Every month, it seems, brings news of another paradise lost, and every year new Edens fall like palm trees before a hurricane--first Tahiti, then Bali, then Hawaii, Mykonos, Sri Lanka. The process is, in a sense, irresistible: after all, paradises cannot get better any more than children can grow purer. Each passing season (and each passing tourist) can only bring to the world's forgotten areas new developments--and in a never-never land, any development is a change for the worse. Elysium cannot be universally enjoyed until it has been discovered, and once it is discovered, it is lost.
Sometimes an Eden is...