Show HN: Meetup with other travelers in a new place
travelfriends.xyz
travelfriends.xyz
I’ve found this to be a lot more isolating so I’ve created a map where I can add my profile and explore if there are any other travelers nearby to meetup with - https://travelfriends.xyz
It’s pretty basic but would love some feedback if any of you would use it? My friends liked the idea and a few of them have added their profiles.
I’ve also asked the local hostels to post it on their boards because I thought it could also be a nice way for shyer people to meet others in their hostel.
What do you think?
I mean, there are pictures and contacts of real women in there. That approach works bad with certain parts of the internet. But this part is usually not leaving their basement and goes travelling, so I hope it catches on with the right people and stay nice at least for a while.
One thing I liked about Couchsurfing that I think could have potential is the concept of vouches. You can only vouch for someone once you've received enough vouches. That along with with references provided a good way to quickly gauge the character and trustworthiness of a person. To gain vouches and references you had to have invested in the community. Not perfect, but often good enough. Couchsurfing also had volunteer community safety ambassadors, but I think less people seem motivated to do that kind of thing these days. I think a lot of the oldschool Couchsurfing moved to BeWelcome and Trustroots
Unless you find a way to validate that one really is travelling, that's a red herring. The issue is that I can see Female X is in London and I can pose as a traveller to catfish her (or worse).
Which is annoying, because the idea is good. I guess this is why we can't have nice things.
When my partner and I are traveling abroad, we love signing up to AirBnB experiences as it lets us to socialize with either great guides or other tourists, and not just be on our own all the time. The fact that we pay for it and each guide has reviews, gives us a peace of mind that the trip is almost guaranteed to be a success.
@elbajo posted an interesting comment about harassers looking for hookups in couch surfing platforms. I guess this is something that could happen more often if there's no payment involved for participants (unlike AirBnB experiences which is paid). I'm curious to know if you have any ideas on how to prevent that if the system remains free?
But overall, if you can get network effects going, a real gem.
Perhaps try to get it going for one or few places/activities. There's a chicken-eggness to an everywhere and everyone design.
ádh mór
One, two of the six people currently registered on the site live in the locations they cite - they aren't travellers at all. Seems like that would undermine the USP of the site and confuse travellers. Looking at Paul's picture, his use of the wink emoji, and the fact he's bragging about his job (inadvertently or not), make it look like he's using the site to meet women. That could be a big problem.
Second and relatedly, you need to a way to stop abuse. Up-voting and moderation will be needed in some form. But also some basic safety guidelines, i.e., always meet in groups and in public places.
Confession: I come from a large enough extended family that I usually already know people in the cities I visit.
Then he shows up to the group stuff but actually crashes elsewhere.
As for the site, it feels a teeny bit like a dating site right now. Uh, I'd consider taking it a step further and let the travelers say they are "Looking for group" for a specific activity.
For example maybe someone would like to go to an amusement park but they'd like to go with up to 3 others. Then other people can request to join the activity and write a short introduction.
Good luck!
Also, I had a better-than-expected experience at the Bikini Hostel in Miami Beach. While there were decidedly fewer bikini clad women than depicted on their website, it was apparent that the patio was used as the neighborhood hangout. Table tennis, Picnic tables, and food being cooked on the grill every night, cigarettes and alcohol shared freely. It didn't matter if you were actually booked into the adjacent building. Many of the guys were construction workers from Argentina, once a guy mentioned he didn't get paid on time so he would sleep on the beach until he could afford a bed again, but there was a share of digital nomads too (god, can we get a different term?). Really walkable neighborhood too, nice spot. Wish they would fix up the kitchen tho.
Puerto Rico is probably just as beatiful and your dollar will go farther, it was actually my first choice but a little harder to drive to ;)
1. You need a strong community.
It is absolutely essential that your membership is responsible for building a culture and reinforcing it. They need to set the standard for your site, and have the tools to keep it going. The community will create and organize events, get to know each other, police its members, form bonds, and welcome newcomers. This isn't easy, but not that hard either. The way it worked on Couchsurfing originally was forums and regular local get-togethers. Nothing fancy, just a regular old forum. But the functionality of the forum is necessary for the members to maintain the community. Having general discussions, pinning topics, 'leaders' of a particular regional community, sorting, advanced search, sub-forum hierarchy. Though unfortunately as with any forum, you'll also have to deal with spam.
