Las Vegas: Lights and Shadows
Las Vegas is a window to two realities where human beings navigate juxtaposed in a sea of contradictions.
Text and photographs by Eduardo Barraza
Las Vegas, Nevada. Enero 17, 2007 - On the cold concrete of the east side sidewalk of Boulder Highway, the
slim figure of a woman walking is lighted up by the multicolor reflection of the lights of a casino’s marquee.
Cold as the concrete where the woman walks in a hurry, this winter night turns on a nebula of spectacular
and fascinating gleam over the extraordinary skyline of Las Vegas, a city of restless entertainment and
gambling. Walking southbound but without a fixed path, the woman −only a silhouette by now− quickly
disappears from the landscape as a shooting star, perhaps longing for better times when clients abounded,
and her long gone beauty used to sell.
Prostitution is illegal in Clark County, where Vegas –as Las Vegas is casually condensed− thrives. A micro-
universe in itself, “Sin City” excludes from its menu of tempting services those offered by sex workers, such
as the woman who faded away in the dark of the windy, chilly night on Boulder Highway. But just as this
unique metropolis blooms, so does activities of “ill fame or repute” −as Nevada ’s Revised Statute 244.345.8
spells it. Gambling, instead, is the center of this cosmos, where multibillions of dollars sustain the powerful
industry of entertainment, in the very city that the National Coalition for the Homeless and the National Law
Center on Homelessness & Poverty named in 2003 the nation's meanest city for homeless people.
Both homeless and destitute prostitutes saunter through Las Vegas’ streets. They are a harsh juxtaposition
in an empire where luxury and gluttony rule. Las Vegas’ countless lights are as innumerable as its shadows;
there, people without shelter and sex workers of scarce clientele hide and seek. Their social status places
them under a table of an abundant buffet, where these dispossessed human beings hardly get the crumbs
and leftovers of whatever may fall to them. But, in the midst of shiny floors, luminous signs, and majestic
buildings, is there anybody who really cares about homeless and downgraded hookers? People walk as if
they aren’t really there, ignoring them, as if they don’t exist. They are just silhouettes and shadows.
A few miles west from Boulder Highway, the hub of Las Vegas’ life, Las Vegas Boulevard −the strip− is the
artery where the incessant flow of tourists concentrates. There, an almost overwhelming world of appeal
bombards the brain with multiple options to entertain the mind. In this adult-oriented environment, Vegas’
attractions present the world in miniature: the Eiffel Tower, the Statue of Liberty, the Egyptian Sphinx
Pyramid, or the skyscrapers of New York −among others− giving tourists the sense of being in all these
places at once. The replicas of these famous world attractions make of Vegas a city of cities that virtually
condenses many places of the world into just a street. Vegas is a genuine art of imitation; its artificial
appearance is both eye catching and breathtaking.
Walking inside the casinos, the feet get a break from the hard concrete of the sidewalks, where people
navigate in awe, hypnotized by the virtually endless things to see. The nice and cushy carpets cover the big
areas of floor where slot machines dominate the scenery, and smoke from cigarettes cloud the panorama.
Gamblers, seduced by the probability of exchanging a few coins for a fortune, stare at slot machines or at the
tables where dealers deliver both good and bad luck. Most people lose not only their money, but their hope
of becoming rich instantly. Their optimism will renovate the next day, as their minds forces them to attempt
obtain, at least, what they have lost already. Some will continue digging desperately, eventually burying
themselves in an abyss of misery.
Those who evade gambling can still spend a small fortune in shows like Celine Dion’s, at the Caesar’s Palace,
where a packet including a room, dinner, and a limo ride can cost more than $1,500. Or how about getting a
$100 baseball autographed by fallen idol Pete Rose? Banned from Major League Baseball's Hall of Fame,
Rose's main income is generated by signing autographs at the Field of Dreams sports store at Forum Shops,
inside the Caesars Palace. Nevertheless, in the ocean of money that Vegas is, the social status of the
majority of people will remain intact; very few will be able to move a few steps up, but many will come steps
down drastically, leaving them disgraced and sunk in poverty. This is how Las Vegas sustains itself; richness
comes from the same people it attracts, coin by coin, expectation by expectation, and desire by desire.
