If you’ve ever had the privilege of travelling, you’ve probably heard the stereotype of tourists travelling across the world to scroll on their phones, talk loudly and never walk anywhere. Having recently been to Greece, I can say that this statement is sometimes accurate. A big part of travelling is immersing yourself in your surroundings, understanding local customs and trying new dishes, but sometimes that sentiment gets lost in translation.
While travelling in Athens, Greece recently with nothing but a backpack and my torn-up tabis, I concluded there are two very different types of travellers — those who often take public transportation or walk everywhere and try to shop local versus the tourists who taxi, take Ubers and often shop at retail chains they can find back home.
Food critic and world traveller Anthony Bourdain is popular for his unfiltered, raw opinions on life, people and food. With Bourdain’s popularity growing owing to his biopic coming out on Aug. 7, his advocacy for travelling has been making a significant comeback into the mainstream media. Bourdain wasn’t just a food critic but an author who always shared the truth with his audiences.
My sister, a lifetime Bourdain fan, couldn’t help mentioning how different our travel experience was from what Bourdain recommends — “Travel isn’t always pretty. It isn’t always comfortable. Sometimes it hurts, it even breaks your heart. But that’s okay. The journey changes you; it should change you. It leaves marks on your memory, on your consciousness, on your heart, and on your body.”
While in Greece with my group of friends, many wanted to take a taxi, whereas I was opposed to it. They wanted to shop at Zara instead of local shops and fell into multiple tourist traps all in the same day. Travellers and tourists aren’t all that different — in retrospect, it’s about attitude and respecting local culture.
I think there are a lot of memories made from carrying heavy backpacks with your friends through the streets of the cities you’re staying in, or from eating street food from a local vendor. Even though staying in a comfortable resort is more than ideal to some, I think there’s something special about having a travel experience that is not so clean-cut and coming back with stories to tell.
If I have any piece of advice for anyone, much like Anthony Bourdain, it would be to travel as much as you can wherever you can. You do not have to have a lot of money to travel. Some of the best memories I have ever made abroad were made with very little money and practically a credit card and a dream. My piece of advice to anyone would be to go anywhere or everywhere, even if it’s a day trip to the town over — get out of the city and explore.
