Las Vegas, The Magic of 'Sin City'

Article and photos: Phan Quoc Vinh

A city with a complicated history

Las Vegas is the most populous city in the state of Nevada, the capital of Clark County and a city famous for its resorts, casinos, dining areas and related entertainment that everyone wants to visit at least once. It is the 28th most populous city in the United States and has many "scary" nicknames such as "Vegas - Gambling Capital of the World", "City of Sin", "Capital of Your Second Chance in Life", "Where the World's Capitals Marry"... Some Americans jokingly say that Las Vegas should be called "Lost Wages". The casinos and hotels have so many bright neon lights that many people call this desert city "City of Lights" without exaggeration.

Las Vegas was founded in 1905 as a small train station. At that time, there were only a few buildings in the middle of the desert. Las Vegas officially became a city in 1911. In 1946, a gambling mob boss, who was associated with the American Mafia, named Bugsy Siegel, built the first casino in Las Vegas, which is famous to this day. For various reasons, he was killed in 1947. This made both him and Las Vegas even more famous.

In the early 1950s, tourists came to Las Vegas not only to gamble but also to see atomic bomb tests in the desert outside the city. Back then, people did not know it was dangerous, they even thought it was interesting to watch. With the development in the next period, Las Vegas became the most populous American city founded in the 20th century, a similar title held by Chicago in the 19th century.

The city has been used as a setting for many movies and TV shows. In addition, it also has the highest number of churches per capita of any major city in the United States. So Las Vegas is very famous for its wedding chapels. Like all other places in Las Vegas, the wedding chapels here are open 24 hours a day. The way to organize a wedding is simple. The couple only pays a few dollars for a license and they can get married immediately without having to wait for anything else! For many years, Las Vegas has been the choice for the happy day of the lives of famous movie stars.

Full of magic to welcome the distant gods

When it comes to "Customer is King", Las Vegas is probably the entertainment paradise that every King wants to visit at least once. I myself have been to many places, but after coming here, I don't seem to want to go anywhere else...

Everything in Las Vegas seems expensive, but the rooms are only half the price of other places, many places cost only as much as a buffet meal ticket. Because people know that when they come here, no one hides in their room to sleep, but definitely goes out to eat and gamble. The massive hotels in Las Vegas are very special because when you enter them, it is like entering another world. Some hotels are like ancient Egypt with the towering sphinx, others are like the tropical island Treasure Island with bustling waterfalls. Some are like the magnificent New York City with the Statue of Liberty, some represent a corner of Paris with the Eiffel Tower soaring into the blue sky.

The Roman statues and the Venetian floating streets are recreated in other nearby hotels connected by free internal trains. So just arriving in Las Vegas, I have the feeling of “Going around the world in just…one day” instead of taking 80 days like the classic adventure novel first published in 1873 by French writer Jules Verne.

Restaurants have a variety of high-class buffet dishes at affordable prices, luxury restaurants with specialties from each country are also very diverse, but perhaps they only make a small profit because the reason is that hotels mainly make money from the massive casinos everywhere to serve the gambling needs of tourists.

These hotels also always have world-famous top entertainers performing, such as big music shows by the Bee Gees, world diva Celine Dion, pop princess Britney Spears, the band Human Nature, 80s rock band Meatloaf, one-time famous singers Rod Steward and Elton John, reenactments of the King of Pop Michael Jackson, The Beatles... Then there are comedy shows by famous comedians, the show of comedian Terry Fator: "The Voice of Entertainment" with puppets that once made the stage of America's Got Talent crazy or open-mouthed with magician David Copperfield. All tourists will have the feeling of "Once in a lifetime" so it is acceptable not to hesitate to spend a few hundred dollars for a beautiful location to admire their idol!

Along with the entertainment centers are famous branded shopping areas with many thousand dollar brands. When "accidentally" wandering into large shopping areas, visitors will be given discount vouchers and directions so that when they run out of money, they will know how to get out. For example, the discount in the branded street in Caesar Palace hotel is quite generous but only for total bills over... thousand dollars.

After eating and shopping to your heart's content, visitors return to their rooms to rest and of course have to pass through the hotel's gambling center. The jingling of the machines and the joyful cheers of the winners are like a fascination that makes your feet stop slowly and stay rooted in this place. At every big hotel, visitors will be enthusiastically welcomed by the staff and just need a credit card to get free access to several big casinos, free buffet tickets, hundreds of dollars in your gambling account as well as a free hotel room for the next time you come here. Just having a tiny plastic card with the word credit card and your name on it will make everyone become a god of this Las Vegas area immediately! And if you don't have it, it's okay, just put cash in the machine and you can try your luck because when you come here, you will see slot machines everywhere, from the airport to the hotel, from the lobby to near the restroom area. Anytime, anywhere you will be invited to insert money without knowing the rules of the game, then press and pray for the blessing of the lucky god of “Wheel of fortune” (like the magic hat often shown on VTV3) to fall on your head! Who knows, maybe with just 25 cents, you will become a millionaire after just one press of the button?

I also tried dozens of slot machines, the luckiest time was when I put in 1 USD and won 50 USD after 2 bets. The rest mostly lost, so the more I lost, the more I was stimulated to continue playing to recoup because everyone around me was cheering, making me jealous.

Finally, I returned home in one piece, leaving that city of temptations behind, but still feeling regretful. I was so absent-minded that even while eating, I could still hear the heart-wrenching sound of the slot machine's winnings ringing, and when I slept, I still dreamed of flying in the sky of Las Vegas, preparing to bring a suitcase of money to become a tycoon in the city... Some mysterious magic kept haunting me.

The Thanh