Heading toward Downtown and Fremont Street − the original site where the gambling industry propagated
in the so called “Capital of Hedonism,” a newer, 10-year old attraction draws tourists and visitors to “feel”
the “Fremont Experience.” The “experience” is a $70 million investment intended to revitalize old casinos
such as the Golden Gate (originally named Hotel Nevada in 1906,) the oldest hotel in Las Vegas. The
“experience” is an awesome light and sound show created by a giant canopy –1,500 feet long and
approximately 100 feet high. The number of lights – more than 2 million, and the sound from speakers that
reach 40,000 watts– create a rather unique and impressive spectacle that literally magnetizes visitors. The
“Fremont Experience” is truly a sight.
Las Vegas, though, happens to be more than just a gleaming city. Luxury contrasts sharply with the
deterioration and abandonment of streets and buildings surrounding the strip. The other side of this city’s
face is unattractive and dull. Dilapidation of some areas seems to be the toll of the nonstop construction and
destruction of new and old casinos, respectively. In this sense, Las Vegas is a true Phoenix Bird – when the
life cycle of a beautiful hotel-casino ends, the old building is reduced to dust, from which a new, modern and
awesome new hotel-casino arises. But around the strip, there’s no apparent renovation, only a steady
decline, similar to that of those individuals who wander on the streets.
Life in Vegas brings together both extremes of human experience –richness and poverty– in the same
scenario, where lights and shadows blend into a single reality. There, a penniless and scruffy person can
literally walk next to billions of dollars and expensive clothes, a precipice between. The two ends of human
comedy and drama almost touch each other through a thin and shinny glass, each on its side, each on its
path, in far-off proximity from each other. Ultimately, Las Vegas is a window to two realities where human
beings navigate juxtaposed in a sea of contradictions, and where the empty stomach of a homeless or a
prostitute will still go hungry in the midst of a $31.99 brunch with unlimited champagne.
slim figure of a woman walking is lighted up by the multicolor reflection of the lights of a casino’s marquee.
Cold as the concrete where the woman walks in a hurry, this winter night turns on a nebula of spectacular
and fascinating gleam over the extraordinary skyline of Las Vegas, a city of restless entertainment and
gambling. Walking southbound but without a fixed path, the woman −only a silhouette by now− quickly
disappears from the landscape as a shooting star, perhaps longing for better times when clients abounded,
and her long gone beauty used to sell.
Prostitution is illegal in Clark County, where Vegas –as Las Vegas is casually condensed− thrives. A micro-
universe in itself, “Sin City” excludes from its menu of tempting services those offered by sex workers, such
as the woman who faded away in the dark of the windy, chilly night on Boulder Highway. But just as this
unique metropolis blooms, so does activities of “ill fame or repute” −as Nevada ’s Revised Statute 244.345.8
spells it. Gambling, instead, is the center of this cosmos, where multibillions of dollars sustain the powerful
industry of entertainment, in the very city that the National Coalition for the Homeless and the National Law
Center on Homelessness & Poverty named in 2003 the nation's meanest city for homeless people.
Both homeless and destitute prostitutes saunter through Las Vegas’ streets. They are a harsh juxtaposition
in an empire where luxury and gluttony rule. Las Vegas’ countless lights are as innumerable as its shadows;
there, people without shelter and sex workers of scarce clientele hide and seek. Their social status places
them under a table of an abundant buffet, where these dispossessed human beings hardly get the crumbs
and leftovers of whatever may fall to them. But, in the midst of shiny floors, luminous signs, and majestic
buildings, is there anybody who really cares about homeless and downgraded hookers? People walk as if
they aren’t really there, ignoring them, as if they don’t exist. They are just silhouettes and shadows.
A few miles west from Boulder Highway, the hub of Las Vegas’ life, Las Vegas Boulevard −the strip− is the
artery where the incessant flow of tourists concentrates. There, an almost overwhelming world of appeal
bombards the brain with multiple options to entertain the mind. In this adult-oriented environment, Vegas’
attractions present the world in miniature: the Eiffel Tower, the Statue of Liberty, the Egyptian Sphinx
Pyramid, or the skyscrapers of New York −among others− giving tourists the sense of being in all these
places at once. The replicas of these famous world attractions make of Vegas a city of cities that virtually
condenses many places of the world into just a street. Vegas is a genuine art of imitation; its artificial
appearance is both eye catching and breathtaking.