2. If your website's features are shallow, so is your membership.
Couchsurfing went downhill once their forums went away, but it plummeted into hook-up culture once they added a feature to "find someone near you right now". It just turned into 50 dudes globbing onto the only chick in the area and mini groups forming around someone who's attractive. The profiles and hosting also turned into dudes only hosting chicks and vice versa. The loss of the community destroyed the entire point of the site, which was to meet travelers. If that's what you want then just have the "connect people nearby" feature, and people will just try to meet the hottest, coolest people they can. There's a market for that, but it's not the same as "meeting other travelers". The lack of community engagement also means people won't stay on your site for long, and it's the long-term membership that makes your site a reliable tool to use.
3. Enable the travel aspect.
Focus on the places, sights, food, music, culture, of each place. One of the most popular uses of Couchsurfing was just to ask locals "What's a good place to eat?" or "In what neighborhood should I stay?"
4. Use your website to shape the culture.
Provide a guide and examples for writing profiles. Add flair for common things people like, like a bowl of ramen, pair of skis, hiking boots, chess board, guitar. Let people personalize their pages with custom CSS/HTML/images - it allows people to express their individuality, which is a part of how people choose who they want to hang with. Suggest local get-togethers (pot-lucks, grabbing beers and hanging in the city square, easy hiking trails, city day tours, etc).
5. Enable the users to add value.
Allow them to add things like local attractions, events. This is another part of the core of your website ("finding local travelers") because people want to both know what to do locally, as well as find people to do it with. Make this super convenient and people will use it, and it will connect people.
6. Take safety reports and treat them seriously.
If people meet through your site, there's the risk of abuse (trust me, it happens). If you're a man running this site, you probably do not understand how at-risk women are when meeting a stranger, and how important safety is at keeping women on the site (let's face it, people will only use your site if there is a healthy mix of gender and sexuality, just like the real world). Community policing takes a lot of this burden off of you, but you still need to take reports and seriously investigate them, and ban people who cause trouble. Harm of an individual harms the community, which harms your site. I'm sure this will be somewhat "controversial", but it's important if you want people to trust your site.
All of that is a crap-ton of work. It may not be worth it for you to sink that much time and effort into your site. Without a community and the tools to develop it, I think your site may become a hook-up site like others before. Trust and community doesn't come easy, but when it works, it's beautiful. Good luck to you, dude!
The problem is that all of these other core items have been competed away by other sites. I think CouchSurfing did well because there wasn't a reddit, tripadvisor, airbnb, ... established, yet, when CouchSurfing was founded in 2003. They had an early-mover advantage, tapping into a sizeable population of like-minded people.
Does CouchSurfing have any remaining competitive advantages?
One example is Docker. All the features of Docker already existed in different tools. But Docker combined everything into one tool, making it easy to solve many different problems with one solution. The only "competitor" to Docker now are the other tools imitating Docker. (Has anyone even tried to use LXC or OpenVZ since Docker arrived?)
Another is Facebook. All of Facebook's individual features exist in other sites. But they combined all those different things into one platform, so people naturally went "Why would I use 10 different sites when I can just use one?" Once Couchsurfing's forums went south, people found Facebook much easier for group and event organization, so all the local Couchsurfing communities fled to Facebook regional groups (..... and made them private and locals-only, excluding all the travelers). Even with a first-mover advantage, Couchsurfing lost their user base and engagement when they chased away the community (as they were chasing investors, revenue, and irrelevant design trends).
The one feature Couchsurfing has that nobody else has is references. My profile has like 70 positive references from hosting travelers over many years, people of all ages and genders, with zero negative references. But some people have references from only one gender, and some people have negative references. This gives people a much better idea if a stranger is worth hanging out with; their profile may look bland, but a bunch of glowing reviews makes you think, they might be fun, let's give 'em a chance. This is distinct from a "friends list" with no reviews or context; they might have 1000 friends, but only 5 reviews. References also help reinforce good culture, as people know if they act like a dick they will get negative references.
