I just arrived home from a visit to Las Vegas, Nevada. I went there for a soccer tournement but I also had the pleasure of seeing the Bellagio Casino. I had never been inside a casino before, much less played roulette or the slots. I was with my parents, a friend, and her dad after seeing Cirque du Soleil and they decided to let me see what attracts millions of people to Vegas: gambling.
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| The Bellagio Casino, one of the nicest casinos in Vegas. |
The friend's dad, we will call him Mr. Jones, went to an ATM machine and withdrew a crisp $100 bill. Let me add that he paid a $5 ATM charge for that withdrawal. Next, we walked over to the Roulette tables, where Mr. Smith, the somewhat experienced gambler chose a table. He watched the table for a couple minutes and then sat down and exchanged his $100 bill for 20, $5 chips. Then he started betting. I watched, hoping he would "hit it big." He didn't. I think it took 5 minutes for his $100 to become property of the Bellagio Casino, leaving him with nothing to show for it except a desire to gamble more.
Don't get me wrong, he had fun, my parents had fun, and my friend and I had fun. It was very odd though. He had just lost $100 in about 5 minutes but he hadn't lost much in comparison to the majority of the people in the casino. The value of money at casinos is so different from any other place. At what other place can you spend $100 and have nothing to show for it? What does this say about us as Americans- or rather those that gamble, that they just give their money to these casinos with a small chance of "hitting it big?"
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