Walking inside the casinos, the feet get a break from the hard concrete of the sidewalks, where people
navigate in awe, hypnotized by the virtually endless things to see. The nice and cushy carpets cover the big
areas of floor where slot machines dominate the scenery, and smoke from cigarettes cloud the panorama.
Gamblers, seduced by the probability of exchanging a few coins for a fortune, stare at slot machines or at the
tables where dealers deliver both good and bad luck. Most people lose not only their money, but their hope
of becoming rich instantly. Their optimism will renovate the next day, as their minds forces them to attempt
obtain, at least, what they have lost already. Some will continue digging desperately, eventually burying
themselves in an abyss of misery.
Those who evade gambling can still spend a small fortune in shows like Celine Dion’s, at the Caesar’s Palace,
where a packet including a room, dinner, and a limo ride can cost more than $1,500. Or how about getting a
$100 baseball autographed by fallen idol Pete Rose? Banned from Major League Baseball's Hall of Fame,
Rose's main income is generated by signing autographs at the Field of Dreams sports store at Forum Shops,
inside the Caesars Palace. Nevertheless, in the ocean of money that Vegas is, the social status of the
majority of people will remain intact; very few will be able to move a few steps up, but many will come steps
down drastically, leaving them disgraced and sunk in poverty. This is how Las Vegas sustains itself; richness
comes from the same people it attracts, coin by coin, expectation by expectation, and desire by desire.
Heading toward Downtown and Fremont Street − the original site where the gambling industry propagated
in the so called “Capital of Hedonism,” a newer, 10-year old attraction draws tourists and visitors to “feel”
the “Fremont Experience.” The “experience” is a $70 million investment intended to revitalize old casinos
such as the Golden Gate (originally named Hotel Nevada in 1906,) the oldest hotel in Las Vegas. The
“experience” is an awesome light and sound show created by a giant canopy –1,500 feet long and
approximately 100 feet high. The number of lights – more than 2 million, and the sound from speakers that
reach 40,000 watts– create a rather unique and impressive spectacle that literally magnetizes visitors. The
“Fremont Experience” is truly a sight.
Las Vegas, though, happens to be more than just a gleaming city. Luxury contrasts sharply with the
deterioration and abandonment of streets and buildings surrounding the strip. The other side of this city’s
face is unattractive and dull. Dilapidation of some areas seems to be the toll of the nonstop construction and
destruction of new and old casinos, respectively. In this sense, Las Vegas is a true Phoenix Bird – when the
life cycle of a beautiful hotel-casino ends, the old building is reduced to dust, from which a new, modern and
awesome new hotel-casino arises. But around the strip, there’s no apparent renovation, only a steady
decline, similar to that of those individuals who wander on the streets.
Life in Vegas brings together both extremes of human experience –richness and poverty– in the same
scenario, where lights and shadows blend into a single reality. There, a penniless and scruffy person can
literally walk next to billions of dollars and expensive clothes, a precipice between. The two ends of human
comedy and drama almost touch each other through a thin and shinny glass, each on its side, each on its
path, in far-off proximity from each other. Ultimately, Las Vegas is a window to two realities where human
beings navigate juxtaposed in a sea of contradictions, and where the empty stomach of a homeless or a
prostitute will still go hungry in the midst of a $31.99 brunch with unlimited champagne.
| Hispanic Institute of Social Issues © 2006-2011 All rights reserved. webmaster@hisi.org |
| ADVERTISEMENT |
Eduardo Barraza periodista y escritor
mexicano, editor de la revista Barriozona, y
director del Insituto Hispano de Asuntos
Sociales. E-mail: editor@barriozona.com
mexicano, editor de la revista Barriozona, y
director del Insituto Hispano de Asuntos
Sociales. E-mail: editor@barriozona.com
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| Photographs by Eduardo Barraza HISI © 2007 |
Published by the Hispanic Institute of Social Issues in Phoenix, Arizona
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| HISTORY IS ABOUT TO CHANGE Grassroots Journalism |
CONTRAST Life in Vegas
brings together both extremes
of human experience –richness
and poverty– in the same
scenario, where lights and
shadows blend into a single
reality.
Photo by Eduardo Barraza
brings together both extremes
of human experience –richness
and poverty– in the same
scenario, where lights and
shadows blend into a single
reality.
Photo by Eduardo Barraza
