Travelfish #395: Travel writing’s trickle down effect
Time to turn travel writing on its head.
Hi everyone,
Sorry, a day late! Have been a bit unwell. As with last week, a huge thanks to all our supporters who have made a contribution to our crowdfunding campaign. We’re now at over US$8,500 and have started commissioning stories—stories you are making possible. Thank you!
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Last week on Couchfish, I’ve been in Sapa a few days, then to Bac Ha for two entries of misadventures.
Sapa doesn’t always look this great—take my word for it! Photo: Stuart McDonald.
On free to read Couchfish, I had “You should have been here yesterday. Really?” with some thoughts on tourism and then, “I need a gun” about an unusual evening in Bangkok and then a ride down the Thai–Burma border. I hope you enjoy them—all the photos in this week’s newsletter are from these entries.
Over on Thai Island Times, David took a close look at Khao Sam Roi Yot. If you’re lucky enough to be in Thailand at the moment, or planning a trip in the future, give it a read.
Cheers and again thank you for all your support
Stuart
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On travel writing
I’ve been thinking about travel—and travel writing—a lot of late. Who hasn’t? Much of the coverage around Covid19 has revolved around the detrimental effect it is having on travellers and the companies who cart them around the world. Less, though not none, has focused more on how Covid19 has affected the small businesses and communities around the world who receive these travellers.
Why?
There’s lots of reasons why this is, but I got stuck on what travel is. Travel writing, in all shapes and sizes, has helped form what travel is today, so I kept circling back to wondering “what is travel writing?”
Pretty even in bad weather. Photo: Stuart McDonald.
Knowing some professionals in the field, I put the question out on Twitter, “what is travel writing to you?” Ask ten people the same question and you get ten different answers right? Yup. You can see all the replies here.
Not surprisingly I guess, most replies focused on either the writer imparting their experiences, or the reader potentially improving their’s. None really took the destination, and the people who live there, into account.
The closest replies got to considering the local population, was still in a currency for the traveller rather than the local—how the traveller could have a “better experience”, “avoid scams”, perhaps work on their empathy. Swinging by the good and dodging the bad should help those in the destination doing good right?
On the way to Bac Ha. Photo: Stuart McDonald.
It’s like the trickle down effect of travel writing.
Nobody suggested “good travel writing” as a means to encourage travellers to have a more positive effect on where they travel, or a reduced impact.
None suggested that the old “front and back of the book” (the introductory and background information in a guide book, which is traditionally split in two halves with the “meat” in between) were actually the most important part of a guidebook.
Are they? Is it more important to be told where the post office is, or to be told why you shouldn’t point your feet at people, or ride an elephant, or touch someone’s head?
Enough for everyone! Photo: Stuart McDonald.
These fall under the catch–all “service writing”—essentially guidebook writing—which much of Travelfish currently is. Many of these facts can be imparted more gradually in narrative travel prose I guess, but you don’t read Kapuscinski to find out where the post office is.
Much as there is talk about a re–calibration of tourism post Covid19, I think talk of a re–calibration of travel writing is well past its due.
Helping improve the lot of the local people in the destination, should not be a side benefit of you doing some activity that benefits you. This is backwards thought. It could be why you are doing it.
Company for an hour. Don’t ask. Photo: Stuart McDonald.
For decades, for many travellers, not just the local population but the environment, governance, human rights and so on, have been but sideshows to the self–centred experience. Fodder for Instagram pics or Facebook Friends you never talk to–until you’re in the market for a discounted room rate next year.
Don’t “travel like a local”—“travel with a local”.
I’m ashamed to say, having run Travelfish for over 16 years, it has taken a pandemic of these proportions for me to realise that, while I’m over–the–moon proud of what our writers have created, we’ve been doing, at least part of it, wrong all this time.
I hope others in the trade realise, that they too can take this moment (even if it is a moment that stretches for years) to rethink all they’ve been doing, all they’ve been writing and, well, how they’ve been guiding.
Got the dosh? Sapa can be pretty comfy. Photo: Stuart McDonald.
Local communities first, travellers second. Before you write anything, think, what are the pros and cons of me writing this. What effect will it have on local communities? How can I advise a better approach that will have a better result for all involved? Where should I tell people simply not to go? What are the costs for those in that destination of doing this? What could I do instead? Where should I just not mention? Most importantly, does the local community even want tourists?
In a way, as always, for Travelfish at least, our number one priority has been the reader. That has not changed, but I think there is a lot more weight which needs to be given to local communities.
I don’t think, the “if I don’t write about it, someone else will, so I may as well” really holds anymore—if it ever did.
What more do you need? Sapa views. Photo: Stuart McDonald.
None of this excludes also advising readers on how to have a good time—but surely having a good time in the knowledge that what you’re doing isn’t having a detrimental effect on local communities, is an even better time?
Travel for too long has been about the traveller, then the destination. Right now it feels like the planet has been turned on its head, and it is time to flip this one on its head too.
Good travels
Stuart
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Ten things worth reading
Fishermen without fish as Cambodia's river reversal runs late
“The Mekong River Commission attributes the delay to lower 2019 rainfall and operations of upstream Mekong hydropower dams, two of which are in Laos and 11 in China.”
From egg hunter to protector, Malaysian ranger battles to save turtles
“Aziz, from a poor fishing family on the island, remembers how he used to hide in the bushes by the beach and race out to grab the eggs shortly after they were laid, with brawls often breaking out between rival collectors.”
The “State of Travel Writing”
Plenty of smart people chatting away here.
The Ugly History of Beautiful Things: Orchids
“In 1901, eight orchid hunters went on an expedition to the Philippines,” writes Orlean in The Orchid Thief. “Within a month one of them had been eaten by a tiger; another had been drenched with oil and burned alive; five had vanished into thin air; and one had managed to stay alive.” Grab a coffee for this one.
Cambodian satellite city near Phnom Penh destroying wetlands with 1 million at risk of flooding
Worth a look just for the artist’s impression of the result...
We won’t take this anymore…it stops with our generation
“First of all, most of the participants were young people aged between 17 and 25. They grew up during a period of political instability, violence, and upheaval.”
These Monkeys Were Once Revered. Now They Are Taking Over $
Urrrgghhh macaques. The pics in this piece make my skin crawl.
Myanmar’s menacing frontier
“While reporting from Myanmar’s borderlands along Thailand and China remains particularly risky, gains in media freedom since the end of state censorship in 2012 have been steadily reversed over the last three years.”
Vindication for S'wak Report editor after 'devastating' verdict against Najib $
Where Will Everyone Go?
“For all the ways in which human migration is hard to predict, one trend is clear: Around the world, as people run short of food and abandon farms, they gravitate toward cities, which quickly grow overcrowded. It’s in these cities, where waves of new people stretch infrastructure, resources and services to their limits, that migration researchers warn that the most severe strains on society will unfold.” A must read.
Something to read
The Glamour of Strangeness
Erudite, colourful and packed with intriguing anecdotes, Jamie James’ Glamour of Strangeness: Artists and the Last Age of the Exotic is a romp through a bygone era, studying the lives of six artists who left their homelands to pursue creativity elsewhere.
Photo of the week
Mu Chang Chai is much better. Photo: Stuart McDonald.
Thank you!
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Travel light!
Stuart & the Travelfish team
Wow, great reflective and analytical thinking on this huge issue. You have articulated well the thoughts and feelings often discussed when travelling. Communities first, travellers second! The fine line! Can’t wait to see what synthesises out of your thoughts cos you have incredible background knowledge and a deep understanding of travel, over a long period of time. Change is inevitable, but not all change is good! Flip travel on its head Stu!