RE dark tourism:
List members may be interested in the following
article which appeared in today's The Independent. As it is rather
long I have pasted in a short extract:
Welcome to StalinWorld
By Robert Chalmers 15 February 2001
You won't believe how bad it is (or even that it exists. But it does,
comrades, it really does). "Tasteless?" Mr Malinauskas stared out
towards the electric fence, the moat and the guard towers that
enclose StalinWorld, the theme park in which he is faithfully
recreating life in a Siberian labour camp. "I wouldn't say so."
Viliumas Malinauskas, the former heavyweight wrestling champion of
Lithuania, charges tourists the equivalent of 80p to enter the park,
with its narrow wooden roadways and clumps of birch trees. There are
plans to have visitors herded into a reception centre by guides
dressed as Red Army soldiers. As a family day out, critics say, it
represents an unpalatable cross between Disneyland and the Gulag.
Yet, undeterred, thousands of sightseers have already visited the
500-acre estate in the south of Lithuania, 80 miles from the capital
Vilnius. Malinauskas hopes the park will eventually attract two
million visitors a year. Certain refinements, such as the concealed
loudspeakers that play tape-recorded screams of women and children,
are not yet in operation. Coach parties, including school groups,
arrive every day. Visitors wander round the site, gazing up at the 53
huge metal statues of Soviet heroes dotted around. The sculptures, in
bronze, copper or iron, are up to 30ft tall and most weigh more than
20 tons. They were proudly displayed at prominent sites around
Lithuania before the country declared independence in 1990.
Full article can be accessd on http://www.independent.co.uk
locate with the search facility
Kevin.
Dr. Kevin Meethan
Senior Lecturer
Department of Sociology
University of Plymouth
Drake Circus
Plymouth
PL4 8AA
tel 01752 233222
fax 01752 233201
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