At the moment I’m reading a book called Paris-Saigon: 16 000 km en 2CV dans l’esprit de Larigaudie by Edouard Cortès and Jean-Baptiste Flichy. It’s about two guys (the authors) who (predictably, given the title of the book) travel by 2CV from Paris to Saigon (and it’s amazing how tempted I am to write in French now, since the book is in French and when I think about it while reading it I think in French). I’ve only just started reading it, so I don’t know if it’s good or not, but one thing is for sure: c’est une sacrée aventure!
(As a side note, here’s an interesting list of 2CV expeditions throughout the years)
It got me into ‘adventure mode’ (already, and I’m only on page 34) and made me think about what possible routes one could do in a similar vein to their trip. They already based their trip on the journey made by Larigaudie (who went from Paris to Saigon by car (Ford Model T) in the 1930’s), but it’s more the spirit of adventure that they were trying to capture, rather than retracing the original route. I’d love to do something similar – not necessarily the same Paris – Saigon idea – but something based on the same type of idea. The problem is that these days it seems like everything has been done already. There’s plenty to learn about in the world, on a personal level, but there is very little left to ‘discover’.
Two big causes of this are development and globalisation. According to the UN, development is a human right, and coming from me, currently living in a ‘developed’ country and having lived, let’s face it, a privileged and ‘developed’ life even in ‘undeveloped’ countries, this is probably a little selfish. But so many more places are easily accessible now compared to a few years ago, and cultures are beginning to modernize as a result of this, with tourists ever-more numerous and foreign investment increasing at an often astonishing pace. The paradox is that it’s the very ‘globalising’ lifestyle that I have lead that has resulted in this situation. And from the point of view of a national of an ‘undeveloped’ country, why shouldn’t they have the right to develop and progress in the same was as developed countries have?
On the other hand, countries influenced by the industrial revolution (such as the US) didn’t have the same level of foreign investment, so it’s not quite such a straightforward comparison and perhaps the rate of development isn’t the same. In addition, the western influence naturally has a cultural element to it. The undeveloped countries want to be successful of course and so will integrate whatever they can into their own culture in order to achieve that goal. The money that enters countries in the form of foreign investment (aid, taxes on foreign business, etc.) is then invested in the country’s infrastructure, often bringing it in reach of mass tourism as well.
One example of how quickly things can change as a result of tourism is Nefertari’s tomb in Egypt (image to the right (of Osiris and Atum, “Lord of the Two Lands” of Upper and Lower Egypt, and also master of the Universe) from the linked site), which strikes close to home for me. I visited it in 2002 while living in Cairo. Inside there is some beautiful art and hieroglyphics – we weren’t allowed to take pictures and at the time they limited the number of people going into the tomb and how long they were in for. It wasn’t cheap, but it cost *only* about $50 US. Now, just 6 years later, it costs about $6000 for the same visit. Yup, that’s right, 3 zeroes.
The point of this is to say that the spirit of travel doesn’t seem to be what it used to be, it seems to have lost its mystery and sense of adventure as a result of this thing we call globalisation. It seems to have changed noticeably even since the 90’s – for example I remember Laos as being very ‘Lao’ still, while now I hear that it’s opening up, with more and more visitors and more and more activities and sites geared towards tourism. I’m still far from convinced that globalisation is overall a positive thing. One thing I liked about Laos was its authenticity. These days tourism seems to be something relatively accessible to a large population, as opposed to the more select, adventurous group a mere few decades ago. To me it seems to be a sad demise to a previously unique lifestyle.
