This past weekend I travelled to Florida on vacation with my family. My mother has an obsession with family trips, especially with the looming prospect of an empty nest. I must say, as strange as it may seem to many, I am not a huge fan of really hot weather, yet almost every year we travel to some tropical location to bask in the heat with fellow pasty tourists. What I find most interesting about these holidays is the resistance to the new culture of many of the places we visit by the tourists there. In Florida, a place famous for delicious seafood, I was surrounded by people munching on hamburgers and french fries. The English are notorious for this (ever seen Shirley Valentine?) for wherever they travel their eyes are peeled for chips and egg or bangers and mash. What is this resistance? Where is the adventurous spirit of the tourist? These Hawaiian-clothed, sandal-bearing, sunscreen lathered people go to great lengths to bake in the sun, but not experience their environment unless in a watered-down way. With the inclusion of all-inclusive resorts, many tourists never step out of the hotel grounds. I find there is a difference between a tourist and a traveller, much like there is a difference between saliva and spit. A traveller goes to really engage with the culture and learn from their experience, where as a tourist is clearly seperated from their new environment and is not as engaged.
2 comments:
There is totally a difference between a traveller and a tourist. I always wanted to be a traveller. You would love Paul Thoreaux's travel books where he explores countries as a traveller - not a tourist. Check them out he has ones for india, china, Russia, the south pacific. Sadly, the older get and more complicated my life becomes, the more I am becoming a tourist. I just want to get to a hotel and relax and not even leave the hotel. One day I shall travel again, though!
I completely agree. I understand that most people go to these warm tropical places for some relaxation time, but it does seem ridiculous that they wouldn't try to experience the culture at least a little. I think that secretly most people want to be travelers, but they aren't willing to put in the time or take the risk to experience something that they are unfamiliar with. I know that personally, I have definitely tried to be a traveler in all the foreign places I have visited because I like to blend in and feel like I belong. For most people, that seems only natural, but sometimes it can get kind of tricky.
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