Revenge of the Tourists with Rajan Datar

Here's a fun tip for you, a simple one.

This is Trevor's travel tip.

Like any like seven, eight hour trip or whatever,

you can sleep in a chair.

Buy yourself one of those.

No, no, no.

Buy yourself one of those like head eye mask holder things

that keeps your head up.

I promise you now, I've done this multiple times.

You sit in the chair, you lie back,

you lock your head in.

That's the key because otherwise it screws up your neck.

It will be one of your best trips you've ever taken. Say the man that has never flown with a four-year-old.
Okay, yes. You see now, you've included.
That changes everything. You've added terrorists to your equation.
There's terrorists on the plane. Yes, I mean, my plan is when I have kids, I'm not going anywhere.
That's my plan.

Because I've seen people travel.

This will be another episode.

Should parents be allowed to travel?

Should children be allowed on planes?

The switch.

I always come through like that muffled speaker.

Two options.

We can always go around.

Trevor, your copy acting is so good.

This is What Now with Trevor Noah. This episode is brought to you by Ultra Running.
Ultra makes performance running shoes that are insanely comfortable, with a roomy toe box and zero to low drop. This helps keep your feet in a more natural position, so you can move how you were designed to.
Perfect for the road, trail, or gym, you could wear them for miles and forget that they're there. Stay out there with Ultra.
Try Ultra for yourself with a free 30-day trial and free shipping at ultrarunning.com. This episode is brought to you by Audi.
The all-new fully electric Audi Q6 e-tron is a huge leap forward featuring effortless power, serious acceleration, and the most advanced tech of any Audi ever. Experience technology that puts you center stage with a panoramic digital stage.
Plus, you can add an optional screen for front seat passengers so they can stream my best work or anything you want to watch. It doesn't have to be mine.
The Q6 e-tron is not just a new EV, it's a new way to experience driving. Learn more at AudiUSA.com.
Always pay careful attention to the road and do not drive while distracted. Well, happy podcast day.
Happy podcast day, Trevor. This is my favorite time of the year.
I'm one of the few people who loathes the summer. And for those people who are listening in the Southern Hemisphere, I'm obviously speaking about the summer in the North.
The North summer. Because in the wintertime, you have struggled during the middle of the year.
No, yeah, I love this time of year because it's like i think summer's too crazy people are too wild it's too hot it's too i'm goldilocks i like it just right you know what it is for me i'll watch i'll watch white people and it's predominantly white people we always joke about this with like my friends from the caribbean and stuff white people will go as soon as the sun is at its peak, white people go outside and they just lie there. They just, they just like, you know what I mean? They just like lie there and bake.
And they rip off their tops. No tops.
And they just, they bake, they just bake. And then I've seen people putting on oil and I'm like, wow, it's one thing to not fear cancer.
It's another thing to invite it. Like he's just going to put like cooking oil on your body.
But yeah, you know, this is us. The summer is over.
People are finally like calming down. Reality is coming back.
And for most places in the world, this is also when they experience a reprieve in tourism. And that's what today's episode is really about.
Tour it time to shut it down and as i said that sentence cities all over the world many cities started cheering yeah shut it down travel shut it down yes shut it down we need to shut it down people are sick of tourism one of the craziest examples we witnessed this summer happened in barcelona barcelona espania where tourists who decided to spend their hard-earned money to go have a romantic getaway in the beautiful catalan city were met with what you can only describe as um the most vicious terrible and and yet funny protest ever. I don't know if you saw this.
Did you see this on TikTok? I saw the video. Can you explain? There were people sitting.
So people were sitting in cafes. If you haven't seen it, you should go watch.
People are sitting in little restaurants and little cafes on the side of the road. And I mean, all these protesters come.
And they're like, go back home, go back home, go back home. And I can only imagine you're sitting at this little restaurant and you're like, huh, I wonder who that's for.
I wonder what that is about. You have no clue that this swarm of protesters is coming for you.
And they arrive there and then they pointed little water guns and started spraying everybody in the face. Of all the ways I could be be protested against someone spraying me with a tiny little water gun is the most adorable form of protest that shows we've lived in america too long because like we're like you know it could get a lot more intense it won't be water guns sweetheart so we're like this is so cute so you're just like wow some American tourists were like, oh my God, there are guns that have water in them?

Oh my God.

Wow.

What a change.

What a delightful change, honey.

I told you Europe was special.

Yeah, it was.

So the story blew up all over the world and people were like, wait, what's going on?

Why is this a big thing?

And it was a big thing because, you know, the residents ofona including the city of barcelona have said we're done we're sick of tourism we don't want this anymore everybody needs to go back to where they came from just stop it and they weren't the only city i mean amsterdam has said that they want to restrict how many people come to their city now. They want to like lock it down.

Places all over the world have basically said that.

It's like, we're just, we're done.

Like actually in London, how do you guys feel about tourists?

Because London's one of those places where people actually live in it.

Yeah.

But it's like, it's packed.

It's literally littered with tourists.

