Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
In order to make the most of this, the rational action would be to look for a progressive
balance between reversal and extension, according to one's individual capabilities, desired
outcomes, current state of health and motivation, as well as the success and failure encoun-
tered during the process. It is a rather complicated situation to study - a challenge for
researchers in tourism. Tourists themselves are, however, often quite capable of measured
withdrawal in locating their individual comfort zone, the ideal proximity to the culture(s)
visited (see also Edensor and Falconer,
Chapter 9)
. Another option is to rely on organised
meeting grounds for host-visitor interaction. The variety of individual solutions is large
within the general patterns of behaviour.
Tourists attending a 'cultural evening' in Hammamet, Tunisia, may join the staged belly
dance and 'meet' the romanticised locals from a position of control. Another tourist in
Antalya, Turkey occasionally explores side streets off the main route, discovering a bistro
occupied by friendly locals and fulfi lling his interests in the difference and authenticity there.
In his beach hotel, he enjoys the comforts of the global culture of package tourism while
having fun with fellow tourists. A wildlife tourist on a safari in Chobe National Park,
Botswana, may have a good rapport with local guides, but she rather stays away from the
backstage
(MacCannell, 1976), the everyday, which has been glimpsed during the airport
transfer. A backpacker in Thailand visits the 'hill tribes' of the north for one week, but feels
relief on a hot Koh Samui beach afterwards, cold drink in his hand, while contemplating on
'tribal experiences' and reporting them to his friends on Facebook.
In public meeting grounds, the outcomes cannot always be predicted by tourists. The
locus of control is predominantly on the local side, and negative outcomes could follow. A
tourist may, for example, become a target of a transposed tourist gaze (cf. Urry, 2001) and
eventually feel a need to return to her enclave. A tourist on a foreign street may, after all,
radiate Otherness by her race, wealth, clothing, gaze, gestures, style of walking, the volume
and direction of her voice, or the timing of her presence, to name a few common attributes
(Hottola, 2002a, 2002b; Maoz, 2006; see also Wagner, 1977; and Gibson on 'encounter' in
Chapter 6
of this volume). Some of these features are attractive to the local eye, while some
are code-breaking and therefore threatening, or indeed both. The consequences of these
attributes are diffi cult to predict. A tourist may hold signifi cant power in some situations, as
John Lea (1988: 62-4) has concluded, but in other situations they become rather powerless
(Hottola, 2002b).
As precarious as the public space of tourism destinations may occasionally be, there is
always the option of in-group reversal. There tends to be an increased cohesion - the
commu-
nitas
of anthropology (Turner, 1969) - within one's reference group in a foreign environment.
The archetypal cultural disputes of Europe, for example, are put aside when European tour-
ists enjoy each other's company in a metaspatial retreat, focusing on the positive familiarity
which keeps the group together (Hottola, 1999: 133-7, 2005: 14-15). This also happens
within a single nationality, as Allon and Anderson's (2009) example of Irish travellers illus-
trates. Lloyd (2003: 355) analysed the 'café zones' of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, while
Westerhausen called traveller gatherings 'a cultural home away from home' (2002: 69) and
Wilson and Richards (2008: 13) wrote about 'surrogate cultural experiences of difference'.
The enclave becomes a microcosmic vacational island in a sea of being away, with familiar
enough cultural variety to be explored with ease.
The company of other travellers may become so rewarding that a 'sightseeing' attitude to
the inhabitants of the destination is often adopted. A search for in-group membership char-
acterises most tourism phenomena involving groups, and this is intensifi ed even further in
enclaves. Internet information platforms, guidebooks and other sources of information guide
