Josie is sunbathing against the backdrop of turquoise water and white desert sand. She could be on the cover of a magazine. It looks like she’s there by herself. Enjoying an undiscovered tourist attraction, 800km outside of Cairo – the Siwa Oasis. Pristine. Untouched.
Josie is encouraging tourists and travellers to venture into different parts of Egypt – to not just go and see the pyramids and go home, which is what most tourists tend to do. With her postcard style video shots, she’s ‘selling’ the place to tourists, as a fresh, off-the-beaten-track destination.
For a while I thought, off-the-beaten track travel promotion is a better alternative to the usual, “send everyone to the same place”, approach. You often hear about the damage done to natural and cultural landscapes when more visitors arrive than a place can accommodate. Sometimes this new kind of promotion is even called ethical or ecological.
But after thinking about how Josie has framed her visit, I’m beginning to wonder if even ethical travel relies on the same dynamics of selling exclusivity and ‘discovery’, and eventually producing the same patterns as old tourism but under a new label.
The more I think about it, the more it feels like gentrification in Western cities. Tourists look for somewhere new to go, somewhere that isn’t overrun with other tourists, where prices aren’t sky-high yet, where the locals still feel welcoming. Travel promoters & tourism boards push the destination until it gets labelled a “tourist trap,” and people move on.
What’s left is probably better infrastructure, but the original community is priced out. Guest houses and markets are replaced by boutique shops, franchises and hotel chains. And with them goes the vibrancy that drew people there in the first place. A two-tier structure takes shape: those wealthy enough to consume the place, and those on the outskirts who service them and maintain the place.