Authors: Michel Houellebecq
'I'd be quite tempted to go with Noureddine,' said Valerie. 'He's incredibly talented, and he's already worked on quite a variety of projects.'
'Yes, he is the best of the bunch; but I wonder if he might be a bit overqualified for the job. I can't really see him doing marketing for a travel company, I see him in something more prestigious, more arty. He'll get bored here, he won't stay. Our target market really is middle-of-the-road. And his parents being beurs, that could cause problems. To appeal to people, we have to use a lot of clichés about Arab countries: the hospitality, the mint tea, the festivals, the Bedouins . . . I've found that kind of thing doesn't really go down too well with Arabs here; in fact a lot of them don't really like Arab countries.
'That's racial discrimination . . .' Valerie said sardonically.
'Don't be stupid!' Jean-Yves was getting angry; since he had come back from holiday, he was clearly overstressed, he was beginning to lose his sense of humour. 'Everyone does it. A person's origins are part of their personality, you have to take them into consideration, it's obvious. For example, I'd happily take a Moroccan or Tunisian immigrant - even one much more recent than Noureddine -to handle the negotiations with local suppliers. They have a foot in both camps which is a real advantage - the people they deal with are always wrong-footed. On top of that, they come across as someone who's made it in France, so the guys respect them immediately, they don't think they're going to be ripped off. The best negotiators I've ever had have always been people like that. But here, for this job, I'd be more tempted to take Birgit.'
'The Danish girl?'
'Yes. Purely as a designer; she's also very talented. She's really anti-racist - I think she lives with a Jamaican guy -she's a bit stupidly enthusiastic about anything exotic, on principle. She has no intention of having children just yet. All in all, I think she's the right fit.'
There was perhaps another reason, too, Valerie realised some days later when she surprised Birgit putting her hand on Jean-Yves's shoulder. 'Yeah, you're right . . .' he admitted as they had coffee by the vending machine, 'my rap-sheet is getting worse, now I'm getting into sexual harassment . . . Look, it's only happened once or twice and it won't go any further than that - in any case, she's got a boyfriend.' Valerie looked at him quickly. He needed a haircut. 'I wasn't having a go at you . . .' she said. Intellectually, he hadn't slipped at all: he was still capable of flawless assessments of situations and people, had an excellent eye for a financial set-up; but he seemed increasingly like a man who was unhappy, adrift.
They began to assess the customer-satisfaction surveys; a large number had been filled in, thanks to a prize draw in which the first fifty won a week's holiday. At first glance, the reasons for their dissatisfaction with Eldorador Standard were difficult to establish. The customers were satisfied with the accommodation and the location, satisfied with the food, satisfied with the activities and the sports offered; but that said, fewer and fewer of them were returning customers.
By chance, Valerie happened on an article in Tourisme Hebdo analysing consumers' new values. The author claimed to use the Holbrook and Hirschman model, which focuses on the emotion the consumer feels when faced with a product or service; but the conclusions were nothing new. The 'new consumers' were described as being less predictable, more eclectic, more sophisticated, more concerned with humanitarian issues. They no longer consumed to 'seem', but to 'be': more serenity. They had balanced diets, were careful about their health; they were slightly fearful of others and of the future. They demanded the right to be unfaithful out of curiosity, out of eclecticism;
they favoured things which were solid, durable, authentic. They had ethical leanings: more solidarity, etc. She had read all these things a hundred times: behavioural psychologists and sociologists transplanted the same words from one article to another, one magazine to another. In any case, they had already taken all these factors into account. The Eldorador villages were built of traditional materials, following the architectural traditions of the host country. The self-service menus were balanced, with ample room given over to selections of fresh vegetables, fruit, the Cretan diet. Among the activities on offer were yoga, relaxation therapy and Tai Chi. Aurore had signed the ethical tourism charter, gave regularly to the WWF. None of these things seemed sufficient to halt the decline.
'I think people are just lying,' said Jean-Yves, having reread the summary of the customer surveys a second time. 'They say they're satisfied, they tick the box marked "Good" every time, but in reality they've been bored stiff for the whole holiday and they feel too guilty to admit it. I'm going to end up selling off all the resorts we can't convert to the Discovery formula and really go for it on the activity holidays: add four-by-fours, hot air balloon trips, traditional feasts in the desert, trips in dug-out canoes, scuba diving, white-water rafting, the works
'We're not the only ones in the market.'