I mean, depending on who you ask, fortunately, unfortunately, grew up in South London.

No one comes there.

It's a part of town.

They're like, you may want to avoid.

So it was only when I went to the center of town, you'd see a lot of tourists.

But it'd be weird for me to go to London and not see tourists.

They're like the extra character.

It's like watching Sex and the City and they're no longer in New York.

And hearing Amsterdam made me feel sad because I feel like going to Amsterdam Is a rite of passage For like a young person in Europe That's literally what they don't want They're sick of your rites of passage All you Europeans who want to go And rites of passage and smoke weed in the Netherlands They're like no And go to the red light district Just you know as a field trip Like that makes Like, that makes me a bit sad. No, they're just done.
They're just done. I'm excited because today we're also going to be chatting to somebody who's an expert in tourism.
We're talking to Rajan Deita. He's not just somebody who's traveled extensively, but he actually, he works in this.
He works for the BBC and, you know, travels the world doing journalism in and around tourism.

And what I love about having this kind of job is that you don't get to occupy only one mindset.

You have to think like the people who live locally, but then you also have to think on behalf of the tourists.

And then you have the cap of journalist and documentarian.

And actually, actually, Rajan, maybe you can tell me, like, in your travels because i've seen some of some of your your clips from from your shows i know you can't say this when you're on camera but are there times when you've traveled and seen tourists in places and thought i'm sick of these dicks these are a bunch of assholes who should not be traveling through any of these places because i know you can't say that that on the BBC. And you're assuming I can say it now, are you? Well, listen, the only time I laugh at tourists, I was in Venice to do a documentary series about overtourism, and you overhear tourists saying, without any irony, there are too many tourists here.
People say that all the time, right? Yeah. And it's like as if they're different, as if they're special.
There's a kind of status thing about tourists, don't you think? We look down on other tourists, but we're different. We're travellers.
As Anthony Bourdain, he would say, I'm a traveller, other people are tourists. Now, I totally understand that, but are we allowed to be so smug about other people? Are we so different? I mean, I hate to say this, Trevor, but I do think that I am slightly different.
And you probably are as well. Yeah, I don't.
So it's funny. I don't think of myself as a tourist.
I find tourists have a certain herd mentality to the way they move if you if you've ever if you've ever traveled to you know any any part of africa and watched like a huge herd of of you know wildebeest or you know like like just really pack animals even cows let's just go with cows forget fancy animals that are in the wild they. They just like move in like an aimlessly sheepish, you know, it's just like, and it's just like, where are we going? Oh, we're all going in the same direction.
Everyone has their fanny packs and everyone's taking pictures of the same thing and they're following the same predetermined path that everyone else would. And that for me is like a tourist.
And do you know what epitomizes that? The selfie. It's all about the selfie.
It's all about getting the right selfie. Can I tell you a little story about Halstatt in Austria? Oh yeah, for sure.
Now, Halstatt is this scenic little town, but a picture postcard perfect little town. It's got the mountains behind the Alps.
It's got a beautiful lake gorgeous architecture it's got less than 800 residents but it's got the mountains behind the Alps It's got a beautiful lake Gorgeous architecture It's got less than 800 residents But it's got 10,000 people at its peak coming a day And adds up to more than a million a year They actually at one point Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait Go back on that Okay, so they have less than 800 residents And they have 10, a day. Yep.
And do you know why that is? It's all based on a slight myth that the town, the village, is basically, you know, Arundel in Frozen? There's this misconception that it's based on this town, Hallstatt in Austria. It's not.
They think it's from Frozen. Lots of people think it's from Frozen.
So they bring their daughters dressed up in princess, you know, dresses and stuff. It's very sweet.
But the local residents are absolutely furious. And going back to the point of the selfie, they at one point tried to block off, fence off the most popular selfie spot to stop people going there but then the locals complain because

they couldn't see the gorgeous view oh if i lived in a town of less than 800 people and one day i wake up and my town has 10 000 strangers half of whom are dressed as elsa I would take the most extreme measures

To counter this

Like

I would take the most extreme measures to counter this. Like, I would basically become a Disney villain, essentially, now that I think about it.
I would round up the townsfolk and I would say, we need to turn this place into a nudist colony for like six months. Because Disney doesn't do nudity.
I think that's the only way you fight it, right? You just go like, all of us, we're going into the streets, dicks out out i'm of the opposite view i i come in on the other side i'm like if you live in a town with 800 people that's like the most boring place on the planet and you get 10 000 new people to see every day a day i mean towns with like 800 people they just get into like opiates and incest like nothing particularly this is austria this is austria not cleveland what are you talking about i'm just like maybe it's the london of me and this is a problem i'm such a city girl i'm just like more is better no more people's better more traffic it means more money it makes your town more interesting the problem is a lot of them are little girls in princess dresses. And as the mother of a little girl, that sounds like my idea of personal hell.
However, they bring their parents, they bring their grandmothers. Sounds better to me.
It sounds like a better town. you're right about the the money aspect obviously it's a huge boon to the local economy

