thepeel
Joined: 08 Aug 2004
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 Posted: Fri Apr 06, 2007 4:24 am Post subject: Slate series on Thailand toursim |
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An excellent series of articles on Slate.
http://www.slate.com/id/2163104/entry/2163105/
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n the beginning there was Jon Stewart irony, and it was good. And then there was Steven Colbert meta-irony, and it was better. But then I discovered meta-meta-irony, and it scared me straight.
In a tiny bookstore on Khao San Road, Thailand, with a bottle of duty-free Jack Daniel's in one hand and a copy of Alex Garland's The Beach (with Leo DiCaprio on the cover) in the other, I was looking through the window at the most dense, most multiethnic, most unwashed group of truth-seeking wanderers I'd ever encountered in one locale, when I made the mistake of cracking open the book and reading its opening: "The first I heard of the beach was in Bangkok, on the Khao San Road. Khao San Road was backpacker land. � Khao San Road is a decompression chamber."
Khao San Road is only a decompression chamber if you are ascending from Laos or Vietnam. I had descended from Midtown Manhattan, and Khao San Road was giving me the bends. I wanted to shout, "Get a job." Then I remembered that travel journalism isn't exactly coal mining, and I exhaled nitrogen and whiskey as I merged with the never-ending party.
Khao San Road is where WTO protesters go to vacation. It is a collection of cheap hostels, Internet cafes, semi-legit massage parlors, disreputable travel agents, nightclubs, and endless stalls manned by Thai merchants willing to cater to the desires of the First World's spiritually confused, culturally eclectic youths. And what do they want? Primarily, tattoos, henna, and dreadlocks. As I walked past a Thai grandmother braiding Bob Marley hair into a twentysomething Japanese head while a Thai man was needling Superman's symbol onto his shoulder, I thought: If this is where peace, love, and understanding lead, then let's give war a chance. |
"Get a job!". Exactly!!
The whole series is great. The photos are worth a look too. I think the guy really frames the tourist experience accurately. |
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