Blog by Keya Acharya

Cancun, Dec 9, 2010 – When you look out from the press room at the centre of the Cancun talks, or from your hotel balcony, or from the window of your moving car, it’s a cobalt sea, dotted with teasing little swirls of white foam, bordered by swaying palm trees along a curvaceous coast of narrow white sands.

Credit: Diana Cariboni/IPS.

Every minute of the day, the deep, lulling sound of the ocean waves coupled with the rustling of the swaying palms surround you.

During the day in the hotel lobby, noisy throngs of holiday-makers, some barefooted or sandal-clad, towel-wrapped go by dropping sand and water in messy puddles, which seem especially so if you are not part of the gang; grapes really are sour! They yell across at each other, continuing their own enjoyable conversations.

And in the night, the beach and the restaurants in the resort turn into an idyllic romantic holiday for couples. Drinks are included in the daily rates, as is the food, which is plentiful and flowing, albeit within time limits as some from the IPS group found out ruefully. Couples lounge twirled together on reclining chairs watching Mexican dances and hearing live bands crooning sweet nothings.

Credit: Diana Cariboni/IPS.

None of them looks as though he or she knew what COP means, or that it is being held here in this palm-tree haven. It is equally hard to imagine that the holiday makers would worry whether their solid wastes were being treated, or if Cancun’s municipality generated all the energy and electricity being used, from renewable energy sources.

In other words, it seems difficult to get serious about anything in this atmosphere. It seems the most unlikeliest of places to discuss something as contentious, oftentimes abstract and difficult as the climate talks.

I hope however, that that’s not the reason for the talks still swaying around, albeit in a more gentler manner than Copenhagen last December, in tune with the palm trees surrounding the COP venue at the spa and golf resort, Moon Palace.