We don’t say that it’s the only way, we just want to share what we consider the best way to travel for us.
That “us” is my friend Tiyo and me. We’re currently creating a new way to discover Paris, and the point we want to do here is : for who ?
That’s simple : we are creating the kind of website we would like to use when we travel.
Being a traveller is a choice
I recently wrote a story about the differences between a traveller and a tourist.
Those differences are : the traveller puts respect, curiosity and effort in his/her trip.
It’s our point of view, and we forged it along our own experiences.
We haven’t always been travellers ; it took some maturity increase to get there.
Personnally, when I went to Ireland during a 8-weeks long trip in 2011, I acted like a total tourist.
Visited all the places in Dublin and around, took hundreds of pictures, but met barelly no Irish people.
Still had a great time though, and met lovely people from Brazil, France and other countries, but this experience left a taste of unachieved in my mouth.
Now, things have changed. I changed. Took my life back atthe end of 2015, and in 2016, I wasn’t a tourist anymore.
Been to Amsterdam, Brussels and Berlin, and each time, took the time to take informations first, find local people and meet them to experience their city in their footsteps, exchange thoughts, passions.
Those where the best trips of my life.
And all it took was respect, efforts and curiosity.
It’s the same for Tiyo and our friends. Sometimes they acted like tourists, and now they’re proud travellers, giving themselves the chance to meet local people when they travel to Greece, Indonesia, or anywhere.
Our traveller’s practice
We know that the key ingredient for a mindblowing travel is to meet local people. Not just tourist guides, real local peoples.
We share our recipe to enjoy each trip as a unique chance to learn, experience and open our minds.
First, we are members of the Internet Nation.
Which means :
- We speak English (fluently enough to hold conversations),
- We are curious about the world (read news and books),
- We use social networks to connect with people worldwide,
- We are used to trust people we don’t know and take “leaps of faith”,
- We know how to search for informations, tips and testimonies.
Internet is our powerful tool, but the core subject is the values we share.
Be respectful.
Believing in Humanity means loving diversity.
We know that no culture is superior to the others, and we are humble when we’re abroad.
Be curious.
We don’t stand out of the local culture, we dive in it.
We meet people, try foods and drinks, go to places that are not on “touristic tours”.
By the way, we don’t believe in “must see” ; each one of us like different things, and it’s better like that.
We keep some time to improvize and be surprised.
Make effort.
We prepare our trips by searching for any piece of valuable informations. We read books, travel blogs, local news (we call that “doing our homeworks”).
We plan our trip on internet (flights, accomodations).
We look for local people to meet, we take the time to share with them, and we thank them.
Those three values are mutually reinforcing.
As you might have guessed, we’re not really backpackers (travelling for weeks) nor city breakers (aka tourists for a week-end).
We just want to enjoy the travel experiences we have, would it be for 3 days or more.
And we want to improve all similar traveller’s travel experiences !
Let’s build something
Since September 2016, we met more than 100 travellers in Paris, and most of them shared our need for a new kind of tool allowing us to meet local people when we travel. Some Parisians even contacted us to testify they want to meet travellers !
For Tiyo and me, it became obvious that we had to create this new tool, for people sharing our values.
And we will begin in Paris. That’s the Welcom’ to Paris project.
If you agree, or disagree with us, or want to add something, don’t hesitate to post a response, I’ll answer to you all.
Our project now has a page where you can register to get our newsletter : www.welcom.city
From Paris with love,
JB and Tiyo
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