IMHO, Docker and Facebook still did core/pure products that (i) were the category best, and (ii) anchored everything else.
It sounds like CouchSurfing lost its way circa 2013 by nuking community content. [0]
> The one feature Couchsurfing has that nobody else has is references.
Agree. That's the secret sauce to any platform. With things where they're at now with AirBNB, hostel sites, and locations that will actually underwrite awful experiences for guests/hosts, I naively assume CouchSurfing is a shadow of its former self. Allegedly, CouchSurfing started adding fees in with covid19, including paid verification.
The annoying part of, say, organizing a hike or boat trip and the part that an app would help the most is not necessarily finding people but reaching out and getting the various kinds of commitment from people you barely know when you want to share costs, share cars, sharing taxis, a boat trip, a guide, etc.
Meeting people is way more fun organically and and I would tend to avoid apps for that (or use tinder, i guess, but ick) but if there are 8 of us who want to share $320 for a one day boat trip and somebody you just met drops out the day before... that's where IMHO the pain and profit potential lies. An app that takes deposits, sets deadlines for commitments, finds replacement people, etc. that I could share with somebody I'd met organically that helps deal with people's inherent flakiness OR finds replacement people - I'd use the hell out of that.
And, you'd have taxi drivers, boat trip organizers, hiking guides, etc. clamoring to join too once it reached critical mass coz the economics of their services often only work if they've got groups of tourists of a certain size.
Unfortunately in its current form this basically looks like a tinder equivalent with "just looking for a travel partner" written as your description with zero chance of reaching critical mass.
I think that's the point. "Travelling" (and others like "finding yourself" etc.) is essentially synonymous with no strings attached sex.
As for meeting individuals, I don't see the point of trying to specifically meet other travelers unless it's for hookups, and if that's your thing you can just stay at a hostel and hookup with random people, that's essentially what hostels are for. The only way this type of app makes sense other than hookups is if it's intended for groups to meet other groups and plan shared activities.
I've also used Couchsurfing for many years and had great experiences! Sadly it got paywalled during the pandemic to stay alive and the usage has plummeted. I also always thought it could be have been done better.
The harassment messages will be a challenge. I've just added a step now that first messages will be reviewed and approved by a moderator, but would have to come up with something more scalable long term.
That sounds like a general description of way too many internet communities, too.
Anyways, I love the initiative and would love to see it catch on, I love communities like this, but, to be honest, as much as I like looking at them from a distance and admire them, I'd probably be too busy to properly participate in them.
But when it becomes the dominant topic everywhere, it is a problem.
Solution is hard of course, with so many singles out there. But I was also single for a long time and as far as I know, I did not harass any women in that time. So it might partly also still be macho thinking, that women are there mainly for sex. It might be even only a small minority doing it, but some aggressive machos can be enough, to destroy a whole community, or make it mostly male. So moderation will be key. "Report user" Etc.
I mean, we are not living under Taliban rule. You can go to a million sex finder sites if that is what you want. No need to encrypt your desires and bother other people who are in some group for the plainly stated topic.
Was I encrypting my desires and bothering other people? I don’t think so. It turns out humans will, from time to time, hook up with other humans who they meet doing random things, even if those things aren’t swiping right on an app.
Like I just wanted mostly to relax in a new awesome wellness place, I have not been before.
But sure, saunas are intense and you see other people without masks, which increase the chance of direct contact.
So if I meet someone nice there and this person is also interested, then sure, things can go another way for us, but not in this particiular place as other people are there for sauna and not an orgy.
Most, especially young women, cannot relax very well, with sexual tensions in the room directed at them, so the sauna culture is very sensitive to keep all that out as much as possible. You are just naked among other people. And relax. You may admire the looks of other bodies, but you are really not supoosed to stare at them, or bother them in any way. But in most public saunas it is sadly mainly horny old people keeping the women out. (which is why I am a bit mad at horny people creeping into private wellness groups looking for swinger sex)
I can't recommend affinity groups (especially co-ed sports) enough for ways to be social, exercise, and explore romantic matches (for cheap!) It bakes in compatibility/values traits.