apparently only 22 of the people who live there actually work in the tourism economy

the rest of them don't and when i spoke to the local economy. Apparently only 22% of the people who live there actually work in the tourism economy.
The rest of them don't. And when I spoke to the mayor, he said, yeah, it's great, except we want half of these people to come.
We don't want, you know, at the very most, we don't want this many because they're walking in their back gardens sometimes to take selfies. They're walking in the graveyard.
Who are those kids? Those are the the kids i want to meet the kids who go to graveyards to take selfies dressed as elsa from frozen that's my kind of kid yeah it's day trippers you know about this they don't like day trippers because day trippers don't stay overnight they don't buy meals they don't put anything into the local economy and they just pack the streets scr Scrubs. They don't want no scrubs.
That's what it is. This is what it boils down to.
You don't want scrubs. So help us understand though, like is overtourism a new thing? Is this acutely blowing up because of COVID? Like did everyone stack up their money and now they're traveling or are we just finding out about it now because of social media? It certainly started, I suspect, in the 90s.
Now, some of the causes are, for example, cheaper travel. Low-cost airlines transformed an awful lot.
The Internet transformed an awful lot because suddenly the world was globalized. You knew about new places.
So the and then the number of people who can afford to to travel is also rising then when it comes to the pandemic there was something after the pandemic called the uh called revenge tourism that's what they labeled it revenge tourism so people who've been somehow deprived by nasty people who invented this infection from traveling um they're going to get their comeuppance because now you're going to travel and not just travel like once a year, but travel three times a year just to make up for it. Because this year will be the highest number of travelers ever in the world.
The biggest year for tourism ever is this year. And that's happening.
That's a fact. Barcelona was an interesting one.
You know, Roger, I don't know if you did any work around that because this was one of the stories that i feel like this year in particular especially this summer as we look at it it was the story that sort of brought this conversation to the fore in a not in an academic way you know like before whenever people would talk about over tourism it would be like you know the galapagos islands have struggled for so long for each tourist one cubic meter of carbon monoxide and where is inflicted and you're like i don't know what any of this means and barcelona was the first place where the locals came out with concrete you know concrete ideas that they put out on on social media and i guess you know tiktok is the one new evolution. Tourists said, hey, you come here, you flood our restaurants.
The restaurants raise the prices, so we can't eat there anymore. The food isn't even good anymore because now they're trying to cater to how many people there are.
On top of that, this was my quaint little street. And now you flood to it because it is quaint.
And now you make it not quaint, but this is where I live. You know, and I, from the things that the locals were talking about, I won't lie.
At first I was like, you guys are ungrateful. These are tourists.
And then when they went through it, I was like, man, how would I feel if I lived somewhere? How would you feel if you lived somewhere? Like this is your home, your home home. People forget that.
Like you go like, that's why I live here is because I don't want to be where this is happening.

And now it's found me. That's exactly right.
You know how I describe it? I say locals feel like extras in their own movie. They're basically pushed to the side.
They can't afford to live there. So you get horrendous stories like in Ibiza about the chef who has to live in his own car just so he can work in the restaurant.
Obviously, locals are priced out because of the Airbnbs, the short-stay rentals, all that contributes. And essentially, it is ultimately about people, locals and tourists competing over the same resources.
To me, that doesn't sound like an issue of tourism. That sounds like an issue of government, of a lack of rent controls, of a lack of social housing so a chef doesn't have to live in his cab, right? And it seems to me that tourists, particularly American, Australian and British ones who are like the worst tourists, if we're honest, become this easy scapegoat where you can say it's because of you guys that I have this problem.
And I'm like, well, isn't it the mayor? Isn't this something your legislature should be dealing with? Because even if the tourists vanish, I don't believe the restaurants are going to bring down their prices. I don't believe the landlords are going to bring down their rents.
So you get where I'm coming from here, right? In fact, some people hate the word over-tourism because it seems to place the blame on tourists for being there to too many of them. No, overtourism is, you're quite right, it's bad management.
It's greed as well. It's basically saying, look, let's get as many people as we can in.
Who cares about the consequences? If it turns into a theme park like the centre of Barcelona can be, so what, we're still making loads of money. But there's another thing called leakage.
Have you heard of leakage? Where most of the money in some places that a tourist will spend somewhere actually doesn't stay in that destination because the company quite often is a multinational corporate. It could be an airline, whatever.
So, you know, it's no win for the locals either at all for that for that reason that's that's that's one of the i would say that's that's probably one of the issues that people don't know about and don't think about is that as the world has become consolidated the money doesn't stay in a city so back in the day you know like let's think of like london or many you know places like it even even um you know new york if you were traveling around a bunch, you were in a taxi. And the taxi money went to people who had started taxi businesses in that city.
The drivers lived in the city, the cars got serviced in the city, and the company, and it wasn't even small like pockets of companies, that were in the city. So the money was within the place that you spent it and then now if you travel somewhere you get there you get an uber from the airport you get to the place you stay in a hotel and you stay in a chain that is owned by a global conglomerate that has now absorbed everything and then you go out to eat and then maybe you go and buy some mcdonald's or maybe you know your kids want to buy something that they're familiar with and everyone's eating in other countries there you go yeah there's starbucks in every country so everybody goes and gets some starbucks and then after that people are like oh i need to get some i didn't bring a top i didn't let's pop into zara and before you before you realize it all the money that you've spent let's say you've spent a hundred dollars a hundred pounds a hundred euros a hundred whatever currency in that day you've spent it you find like that money is no longer pumping up the local economy in the same way and i wonder if that's like an insidious side of it that the locals and maybe the city officials don't even think about does that make sense it's like this homogenization across cities like it's very rare i go to a city, unless it's Lagos, and you're like, this is an entirely unique place in the world and I'll never experience something like that.
I'm talking about these types of tourist hubs. I don't know.
I just find that they all replicate each other and that leakage just doesn't affect where the money goes. It actually affects what you experience when you get there.
When I was in Shoreditch, I was like, this is like Berlin. You know, like kind of like there's like if you go to a coffee shop in certain neighborhoods.
And I was like, oh, this also reminds me of downtown L.A. And it's pretty much the same everywhere you go.
That's quote, unquote, popular. We're going to continue this conversation right after this short break.
you can move how you were designed to. Perfect for the road, trail, or gym, you could wear them for

