The Thing about Tourism…
How 11 months of backpacking changed my perspective on traveling
I loved Lisbon.
Six years ago when I visited the city, I could get lost in the old town, mesmerized by the white walls and quaint doors without encountering another tourist.
People smiled back as I walked past. In a nameless restaurant at the top of some narrow steps, the cook didn’t speak any English but patiently communicated with me in hand gestures what the fresh fish of the day is, and gave me a tasting glass of their house wine free of charge because I was a foreign guest to her city. At night in a small, cozy Fado restaurant, the attentive audience didn’t say as much as a single word during the hour-long performance of Portugal’s folk music.
Two weeks ago, I went back to Lisbon for the first time. I could barely recognize the place. Streets were filled with tourists with their wheeled luggage, and hand-peddlers who seek pity from said tourists. I see café staff with the same disdaining looks as their counterparts in Manhattan, Paris, or other tourist-ridden destinations. Souvenir shops appear from every inch of cobblestone wall, and at every given hour, you’ll encounter waiters inviting you in for a set lunch in a restaurant where diners talk over the Fado musicians.
Tourist arrivals to Portugal have been growing for about 10% annually since 2011, and the above are just a few anecdotal examples of how standard of living is affected. Long story short, locals are not happy.
Eleven months ago, I quit my job to travel. Traveling quite literally became my life. I was convinced that I am a citizen of the world and I wanted to set foot on every interesting piece of land to experience the culture for myself.
Eleven months later, after having set foot in more than 40 countries in my lifetime and witnessing the impact visitors have on towns and cities, I’m not so sure if I want to contribute to that culture anymore.
The thing about tourism, is that it excludes its locals from their own city.
Have you ever had the experience of walking down your block — the street you grew up in and one you’ve walked a million times — and realize that none of the businesses want you inside?
I have. A few years ago, Hong Kong was a bustling, low-tax shopping haven for mainland Chinese tourists. When I walked down the main streets of my city, less than half of the shops have signage in our native tongue, and even less will greet you in Cantonese — our native language. Most of the shops I grew up familiar with have turned into luxury fashion stores and jewelry vendors catered for cash-spending tourists.
It doesn’t feel great, that, I can tell you from personal experience.
When I walked down the main street of Lisbon two weeks ago, I realized I was one of the reasons that made Lisbon excludes its locals. Souvenir shops, restaurants with English-only menus and bars that offer XL-sized sangrias are everywhere. Believe me, these were clearly not businesses opened for the people who live there.
The thing about tourism, is that it makes a city unaffordable to the people who call it home.
When I was in Nepal, I put a lot of effort in bargaining and making sure I wasn’t “tourist-priced.” Sometimes I would get slack from another traveler with an attitude of “why don’t you just pay the up-charge and consider it charity for the local people.”
First of all, it’s human nature to want to be treated fairly. Moreover, I was once told this by a Nepali local and it made a lot of sense to me: “Please don’t pay extra for things that should normally cost less. It has long-term effects to our economy that you might not realize. Take a shoeshine for example: if he learns that he can make double the money shining shoes for foreigners, sooner or later, he’s going to charge the same amount from everyone who walks in the door, including the locals who cannot afford the upcharge. Then guess what? The shoeshine will start catering only to foreigners and the locals can no longer afford to shine their shoes in their own neighborhoods.”
Let’s look at another more concrete example: Airbnb. We all love Airbnb — except maybe residents of Reykjavik who are unable to find affordable, long-term apartments for rent within the city, because a large portion of available apartments are now full-time Airbnb rentals catered to visitors.
According to this article, Reykjavik’s “only apartment rental website, leigulistinn.is, listed just nine apartments for rent in downtown Reykjavik during a recent search.” If you search for a weekend vacation rental, however, Airbnb alone provides thousands of options within those same geographic perimeters.
The thing about tourism — any amount of it — is that it will change the people and place we visit.
In the long-term traveler community, we often pride ourselves as ‘travelers’, not tourists. We say that we’re conscious of the things we ask, we try to live and eat like the locals, we don’t expect heat or electricity or WiFi to be available, and we don’t ask for luxurious amenities in a way that would signal privilege to the locals.
But no matter how hard we try, it’s impossible to deny the fact that we do come from a different culture and way of life, especially when we visit a country that is less developed. The fact is that we are unaccustomed to drinking non-purified water; our stomachs can’t tolerate that type of food for three weeks straight; we do speak another language; or that we just cannot physically walk efficiently through routes that hasn’t been cleared.
The fact is that when we visit, we hoped and half-expected these minimal accommodations to be already in place anywhere in the world, when in fact, these “basic” accommodations are unnecessary and foreign — sometimes even luxurious — by the locals’ standards. The fact is that, we — and I mean everyone who has the means to read this article now — are privileged in at least the most basic way possible. It’s important to recognize that when we travel to a place with less, the locals in that place have and will have to make adjustments to their normal standard of living for us.
More than not, traveling to countries with less has made me understand the phrase, “most of the world don’t live like this.” It’s a phrase I’m not sure I actually fully grasped the significance of, before I ever set foot outside North America, Western Europe or East Asia.
For locals who regularly interact with tourists, tourism can easily make them dissatisfied with the life they have.
I’ve always had a love-hate relationship with the phrase “ignorance is bliss.” In Bhutan, I learned that some of the happiest people are the people who have only been exposed to their own way of life, and therefore satisfied with what they have. They don’t know of the luxurious lifestyles that’s possible, and therefore don’t crave it.
For locals who interact with tourists a lot, they’re exposed to the privileged lifestyle their guests are used to without any means of actually accessing it. It’s the case of chasing a carrot you can never taste: the ultimate torture.
I remember a folk tale that described hell as exactly that: — a group of starving people sitting around a large round table full of delicious food. What makes it hell is that their arms and hands are attached to extraordinarily long spoons incapable of reaching their own mouths. In hell, they will starve eternally while seeing delicious food in front of them without ever being able to taste them.
During my three-day trek in Myanmar, it took me a while to realize why our trekking guide consistently walked a few meters in front of our group. For six hours a day, our group of backpackers were always talking about the different travel plans we have, exchanging advice on our next destinations in Europe or Asia or Africa, — conversations any regular travelers would have.
The furthest place our guide has been to was Bagan, a city 5 hours East of where he came from. He is so proud of it that he even keeps an entrance ticket to show off to villagers during our trek. It occurred to me how much of a torture it must be to hear conversations about traveling the world, day after day, when it is brutally apparent that within your lifetime, you yourself might never be able to afford to visit another country.
The thing about tourism, is that it’s only going to become more common. Cheaper flights and more accommodations mean that more cities and towns are going to be catered to those who visit for a weekend, not for those who live there.
South East Asia, especially Thailand, are prime examples of this. There are resort towns and neighborhoods in Thailand that has basically rebuilt its economy completely surrounding tourists.
On the other hand, there are also countries and cities, like Bhutan and the area of Vang Vieng in Laos, where the government decided to step in and shut down overflowing tourist businesses, or heavily monitor travel itineraries and areas in which tourists have access to. But then to what extent can governments do that before voices of opposition start fighting back, or visitors look elsewhere for a more authentic, less monitored cultural experience?