'No . . .' he agreed, disheartened.
'We should try spending a week at one of the clubs, incognito, not for any particular reason, just to see what the atmosphere is like.'
'Yeah . . .'Jean-Yves sat up in his armchair, took a sheaf of listings. He flicked quickly through the pages. 'Djerba and Monastir are a disaster, but I think we're going to drop Tunisia altogether anyway. It's already too built-up, the competition are prepared to drop their prices to ludicrous levels; given our positioning, we could never follow them.'
'Have you got any offers to buy?'
'Oddly enough, yes. Neckermann are interested. They want to get into the Eastern European market: Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland . . . very bottom of the market, but the Costa Brava is already saturated. They're interested in our Agadir resort as well; it's a reasonable offer. I'm quite tempted to sell to them; even with southern Morocco, Agadir isn't taking off- I think people will always prefer Marrakech.'
'But Marrakech is awful.'
'I know . . . The strange thing is that Sharm-el-Sheikh isn't doing all that well. It's got a lot going for it: the most beautiful coral reefs in the world, trips to the Sinai desert
'Yeah, but it's in Egypt.' 'And . . .?'
'I don't think people have forgotten the terrorist attack in Luxor in 1997. After all, there were fifty-eight dead. The only way you're going to sell Sharm-el-Sheikh is to take out the word "Egypt".'
'What do you want to put in its place?'
'I don't know, "The Red Sea" maybe?'
'OK, "The Red Sea" it is.' He made a note and went back to leafing through the figures. 'Africa is doing well . . . that's strange. Cuba comes rather low. But Cuban music, that whole Latin vibe is hip isn't it? The Dominican Republic is always full for example.' He read the description of the Cuban resort: 'The Guardalavaca hotel is almost new, it's competitively priced. Not too sporty, not too family-oriented. "Live the magic of Cuban nights to the wild rhythms of salsa ..." Numbers are down 15 per cent. Maybe we could go and have a look at the place: either there or Egypt.'
'Wherever you want, Jean-Yves . . .' she answered wearily. 'In any case, it will do you good to get away without your wife.'
August had settled over Paris; the days were hot, almost stifling, but the good weather didn't last: after a day or two a storm would come, the air would suddenly become cool. Then the sun would come out, the mercury in the thermometer, and the pollution index, would begin to rise again. To tell the truth, it was of limited interest to me. I had given up on peep-shows since I had met Valerie; I had also given up, many years ago, on the urban adventure. Paris had never been a moveable feast for me, and I could think of no reason why it should become one. Still, ten or twelve years ago, when I was starting out in the Ministry of Culture, I used to go out to clubs and bars that were 'unmissable'; all I remember was a slight but persistent feeling of unease. I had nothing to say, I felt completely incapable of starting a conversation with anyone at all, I didn't know how to dance either. It was in such circumstances that I started to become an alcoholic. Alcohol didn't let me down, never once in my life: it has been a constant support to me. After about ten gin-and-tonics, I occasionally - pretty rarely, all in all it must have happened four or five times - managed to find the requisite energy to ask a girl to share my bed. The results, in general, were pretty disappointing: I couldn't get it up, and I usually fell asleep after a couple of minutes. Later, I discovered the existence of Viagra; elevated blood-alcohol levels limited its effectiveness a lot, but if you boosted the dosage, you could still get somewhere. The game, in any case, wasn't really worth the candle. In fact, before Valerie, I had never met a single girl who could come close to a Thai prostitute; or maybe when I was very young, I managed to feel something when I was with girls of sixteen or seventeen. But in the world I moved in it was a complete disaster. The girls weren't remotely interested in sex, only in seduction - and even then it was a kind of elitist, trashy, bizarre seduction that was not the least bit erotic. In bed, they were simply incapable of the least thing. Either that, or they needed fantasies, a whole lot of fastidious, kitschy scenarios, the mere mention of which was enough to make me sick. They liked to talk about sex, that much was true, in fact it was their only real topic of conversation; but they didn't have the slightest sensual innocence. Actually, the men weren't much better. In any case, the French have a penchant for talking about sex at every possible opportunity without ever doing anything; but it was seriously starting to depress me.
