What I Discovered by Visiting Every Disney Park - NYTimes.com - 0 views
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Disney haters have long criticized the company’s overseas parks as products of cultural imperialism: the evil Mickey Mousification of the globe.
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I thought about what visiting the 13 parks had taught me about how Disney operates, particularly overseas. Far from monolithic, the company’s theme park empire is full of quirky surprises. Yes, the notion of Disney as a cultural bulldozer needs to be retired — especially as it builds a 14th park in Shanghai that will be the first to do away with a Main Street-style entrance. (Instead there will be a vast garden that will accommodate Chinese cultural festivals.)
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To compete with the splendor of Paris, Disney spent lavishly to open the resort in 1992, and its ornate landscaping has only improved with age: Austrian black pines, endless rhododendrons, pathways that hug serpentine streams. Of all the Disney castles, the one here is the most extravagant.
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“We made some mistakes early on, but we learned from them,” a senior Disney executive once said to me. “How can you judge us without seeing for yourself?”
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In France visitors stroll along those glorious garden paths — no rushing to the rides. Disney World in Florida is a melting pot endurance test, while the original Disneyland in California relies less on tourists than on annual pass-holding locals. Tokyo visitors, once completing that initial sprint, stand politely and quietly in tidy lines; Hong Kong attendees from mainland China show little interest in personal space, even leaning on one another in the ride queues, and go gaga for simple go-in-a-circle rides that would bore most Americans.