But saunas...?
For saunas, one of many obvious differences (with volleyball/softball) is that I can't expect someone to engage in conversation. For sports, I need to communicate and coordinate. Parent is referring to people lustfully conflating brothel/bathhouse facilities with a family YMCA.
In Germany, sauna clubs are unapologetically marketed as brothels.
I am not sure, if I understand that right, but here in east germany a sauna is about sauna. And fkk is fkk(nudism). And sex is about sex. And surely people are combining it, but I have not heard of a gay "sauna club". That is, I do not know any sauna club at all. I am just in a telegram group, where a privately owned wellness place announces the next days when they are open for people (limited). And general talk around sauna/wellness. Nicer atmosphere, than in the big puplic ones, when you do not own your own sauna, which I would usually prefer.
>I am just in a telegram group, where a privately owned wellness place announces the next days when they are open for people (limited).
In the US, the equivalent are "country clubs."
See also: "oriental massage parlours".
One minor pivot that OP might consider is make the site about finding ways for travelers to integrate with the local community. Volunteering opportunities would be the primary idea that comes to mind, but if there's any mechanism to integrate with meetup that might be useful as well. Basically tie in systems that have already developed a survival mechanism to filter out creeps.
Besides, "finding a partner" is a much more common and pressing goal than "finding strangers who also like that niche thing I do".
It was part of the wave of new social networks that were to (and did) change how we use software. It was actually really useful and I met many people through it that I never would have otherwise. I count many of them as friends to this day.
"meeting random people and being curious about them and become friends" is a bit of a superpower in your 20s IMO. It's something I, usually by choice of venue (sleep early, eat properly, etc), don't do any more.
It happens a bit with friends-of-your-kids when you get to that stage of life, but the factors of who they are become much more constrained to certain things like schools, neighbourhoods, programs, etc.
- The map select seems to spazz out when I pan and zoom, often panning far greater distances than I intended.
- Maybe support something like Gravatar for profile images so you don't have to upload if you don't want to.
- I am impressed that I can mostly use this with NoScript enabled! I don't just get a white screen whin I disable JS. I always give sites a +1 if they can support some sort of non-JS fallback. More sites need to do this instead of the blank page dark pattern
How outfashioned.
I did it in 2014-2018 and it was awesome. I heard pre-2010 was even better.
Social networks full of bots and trolls are 13 to the dozen, but there is a real chance to make something really useful if it's based on manual vetting.
Also, a list of interests / desired activities, so I can see what we have in common.
It's fun to hang out and party with other travelers, but you don't really learn anything about the country when you do that. The country you're traveling in gets reduced to an amusement park for you and your fellow travelers. Meeting locals and getting a feel for life in the country is IMO slightly deeper.
That being said, obviously the amusement park model of travel is a thing, hence guided tours, all-inclusives, parties catering to travelers, etc... Also this app low-key feels like a hookup site.
The fact you're with other people doesn't mean you can't meet and interact with the local people and culture. It's also possible to spend time with travellers one day, and locals the next day. The point is they're not mutually exclusive.
Then again, they might also take you somewhere they haven't been to before either because they're convinced it'll impress you more than the dive bar or McDonald's they usually meet their friends at, and sometimes the cheesy backpacker bar is more fun than both. Sometimes the cheesy backpacker bar has more local people in it than the reputable local restaurant too!
it's not like you get to Mongolia and are like "wow instead of jobs Mongolians just play golf all day"
Also hawk training for Eagle Hunting must be fun to watch...
Also, to me, traveling is different than touring/being a tourist. My permanent home now is a tourist town and there's a marked difference between tourists coming for a weekend and travelers who come for a yearlong work holiday visa. The 'traveler' scene is a thing, not my thing though. They have a good time of sorts. Living somewhere is different though.
why would locals want to meet you?
Locals stay the hell away from tourists hoards at most destinations.