Anything can happen in life, especially nothing. But this time at least something had happened in my life: I had found a lover and she made me happy. Our August was very quiet. Espitalier, Leguen and most of the other senior executives at Aurore had gone away on holiday. Valerie and Jean-Yves had decided not to make any important decisions before the Cuba trip at the beginning of September; it was a break, a period of calm. Jean-Yves was a bit better. 'He finally decided to go see a whore,' I learned from Valerie; 'He should have done it long ago. He's drinking less now, he's calmer.'
'All the same, from what I remember, hookers aren't up to much.'
'Yeah, but this is different, these girls work via the internet. They're pretty young, some of them are still students. They don't take many clients, they pick and choose, they don't do it just for the money. At least, he told me it's pretty good. If you want we can try it sometime. A bisexual girl for the two of us: I know men are turned on by all that and, actually, I like girls too.'
We didn't do it that summer; but the simple fact that she had suggested it was tremendously exciting. I was lucky. She knew the different things that kept male desire alive - well, not completely, that was impossible, but let's say enough to make love from time to time, while waiting for everything to come to an end. In fact, being aware of such things is nothing, it's so easy, so pathetic and easy; but she enjoyed doing these things, she took pleasure in them, she enjoyed seeing the desire rising in my eyes. Often, in a restaurant, when she came back from the toilet, she would place the panties she had just taken off on the table. Then she liked to slip a hand between my legs to make the most of my erection. Sometimes she would open my flies and jerk me off right there, hidden by the tablecloth. In the mornings, too, when she woke me with fellatio and handed me a cup of coffee before taking me into her mouth again, I would feel a dizzying rush of gratitude and gentleness. She knew how to stop just before I came, she could have kept me on the brink for hours. I lived inside a game, a game which was tender and exciting, the only game left to adults; I moved through a universe of gender desires and limitless moments of pleasure.
Chapter 7
At the end of August, the estate agent in Cherbourg phoned to tell me he had found a buyer for my father's house. The guy wanted me to drop the price a little, but he was prepared to pay cash. I accepted immediately. Very shortly, I would, therefore, receive a little more than two million francs. At the time, I was working on a proposal for a touring exhibition in which frogs were to be released onto playing cards spread out in a mosaic-tiled enclosure - some of the tiles had been engraved with the names of great men of history, such as Diirer, Einstein or Michelangelo. The lion's share of the budget was allocated to buying the decks of cards: they needed to be changed fairly frequently; the frogs had to be changed too, from time to time. The artist wanted, at least for the inaugural exhibition in Paris, to use Tarot cards; in the provinces, he was prepared to make do with ordinary playing cards. I decided to go to Cuba for a week with
Valerie and Jean-Yves in early September. I had intended to pay my way, but she told me she would sort things out with the group.
'I won't get in the way of your work . . .' I promised.
'We're not really going to work, you know, we'll just behave like ordinary tourists. We're not going to do anything much, but that in itself is very important: we're going to try and work out what's going wrong, why there's no atmosphere at the resort, why people don't come back thrilled from their holidays. You won't be in the way at all; on the contrary, you could be very useful.'
We took the mid-afternoon flight to Santiago de Cuba on Friday September 5. Jean-Yves hadn't been able to stop himself bringing along his laptop, but he seemed relaxed in his pale-blue polo neck, ready for a holiday. Shortly after take-off, Valerie put her hand on my thigh; she relaxed, her eyes closed. 'I'm not worried, we'll work out what's wrong . . .' she'd said to me as we were leaving.
The transfer from the airport took two and a half hours. 'Negative number one . . .' noted Valerie; 'we must check and see if there's a flight into Holguin.' In front of us in the coach, two little old ladies of about sixty, with blue-grey perms, twittered constantly, pointing out items of interest as we passed: men cutting sugar cane, a vulture wheeling over the fields, two cows returning to their byre . . . They had the air of ladies determined to be interested in everything, they seemed dry and difficult; I got the impression they wouldn't be easy customers. Sure enough, when the rooms were being allocated, twitterer A doggedly insisted on having a room next door to twitterer B. This sort of demand had clearly not been anticipated, the receptionist couldn't understand at all, the resort manager had to be sent for. He was about thirty, with a head like a ram and a stubborn air, his narrow brow furrowed with worry lines, in fact he looked a lot like the actor Nagui. 'No problem, okay . . .'he said when the issue had been explained to him; 'No problem, okay, my dear lady. This evening is not possible, but tomorrow we have some people leaving and we will change your room.'