Translation of ambience in German

So she and I went to the food store to buy some lunch. However, the store had almost no food and one could pay in local currency or in US dollars. One could really see the country's poor economy.
One could see in every touristic site and traveler's office advertisement for language schools and private teachers. The teachers usually gave the CV with an nice picture of themselves. It looked funny.
By the way, after my horrible experience I had changed the hostel. The place was not really better but much more quiet and near the Ocean. I woke up with the sound of a siren. It was the police.