The End of Tourism and the Need For Radical Hospitality
Traveling has many benefits. It can be a wonderful way to learn about other cultures and appreciate diversity. It can help you reduce stress and offer a sense of adventure and excitement, but our travels also have an impact on the people and places we go that we may not even realize. It can lead to an increased cost of living for local residents, overcrowding, loss of natural habitats and changes in cultural traditions. Chris Christou, host of the podcast “End of Tourism” talked with the RISE Traveler Podcast about how we need to be more aware of the impact our travels have on the destinations we visit, how we can reimagine travel and tourism and the need for radical hospitality.
Chris grew up in Toronto, Canada. After spending his teenage years feeling lonely and isolated, he decided on a whim to start traveling and became a, “semi-permanent backpacker, part-time tourist.” He eventually settled in Oaxaca, Mexico and began working in the tourism industry. This perspective enabled him to see a whole new side of the industry and he observed how many modern travelers never stay in a place long enough to see their effect on a destination. He started his podcast to help amplify the voices of people and communities being negatively affected by tourism and to educate travelers about different social movements and discussions going on around the world.
He used his home of Oaxaca, Mexico as an example of the negative effects of overtourism. Oaxaca has seen an explosion of visitors and digital nomads and with it gentrification and an extreme rise in rent. Chris says of the local people, “nobody that we know lives…in the historic center downtown of the city anymore…and basically, because of platform capitalism, so much of the rentals have become short term Airbnbs, forcing people, local people, into the peripheries of the city, and generally undoing any sense of community that still existed in those neighborhoods.”
He understands why people want to travel and work remotely, but being creatures of habit, we take our reasons for leaving our homes, like the high cost of living, and bring it with us to our new destination. He’s not saying, don’t travel, but everyone should understand that their travels will have an impact on the host communities. “If you are thinking of traveling”, Chris says, “you should do your research about your destination, which should include, the history of that civilization, the culture, dance, food, but also the social movements, the infrastructure and economics.” He also says to reach out to the community and see how you can get involved and more importantly ask if you’re needed in that place. “Do your best to undermine the entitlement that says you deserve to be there,” he added. “We don’t want you to come and just participate in the spectacle, and the gentrification, without knowing it. We want you to come and be a guest in a way that allows us to practice and regenerate our local forms of hospitality, which are not this kind of standardized hotel version of industrial hospitality.”
Local hospitality is what Chris refers to as ‘radical hospitality’. A phrase he defines as: “It’s first of all local in nature, which means that it can’t be outsourced. It can’t be standardized, or homogenized.” When Chris worked in the hotel and catering industry, he said everything had to be done the same way all the time in order to try and create a sense of home for travelers. He gives an example of radical hospitality when he describes the women in Oaxaca each having a different recipe for the local dish and how they are respected for their individuality. “Every single family has a different recipe, and the women will go to their deaths, to prove that and to say that and just to make sure that it’s understood,” Chris says. “It’s not to say that we’re going to find a way to be exactly the same, it’s a way to try to honor and celebrate our differences.”
Along with practicing radical hospitality, Chris says we should start reimagining what sustainable travel could look like in the future.To begin with, he thinks planning to travel should be a slow, deliberative process that could take years and include many conversations with the people around you and with people in the place you want to visit. Traveling sustainably might also mean only traveling once or twice in our lifetimes and never stepping onto a plane. Chris says, “We have to be able to imagine different worlds. And we have to be able to imagine worlds that don’t look anything like the ones that we inhabit. And to fall in love with that imagination and the capacity to imagine things differently.”
If you want to read more of Chris Christou check out the links below:
https://chrischristou.substack.com/
https://www.theendoftourism.com/
About RISE:
RISE Travel Institute is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization dedicated to creating a more just and equitable world through travel education. Our award-winning online curriculum consists of a 10-week cohort-based Flagship Certificate Program, thematic short courses on sustainability and anti-oppression in travel, and place-based conscious travel short courses. These programs are designed to encourage travelers and travel professionals to think deeply and critically about sustainability and justice issues related to travel and tourism using a systems approach and decolonial principles. Additional programming includes Experiential Journeys for our alumni, a professional development program for educators, a study abroad pre-departure program (coming soon), and the production of educational resources on sustainable travel and tourism. We envision a world where travelers practice and promote responsible, impactful, sustainable and ethical travel that uplifts global communities and protects natural ecosystems.
About the Author:
Yvonne Montoya is a writer and independent filmmaker. She is an ovarian cancer survivor and she’s producing a documentary about the disease for PBS. She hopes to improve the diagnosis and treatment of ovarian cancer while advancing women’s reproductive healthcare overall.
