thoughts on being a 'good' traveler
note: I'm currently on vacation (might do a trip report afterwards) and had this thought, so a bit ranty.
On almost every trip I've been on, I've had this thought - that I'm a 'good' tourist. I try hard to learn some basic language so I don't force english everywhere. I try to follow local norms. I try to be quiet and respectful of my surroundings.
Of course, I'm not perfect. There are stumbles where I make a blunder and feel cringe in my soul. Even something as minor as standing on the wrong side of an escalator while people walk around feels bad. And I don't think that people should strive to basically blend in; after all, you're still a tourist.
But day to day when traveling, there are times when you see other tourists and think, wow, how embarrassing. Without going into details, I'd categorize these as second hand embarassment/cringe; something like taking up the entire sidewalk with a group, blocking it off to the flow of foot traffic.
There are obviously levels of respect and care, and sometimes it's easy to get on a high horse when it comes to thinking about other tourists. Surely I am the enlightened, respectful tourist making small accidental blunders while they are the bumbling fools purposefully embarrassing themselves.
But then again, isn't this true of everything? It's somewhat human to have self serving bias.
I'm sure to the local residents at the end of the day, a tourist is a tourist, in varying degrees. All one can do is try to be the best representative for themselves and only themselves. But then again, maybe writing this post by itself is self-serving in itself! I've only ended up in a loop.