miles and forget that they're there. Stay out there with Ultra.
Try Ultra for yourself with a free 30-day trial and free shipping at ultrarunning.com. This episode is brought to you by Amazon.
Have you ever gotten sick on a very expensive, very non-refundable family trip? Amazon One Medical has 24-7 virtual care,

so you can get help no matter where you are. expensive, very non-refundable family trip? Amazon One Medical has 24-7 virtual care,

so you can get help no matter where you are. And with Amazon Pharmacy, your meds can get delivered

right to your hotel fast. It's kind of like the room service of medical care.

Thanks to Amazon, healthcare just got less painful.

i mean not to not to play the african mom in the group chat here but like

like if if i was having this conversation with i think any of you know my african

mother's aunts etc a lot of them would also ask the question you know sort of to what you were

saying rajan is they'd be like they'd be like but why were they advertising yeah

Now, let's see. you know my african mother's aunts etc a lot of them would also ask the question you know sort of what you were saying rajan is they'd be like they'd be like but why were they advertising yeah they told us we must come to barcelona they told us we must come they are the ones we did not know about barcelona before they told us huh so now they are complaining but you told us to come because it's true it's like you i don't know about marbella.
I don't know about all these other people. You advertise it.

So not to victim blame, but-

I would say, hang on though,

just separate the marketing teams, if you like,

or the big advertisers, the big commercial companies

who obviously, yes, do sell the dream,

sell the idea, come here,

you'll have the best time of your life

with the locals who aren't necessarily

part of that marketing machine who didn't necessarily do that. I mean, when I first went to Barcelona, for example, it was word of mouth.
A friend of mine said, you've got to come here. It's really brilliant.
You know, it's cool. Then it became a product.
Then it became commoditized, fetishized, whatever you want to call it. It became, you know what I mean, something that everyone had to do.
And back and back to your point cristiano it was never managed properly it's been un not properly regulated essentially and now it's a bit too late in some places and and and their very local culture and the fabric of the of the city or the destination is being is being damaged undermined like i've seen this in south africa for instance yeah i've seen how in some parts of south africa we've done an amazing job with our tourism in in locking it into like the local so we go here's a game reserve here's a safari you're going to come you're going to see animals you're going to experience something you've never seen before like south africa has some of the best tourism in the world i know i'm biased but it's true and and what some people have done really well is they've gone, this land belonged to people. This land is still occupied by people.
And so what we're gonna make sure is when you come and do your tourism, your tour guide is earning money because he's a local. The person who lives on this land is getting, they're getting some of your like tax because they're locals.
And so whenever they see you, they smile, not just because they're seeing a foreigner, they smile because they see somebody who's contributing to their quality of life. They smile because they see somebody who's leaving an indelible impression on them that goes beyond just like a temporary interaction.
And then I've seen other places where that's not the case. I've seen places where you literally were once the kings of this land, and now you've been relegated to basically being busboys for people who don't care about you and treat you like something just above a slave whose job it is to carry their bags and bring their food.
Rajan, I'm really curious. Is there anywhere you would say this is an example of well-managed tourism? There are.
I mean, unfortunately,

they also tend to be quite expensive.

So Copenhagen,

have you heard of what's happening in Copenhagen?

They are basically offering you rewards

for being a good tourist.

