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Travel
the World... |
Independent advice for |
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traveling the world |
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| Photo courtesy of Jeff Booth
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Red Eye
By Jeff Booth
I first went to Europe thinking they actually had more culture there. I traveled to China still expecting ideological Communism. I sat in a mosque in Indonesia and had the Imam explain to me the similarities between the Koran and the Bible, which I'd never known existed. I thought dollarization of the Ecuadorian currency (and American economic benevolence) was a good thing–until I sat around a cuy roast over an open fire outside Quito and heard about the reality of jobs lost. I thought they used chopsticks in Thailand (nope–forks usually). I didn't imagine malls in Malaysia. You mean, the French eat something besides funky cheeses?
Stereotypes exist. Travel unmasks them.
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One of the greatest benefits of globetrotting is learning–both about yourself and where you're traveling. But no matter how many guidebooks you read (and maybe sometimes because of it) certain stereotypical images color all perceptions of foreign lands. The only way to combat those stereotypes is to face them. We're all uninformed until we learn. We all lean on impressions from a cousin who spent a week in Hong Kong a decade ago, or a travel article from a newspaper we like (yes, even our own magazine isn't meant as a definitive source of information). That's fine to a certain extent, but to understand anything about a foreign culture you've got to experience it yourself. You've got to make a few cultural gaffes and get set straight. You've got to separate the surface from the substance. It takes time, but more than anything, it takes openness to realizing your own misconceptions and throwing them out the window.
Imagine: what if an international traveler was backpacking around the U.S. and imagined it all to be like Hollywood movies, and only had one day walking around New York, one day at the beach in Miami, one day hiking the Grand Canyon, and one day in traffic in L.A.? Think they'd have some insight into the States? Don't commit the same mistakes when you travel abroad. The reality of foreign countries is more complicated than the glossy brochure makes it seem, and they're better for it.
Go forward, never straight,
Jeff
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