Why does anyone want to meet anyone? Does every girl at the bar want to meet you? Does every co-worker want to hang out after work? The answer is obviously mostly no, but sometimes yes. So you go out, talk to people, maybe it goes somewhere, maybe it doesn't.
> Locals stay the hell away from tourists hoards at most destinations
So don't act like the tourist hordes? Act like a normal person? And go somewhere that the tourist hordes don't?
Ah, the dreaded "not all tourists..."
Is it that hard to imagine that some people are fun and interesting to be around?
I'm not actively seeking it but that happened quite a few times through a hiking club or my choir.
People don't know this, but they probably would have success just trying to speak to me in the street.
I don't live in a touristic city though, people come to study or for the mountains around usually.
Best thing (impossible to do if you're just traveling quick) is to learn the language to like B2 level and then go around and socialize, etc. Can really get a true vibe of the people and usually everybody is so amazed that you put solid effort in to learn their language that they introduce you to friends and invite to parties etc. Way more rewarding than doing a pub crawl with a bunch of Germans and Brits and stuff.
Turns out most people travelling don't live in the same city as you - and when you happen to end up in place they come from, or the places their relatives and friends live - it's them, or their friends, or their families that put you up for the night, wash your clothes, take you for dinner, show you around, etc etc.
That aside, talking to other travellers usually means you have a much better idea about places to stay (because most locals don't have a clue about where to stay in their own town/city), how to get about, and all the rest - especially if they're following the same sort of travel path that you are.
I get your point, I just think don't think you're necessarily right for the market this site seems aimed towards.
I know they've instituted a paywall and haven't looked beyond it (can't travel right now due to family issues + COVID) but I always thought that there should be a place for the sites/apps that straight up charge you for their service, instead of milking you with ads or selling your data. Has the good old paid model invalidated the site so much in the eyes of its users?
But once that box has been checked in life, there are swiftly diminishing returns to gain from meeting other transient, internet-connected, first-world people like yourself. Especially when the alternative is to get exposure to new things.
There are a lot of people who are proud of where they live, and want to help you out in finding the best (non-touristic) spots.
Not attacking you but what does "non-touristic" even mean though? If you wanna not be a tourist and "live like the locals" get a job and an apartment there and stay a while. If you are only there for a week you'll always be a tourist living like a tourist--you are a transient visitor and nothing more.
In my book, to not be a tourist and "live like a local" you'll need to immerse yourself in all the mundane, routine things people in that area do like:
- Get a drivers license & register your car (if you have one)
- Get a haircut
- Go to the doctors office and the dentist
- Purchase a new pair of shoes
- Take your pet to the dentist
- Have a meaningful opinion on some local political issue (I'd say vote, but that isn't always possible without actually being a citizen)
- Go grocery shopping and purchase household sundries like toilet paper, paper towels, cleaning spray, brooms, etc.
- Get mail and packages delivered to your residence
- Speak to people in the native language. Be able to read it too.
That being said, I do understand the desire to escape the "tourist traps" and go somewhere that isn't just trinket shops and tacky shirts. I don't know if you need to know locals to find that stuff, I think you need to have an understanding of the kinds of things you like to see.
I would only include a few of your bullets, begrudgingly, as things that I'd put in the "non-touristic" box. For example, someone if someone is trying to select a restaurant, then highlighting the more authentic options which resonate are something that I've had locals do on virtually every trip. Local people to me sometimes includes other business owners or tour guides I've encountered on the trip. I've normally done some research to find the the better spots, but a local person may know which one offers a particular delicacy that is prepared in a traditional way. They may even just know which one doesn't really require reservations.
As an example, I was in Kyoto in 2019 with my wife. For various reasons we got to our ryokan (guesthouse) later than expected. We were on the fence about planning a fancy Kaiseki meal later in the week for my birthday because only one of us is an adventurous eater. Our hosts asked us about our plans for the week, if we had food, etc., and suggested an amazing local place that we would never have found on our own. In a way it was intimidating given that no one spoke English, but our hosts had really greased the wheels with the husband and wife who ran the place. This is absolutely not the kind of setup and assistance that you get from a concierge in hotels where there is a degree of risk avoidance.