So if you clean up and tidy up

and if you, I don't know,

if you don't use plastic or something,

you know, anyway,

if you behave well,

you'll get a free coffee or maybe more. Wait, wait, but they how do they know this is this like a danish guy following you around like how do they how do they monitor my my good tourism behavior no i was it's funny because i was i was just there i was just i was just in copenhagen doing shows like this was i don't know maybe like a month or two ago i was there nobody gave me any rewards i didn't make a a mess.
I think it's just started. I think it's literally just started.
It's called Cope and Pay. Oh, right after I leave.
Because you left. Cope and Pays, it's called.
And they're doing something similar in Oslo as well. Yeah.
It's funny you mentioned Oslo. I'm a TikTok addict.
And, you know, when you're geolocated wherever you go. So I'm swiping and I got a come to Oslo ad.
So I'm like, it's not that smart because I'm already here. But the entire ad was about there are no lines.
You may run into the king. The food is great.
It's relatively cheap. They were like selling Oslo to me.
And I'm like, oh, there are places that are like, would love the Barcelona problem. But it seems that like our tourists aren't dispersed in the right way it's kind of and it's like lopsided it's either they're all going to one place and they're ignoring other places that kind of desperately want them to come and do want that injection into their local economy i think you're absolutely right there is an interesting other side to this though because part of the reason for this explosion in tourism is that there are new markets opening up.
So for example, Chinese tourists, suddenly exploded, the numbers of them suddenly exploded about 10, 15 years ago. And they became, I think, the biggest single travelling nation.
Now India are doing that, because again, you've got people who are newly kind of little bit moneyed. They've got disposable income.

They can now afford for the first time to travel. Now, if you're going all the way across to Europe, you can't really blame them for wanting to go to see Venice and Paris, the Eiffel Tower, and then maybe Florence, maybe London.
You know, the usual suspects. You know, I can't blame them.
but now I think so now the chinese and indian got some money and we're like don't come anymore is it that makes me think it's the type of tourist not the actual tourism if we're saying it's just like people from the far east now have a high disposable income we're like oh close the barriers there's too many of you i actually think i actually think therein lies one of our solutions we should actually say that these places should shut down their tourism to all europeans and to all people from western countries because you've done it now you've had your time you've seen the thing okay? Now it is Africa's chance to come and see what was built with their resources. And it is India's turn to come and see what was built with their labor.
And it is China's turn to come and see what people use their technologies for. Because like, you know, it's one thing to be colonized.
It's another thing to be colonized and then go and see and be like, ah, look at that. it wasn't so bad look what they did with our gold oh look at that church ah my great grandfather was enslaved but look at the craftsmanship ah ah what a beautiful beautiful thing there is a silver lining to every cloud can i ask you each of you where do you think it does actually work it's respectful to the to the locals it's a really distinctive interesting experience and it feels like the balance is right huh okay so where would where do i think they've got it right i think tokyo might be one of the best because the city is designed in such a way.
It's designed to contain a large amount of people. But even then, they've really managed to find a way to keep Japan being Japan in those parts and still have like a ton of tourists at the same time.
Yeah. So if you'd asked me this question five years ago,

I would have said without a doubt Accra. It's kind of, it's like, I think it's the home of the global black diaspora.
You can see the historic with the door of no return. You've got great hotels, lovely people.
The food is amazing. But you know, the...
This is, this is, can you, before you carry on, can I, can I just pause?

Sorry.

I, I thought. um the food is amazing but you know that this is this is can you before you carry on can i can i just pause sorry i i thought it was an earthquake but it was a it was a nigerian complimenting wow i'm gonna get i'm gonna get cancelled by my people and my family that was a for a moment i was just like i was like is there another akra that i don't know about i would say, like one of the most wonderful places on earth.
However, because of the president and lots of initiatives, there's a thing called Dirty December, which is every Christmas. People from across the diaspora land on Accra.
And what it's done for the locals is meant braiding your hair is super expensive. Food is super expensive.
They're being pushed further out. My perspective is that does it really well is sydney and it just is like it never seems that busy however i think it's because it's so far yeah that like there is like the there's kind of like a cap to the number of people who are going to make that journey also i've got to say if you make an effort and you go there and you talk to the local people, you talk to the right place, you do a little bit of research beforehand, you will find amazing things in every single destination in the world.
Because a lot of it is about people and how you approach people and how you prepare for your trip. You shouldn't look at a trip or holiday as a transaction, as a consumer transaction.
It's got to be more than that, if you like. Don't just go there for a quick thrill.
Go there, in a sense, almost in a kind of Buddhist sense, with the whole sense of feeling that you're lucky to be there, that it's gratitude. You're a guest in their country, in their culture.
And i know it does annoy me sometimes when people think well i just go there and i'm expecting some amazing thing to happen to me passively passively you've got to make it work you've got to be proactive rajan i love that idea as like a very noble and virtuous thing to go into traveling with I think the difficulty for me, and I just speak as a millennial, is that often how I pick a place, I'm such a basic bitch, is social media. It's because there's like a travel influencer or a friend I followed, and it's like a really nice hotel, and the pool is good, and they go to another restaurant, and they take a picture of the food, and I'm like, the food looks good.
So I'm going into it expecting to be titillated because I have a hard life. I've got kids.
I work really hard. Give me pleasure.
Like, I don't want gratitude. I want just like pleasure and to feel a bit tipsy.
Like, I think because lives are so hard and most people are traveling to escape and they want to feel really good. And between social media and that, that kind of really clashes with this idea of this kind of very Buddhist and virtuous gratitude.
I want to respect your country because it's like we do go to take, unfortunately. And I'm speaking for myself here.
No, the one exception I would tend to make for that rule that I just, well, that kind of attitude I just gave was if you have a young family.

