BRITISH TV presenter Adrian Chiles described for the Guardian his visit to Dubrovnik during the pandemic, as well as his conversation with the tour guide Roberto De Lorenzo, whose attitude took him a bit by surprise.
In the text titled "Tourists aren't so bad – just ask Roberto the Dubrovnik guide," he first describes his arrival. He said that he put the mask on Heathrow and didn't remove it until he left the terminal building in Dubrovnik, only to be asked by the taxi driver to put it back on when he got into his cab.
He compared the entrance to the restaurant in the hotel to the scenes from MASH, where the doctors scramble to be ready for incoming wounded.
"The weather has been unusually poor, but the old town is enchanting in any light. And a guide called Roberto De Lorenzo has made me see tourism in a different light. He is from a long line of residents of the old town. I said how nice it must be for him to have a bit more space this year, without the cruise ships disgorging their human cargo every five minutes. But he had no truck with this line of thought," he wrote.
"When the cruise ships come, and thousands and thousands of people are packed in here, in the summer heat, it feels to me like the most authentic experience you could have of Dubrovnik, as it was in the height of its trading powers. You think then it was quiet and peaceful? No, it was totally crowded and mad, just like it normally is here at this time of year. Who are we to complain? It was the lively interaction of crowds from around the world that made us great in the first place. If we'd stayed closed to the world, we'd still be a fishing village," Roberto took him by surprise with his answer.
"I hadn't thought of it like that. Roberto is like a living embodiment of the great trading era. He is fluent in English, German, French, Spanish, Italian, and Mandarin. But wherever you are from, look him up if you happen this way," Chiles concluded.