Good Tourism

By Kenneth Bagnell

 

   Now and then, I remember how, when I was in university, some friends used to condemn tourism or at best look at it with condescension: too much excess, too much exploitation, too much pollution. Maybe it was a fashion back then to put it all down: tourists arrive, gawk here and there, tip the locals miserly and leave with no sense of what matters: the character of where they’d been. Yet even back then, the 1950s, local governments were trying modestly to attract the very people my friends saw as problems. I’m glad that, today, it’s different: we know that while tourism like other human activity, should adhere to responsibility, on the whole it’s a value, not just for those who receive the traveler but for those who travel. As Augustine the ancient theologian put it: “The world is a book and those who don’t travel read only the first page.”

     Obviously, there are new forms of tourism so transparently ethical only a chronic complainer would find fault. I mean, to cite just a couple of examples, Habitat for Humanity, (it’s constructed over a half a million homes since it began) or Africa by Design, in which our daughter Andrea, went awhile ago, to help and mentor women in the slums of Nairobi, Kenya. There are countless others. But my view is that even if it’s simply a week or two in a trailer park, say in Florida, it’s positive. I invite those who distain this latter reference to think again: I’ve had relatives who did exactly that. They’d spent most of their lives underground as coal miners at miserable work, for precious little income. Only a callous snob would denigrate such families for having a week or two of Florida sun in the evening of their lives.

     Mind you, those who travel have a responsibility and not just obvious ones like being courteous, (I’ve seen too much of the opposite) and leaving decent gratuities (at least fifteen percent). I mean preparing by doing some research on where they’re going before they leave home. Much is now available through ever improving travel guides, my favorites being Moon, Lonely Planet, Rough Guide. Why do research? A single example will do: in my life as a journalist, I’ve been to Cuba a few times. I like the country, the people and am hopeful for the market principles now introduced. A trip to Cuba shouldn’t be simply a beach holiday. It should include a guided visit to, for example, Havana, one we should prepare for.

     A few years ago, I was on a bus, heading to Havana with the usual well informed guide. (Many are lawyers, accountants, teachers, needing tourism tips.) About 20 others were aboard, all taking an afternoon from the beach to see Havana. On the way, the guide, using his microphone, gave his overview of the city, its history, its sites, its issues. He invited questions. Silence. I deliberately waited, partly because I’m hesitant about being too obvious. Still no questions. In Cuba and nobody had a question?

  So I did ask one: “How many times did the CIA try to assassinate Fidel Castro?” The guide lit up: “Over 600.” Obviously he felt the question would open the door on others. None. (The figure 600, from a former head of Cuba security, is obviously questionable; forget what it would reveal, if true, of an organization trying anything 600 times and failing 600 times!) But the silence on the bus tells us something: the passengers were on a beach holiday and only that. They might have been in Bermuda or the Riviera. In Cuba that’s unfortunate. We owe ourselves and Cuba’s people an interest beyond sand and surf. Cubans have — regardless of your opinion or mine on their country’s political past and present — a history of hardship, one they still live with. Visitors should come knowing something of it. In most travel, the motto of The Boy Scout movement makes sense: “Be Prepared.”