I don't blame you if you've got a young family for going to an all-inclusive hotel in Marbella, where you want to go and just stay in that hotel.

Don't go out.

The kids are happy.

They're playing in their swimming clubs and whatever they do.

And you can actually relax.

I get that.

I get that. I've been there.

So, yes, this is possibly for somebody who's got a little bit more time because time is a big thing here to take this attitude and to be like this. So where do you think the responsibility lies then? Do you think, you know, when you hear stories, like let's say in Bali, for instance, you know, Bali has become one of the most popular destinations for remote workers now, which is a new type of tourism where people aren't just popping in for a day.
People aren't staying for a week. They're sort of living there, but only for the periods of time that they need to live there.
You know, so you see people becoming these, what do they call them? Digital nomads, right? That's what they call people now since the pandemic. And so now people go, hey, I live in Bali for six months of the year.
I do my regular job. I earn my income from my own country.
And I'm basically living like a king in Bali because I earn in a foreign currency. And then the locals in Bali say, hey, we like some of this, but now housing is slowly starting to creep on us and locals can't afford to live anywhere near to where they work or where they live their lives.
And then some of the people are even complaining about like the tourist, tourist part of it. They go, all our temples have turned into attractions.
You know, it's like we live in Disneyland. This is where I actually pray.
Like I actually, actually pray. And you're coming in here being like, oh, can you take another one? My chin looks fat in that one.
Do you think we should be pushing tourists to be more conscientious? Or should the locals or these countries be saying, hey, this is what you are allowed or not allowed to do when you come to our country and this is how it should or shouldn't be? Well, I think that there are two sides to this. The first one is what you said.
Yes, quite. We have personal responsibility.
But the other side of it is definitely, the local government there should be saying, these are the rules. I mean Amsterdam is eventually doing that now.
So don't come here you Brits on stag nights and do what you do, don't come here, that's it. I think there's other things that local authorities can do like stopping cars from coming in to city centers, reduce parking, use much more public transport so that people have to come in with buses or trains, which is healthier for the ecosystem and everything like that.
So there are methods of doing. And the ultimate one is if it's actually worse for locals to live there, there's something wrong.
Huh It It's a really complicated one because I don't know who the quote-unquote asshole actually is. Yeah.
There's just this inherent tension in traveling that you really can't avoid because wherever you're going to is somebody's home and homes have rules. You know, there's some homes it's like, take your shoes off at the door.
And you're like, but I don't want to take off my shoes. But shoes but they're like no take your shoes off at the door and i it's this delicate dance and i don't think we've got it right because i think the issue is that most people the tourists have the upper hand because they have the capital for the most part if you can yeah travel it's because you have disposable income sure there are people they save up for a long time but most people are pretty affluent they've got a lot of money and they want to throw it around you know i i'm myself like i'm like i want to buy this bag in paris even though there's a store down the road in la but you're like no i want this i want the experience of like a parisian menace a parisian sales associate who's going to be rude to me however i bought this bag at bag at the original store, right? So tourists, we come with a certain entitlement attitude and amount of money.
And I don't see most tourists bending and being like, oh, we're going to modify ourselves to the local rules because that's not what you go away for, is it? Maybe. Okay, maybe I have a pitch because, you know, Christiana had this on one of our previous episodes.
It was like, we have these fun episodes, If I Rule the World. And it's really just like thought experiments.
And Christiana's one was, which was unanimously voted on, which never happens. Everyone agreed with her.
And the idea was, everyone should have to travel. It's mandatory.
Your governments sponsor it all around the world. It's like free.
You you have to go somewhere and the reason behind it was if you don't travel you will always have a limited view of the world and it's like you know then then then how do we find that balance because on the one hand we're saying to people hey travel don't be ignorant go and see another way of living and then when you get there those people are like go back to where you came from you leave us alone we don't see our way of living it's like so so how do we how do we balance that i would say i would say try and be a conscious traveler act like somebody you would act like in your own personal space with your friends and and your neighborhood but i would i would actually argue what you're saying might actually be the problem i would argue the problem in amsterdam is the fact that the english tourists who come there are acting english i'm and i mean this truly like i think people are going to places being themselves we were taught the opposite thing and that is you when you go to somebody's house you do whatever they're doing like i grew up in a christian family but whenever i'd go visit my friend's house and they were Muslim or they were Hindu or they were Buddhist or whatever it was, my mom would say to me, when they pray, you put your head down and you pray with them. And I was like, but mom, we hate Buddhists.
And she'd be like, but you're in their house and they're praying. And she'd go like, this is not the time for that.
You respect their culture. And if they pray like this, you pray.
And when they burn incense, you also gonna burn incense with them. And I was like, but mom, we are in an existential war against these people.
The Lord has commanded us. I was very religious when I was young.
I was like, we're gonna ride the chariots of Jericho and burn everybody else who's not Christian. But my mom, despite being as religious as I was at this time, my mother would say to me, no, when you go there, you are in somebody else's house.
Your job is to adapt as quickly as possible. And so I wonder if the solution is the other way around, is to say to people, maybe, you know, like you do driving tests, maybe you should have to do tourist tests before you travel.
So you go, I'm traveling to Japan. And then they go, before you come to Japan, here's a little test you have to perform.
If you are in a restaurant and your friend tells you something funny, do you A, laugh? Do you B, laugh and then say something back? Do you C, nod your head silently and ignore it? Or do you D, not go to a restaurant with a friend? You should travel everywhere alone because it's rude to be with other people in a restaurant because it makes more noise. And then if you pick D or C, the Japanese are like, okay, you can come in because we don't want people laughing in restaurants.
We don't want people being loud in restaurants. So please, you know what I mean? Maybe that's the solution.
We test people before they go to countries and the country, you have to assimilate to what the country wants before you're allowed to be a tourist there. Do you know what? There is a country a little bit like that, which is Bhutan.
Oh, Trevor loves Bhutan. I've been to Bhutan.
Tell me, isn't there an element there of respecting local traditions? So, yeah. So you see, Bhutan is one of the more interesting examples in the world because bhutan is a country that exists in in one of the most precarious positions right you you have a country that witnessed like every country around it sort of get taken over by a larger power and bhutan exists in the space where it's like we want to remain bhutan they've said look we understand that there are many benefits to tourism we understand that there are many benefits to you know globalization and and expanding but they said but also we understand that this this tap that you open of tourism is very difficult to close once it's open and so what we're going to do is we're slowly going to open the tap and start with a drop go to a drizzle and then see where we go from there before this thing just turns into a fire hose and and so it means you you have a country that's like trapped in time which ironically makes it the darling of many people who go there you know especially white people white people love that shit let me tell you something now.
White people are like, oh, my God. I wish everywhere was like this.
But what also happens in that scenario is that the reason those Westerners, by the way, partly love Bhutan is because it's exclusive. It's like they're special.
They're different as well to go there. They can afford those, you know, quite expensive taxes to go there.
Not many other go there and in their defense i'm not even saying they're assholes the thing that they're appreciating is the very same thing that many bhutanese people wish to move on from the people of bhutan are like yeah but i wish there was a mall so i think there's like a you know there's a tough balance there in like how do you lock it down because i think it's a lot harder for a place like bhutan you know to recover from what happens in barcelona barcelona is you know they're barcelona it's what 12 of their gdp you know so barcelona can fight against tourism and be like ah we'll figure this thing out but if a place like bhutan lets everybody in their gdp can quickly become all tourism and then they may be like addicted to the you know to the drug that they've taken a sip of we'll be right back after this maybe this is another question do people have the right to be tourists because sometimes we make it seem like a right you know and i know i know it's a risky thing to say because well a i know i can afford to go anywhere so i know it's risky but but should everybody have the right to travel so even when we say oh but it's so hard for people to go to antarctica then i was like yeah should everybody have the right i believe in the right to travel i believe we're global citizens this is where I've become a bit oh goodness crazy goodness here we go I really do believe in that thing about I wish every citizen of the world had the opportunity and was funded by their government to go somewhere else because it just also means you look at home differently yes but I'm saying should you have the right to go everywhere yeah but my view is

