as to how completely it seems to fall short of their expectations. Perhaps they see Asia as a submissive mistress on whom to dump their western industrialized frustrations, desperately prostituting herself to the lowest bidder, afraid to answer back? I think the Thais are driven by something of a work ethic, and a sevice ethos, but even they seem to know when a line has been crossed. Respect is respect, wherever you go. I for one have nothing but deep gratitude for these charming people who have enabled me, despite my comparatively lowly social status back home, to have a relaxing holiday.