Something about tourism makes me want to puke. Though I’ve had this feeling for years, planning to be a tourist for the next 7 months has finally prompted some self-examination to better understand its roots… so here are some thoughts…
Tourists are consume-jerk robots and I seldom enjoy being around them or in any way associated with them. They’re often rude, have very little consideration for anything or anyone around them, and appear to function solely to take pictures as proof that they had some experience that they may or may not have had. It’s hard to understand why tourism brings out the worst in people this way except that they have no community to remember their ill behavior.
Tourism often creates a distorted facade of culture that principally reflects the (lack of) culture that engages typical tourists. Nice paintings you can hang on your wall and not have to think about again happily sold to you by vendors that have a pleasant conversation so rehearsed as to make an engaging conversation difficult, if not rare.
Tourism marginalizes my individualism and rains on my facade of uniqueness parade. I can’t say I haven’t missed the best picture because I saw someone else shoot it before me, but it’s still awfully hard to stand in line to take the same picture that everyone else will be posting on flickr tomorrow. I consider it a principal goal in my life to discover myself and find/create my own voice, but maybe I’ll have to keep learning when to take off my pride shades and get stoked on what others have already found.
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