that like why i'm a product of colonization right and i'm just like so now we're saying the worst

kind of the worst kind of travel that was that was the original over tourism where they really

took it too far i think starting with barcelona was crazy because i'm like look a lot of people

speak spanish that shouldn't be speaking spanish and it's because of a certain type of over tourism

I'm not going to, a lot of people speak Spanish that shouldn't be speaking Spanish. And it's because of a certain type of over-tourism and overstaying your welcome.
But like my view, honestly, is that I think traveling is a right. In a world where we are so close up and borders have become so fraught and people are at war with each other for different reasons.
I do think that there is even like a spiritual pursuit of travel. Like I think it makes the spirit better.
And I think that should be anything that makes humans better should be a right, in my opinion. I mean, I think the issue is that there's this fine line between the right to roam, if you like, the right to travel freely, as we all should be able to I but compared to a right to a holiday or a right to go somewhere exactly is that the same as the right to shelter the right to water the right to you know whatever um it's not on the same scale is it it's different no I think yeah it's kind of like you know Maslow's hierarchy it's somewhere like it highbrow and up on the top.
But I honestly think travel has been the thing that has made my life so much better. And I do think it make other people's right.
Even if it's like you go to another country and you're like, my home is the best place on earth. I'm never leaving again.
I think that's a valuable thing to experience. I think for most people and most travelers, it's an issue of literally, I can get to Paris, I can get to Venice, I can, and Barcelona, I can see the things I want to see.
And they will just go there in herds, as Trevor was saying earlier. It's mass tourism.
Don't forget people in Barcelona, the thousands are being all, and all these places are being disgorged from cruise liners coming into the city, all going to see Ramblas or Sagrada Familia or whatever it is. They will go to the places that's the most obvious.

So it's the Anthony Bourdain trendy cool types who want to see the other bits.

They may set a fashion which in 10, 20 years may lead to more people going to somewhere.

But I think on the whole, we may laugh at them, but they are doing a good thing because they're doing what's called dispersal. They're spreading people out and taking them to new owners.
So they're the minority. They're the minority, like the hipsters, backpackers.
Backpackers, by the way, I'm a big fan of. There's this whole saying in the new thing is value, not volume.
A lot of the money that backpackers spend goes into the local economy because they use the smaller shops. They don't buy and spend, stay in big hotels.
Yeah, they use like the laundry around the corner. Exactly.
They go to a local hostel. Absolutely.
And they travel by public transport quite a lot as well, which is also healthier for the local the local environment so yeah um it's it's it's a quandary about you know how you traffic this how you try and guide people to certain places okay i have a pitch i have a pitch and rajan i want to see if you if you like this because you are learned and you are fair unlike myself what about what about this for a pitch why don't we make it a lottery system worldwide and not everybody can go to the country they want to go to it's like ranked choice voting so you're going to put all the countries you want to go to it's going to put you into into a system. And then it'll be like, yep, you have been given access to Japan.
Oh, actually, no, you sorry, you haven't been successful for Japan. You can visit Rwanda or nope, you didn't get Rwanda.
You can't see the gorillas. You're going to get access to, you know what I mean? Like Mauritius, the Maldives.
Because then it'll alleviate everyone going to the same place at the same time. And you go, everyone in the world has to have travel visas, but it's a lottery system.
And we basically like spread the people out randomly and like, you know what I mean? Yeah. What about that? 80% of people go to only 10% of the world's destinations.
So that would change that for the start of. The other thing is there are a few of us, and that probably includes us three, who are traveling way more than your average person in the world.
Don't forget, don't forget half the world at least has never been outside their country. Here's two things to that.
One, I asked once on a flight, I was really annoyed, and I asked the flight attendant, this very nicely though, I said to them, I was like, hey, don't you think it's time that we retire the safety briefing? I think people know how to fasten seatbelts now. And I think everybody knows how the masks work.
And like, we don't need this thing. And she said something to me that was fascinating, which was true.
She said, actually, you'll be shocked to find that most people who are traveling, especially on flights have not flown before or are flying for the first time like you'll be shocked at how many of those people are actually experiencing this thing you know in a novel way but the second thing this is just a fun fact as an aside the 10 20 rule applies to everything i don't know if you know this so um the same way you go way you go like travel, let's say 10% of the people or 20% of the people are responsible for like 70, 80% of the travel. It's the same for ice cream.
It's the same for candy. It's the same for clothing.
No, I'm being serious. It's exactly the same.
Uh, 20%, 80% of the ice cream in the world is purchased by 20% of the people. Um, 80% of the fashion in the world is purchased by 20 by 20 of the people 80 it's a it's a really weird rule but like people over buy they over like you will be shocked if you like anything and you buy a lot of it you are part of the reason the industry like still exists everyone else just samples it so and so i guess tourism is the same now this makes me side with the people in barcelona who were doing the booing because it's just like these are people that travel everywhere and make everywhere bad so maybe you should like spray them with water pistols it's like oh now it's like oh it's the privileged elite right it's not somebody that that's the first time ever they've got on a plane or been able to visit barcelona this is probably someone that's been to madrid who's been to london who's been Hong Kong, who's been to Tokyo.
This is what they do. So yeah, let's...
And also your way, Trevor, actually is a lot fairer in the sense that as well is that because otherwise what we're going to have is basically people are going to be outpriced. In other words, only the very rich will be able to go to certain places.
Yeah. And this avoids that issue.
I totally agree with you in that sense.

Yeah, it's a great idea.

I like this idea.

We just start a world lottery.

And you know what?

I think my idea would work.

And you know, ironically,

what will be the downfall is there's going to be one country

that doesn't want to participate

because they're going to get greedy

and they won't be part of the lottery.

And they'll want more

and they'll get more people

because they won't be part of it.

And then other countries will back out

and then we'll be back to Barcelona being overcrowded.ded trevor this is a difference between a south african and nigerian because my mind went to no you bribe to win the place that you want on the lottery i was like i was like that's gonna be the problem people bribing so they get butan instead of rwanda oh wow oh well rajan thank you so much man. I really, really appreciate it.
Absolutely. Thank you so much for joining us.
Lovely talking to you both. Thank you, Rajan.
What Now with Trevor Noah is produced by Spotify Studios in partnership with Day Zero Productions. The show is executive produced by Trevor Noah, Sanaz Yamin, and Jody Avigan.

Our senior producer is Jess Hackl.

Claire Slaughter is our producer.

Music, mixing, and mastering by Hannes Brown.

Thank you so much for listening.