The mundane is only something you have time for on an extended trip. By the very nature of being long enough on a trip that your hair grows out, you'll likely need a trim. You may have the choice of somewhere that's easy and comfortable for a someone from a different place, or you may see that your comfort with the location has changed to open different possibilities. Of course, if you like to throw yourself into situations you can skip the haircut before leaving and try to find something when you arrive. Your personality impacts how comfortable you feel with that.
But like, the small group I was with ended up at a place like this that did Korean BBQ: we showed the proprietor the cash we had, and basically they brought out a selection of delicious things, took our money, and that was that. I guess it's possible we might have been disappointed, but it ended up being a great experience, and certainly far more true to the experience of a local than eating in one of the hotel restaurants.
There are the beaches that locals party at or are empty, not the overcrowded ones that tour busses shuttle people to.
You can be a tourist and still get to experience the fun parts of life the way locals do, without having to get a 9-5 in the town.
Let me give you an example. When we were traveling in Cuba, we met a fellow Flemisch guy, who seemed to know a lot of locals. We started talking. He was there visiting his ex-wifes Cuban family. He and his ex-brother in law invited us for dinner at their house in Santiago de Cuba. One of the best experiences I had, and I don't consider such a thing "touristic". You're not talking to a tour guide there.
A lot of times, the locals are very happy to interact with you. And coming from a western country, it always surprised me how welcoming other, poorer countries are.
Your response appears to be rooted in a rational conjecture of some sort. Do you have direct experience getting to know strangers while spending time in a foreign country?
I can speak from experience - there are people, nearly everywhere I've ever traveled (swaths of Asia, Europe, and South America), who are interested in speaking with me, so long as there is a reasonable way for us to communicate. It's as easy as expressing interest in their culture/town/business/activity and being generally friendly and positive.
edit: I should add, when I say "speaking with me," it infrequently goes beyond a simple brief conversation. Dozens of these interactions have turned into longer engagements, from dinner parties at people's homes, to activities like fishing, to being shown real locals spots. I have a loose network of "friends" all over the world now and have met a handful in my own country when they have visited.
Sure, you wont understand what it is really like to be a local resident from a single conversation, or spending a day together, but you can connect and learn more than you knew before.
You don't have to fetishize locals, to seek out their company and perspective over other tourists. Some of my fondest travel memories are from being invited into peoples homes for meals with their family, talking with them, and getting a tiny peak at their experience.
There are only so many tourist destinations to accommodate rising number of tourists every year. Every single place is overrun with mobs.
Backpacking to some remote asian town is fantasy not achievable to 99% of people with kids, mortgages , pets ,aging parents ect.
People are beyond friendly to tourists. In my younger days some Japanese tourists were so happy to meet me we took pictures.
As long as you respect no one owes you anything life is great. That said, I vastly prefer real life socialization over any app. The website being shown here is a bit counter productive. Your in a foreign country, just experience it. Don't stair at your phone all day.
I am guessing you are white? I experienced something similar when we went to china, all the locals were mobbing white people in our group to take pictures with them. I am not white and no one bothered me :). Pictures with whites is a trophy for chinese locals?
We had some sort of "lunch with locals" where 'locals' were toasting to 'the beauty' of white women in our group. All non whites were completely ignored by the locals. I've never experienced such overt racism/sexism anywhere else, Really bizarre experience. screw the locals.
China , even to my friends of color has been amazingly great. They tell me you will get stared at, but it's nothing compared to the open hostility faced in America on a day-to-day basis.
ok ? But you are white. yea?
What you described in your original comment is a white person experience. No asian is rushing to get their picture taken with an Indian, lol. I later learned that having your picture taken or having a white 'friend' is some sort of status symbol.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_monkey
> The phenomenon is based on the perception that association with foreigners, specifically white foreigners, can signify prestige, legitimacy, and international status.
> Regardless of skin tone they've been treated much better in Asia than in America.
This might be true but i was talking about overt racism. I've never experienced this total shameless overt racism outside china. It didn't even occur to 'locals' that totasting to white women's beauty had anything wrong with it, it just made sense to them that white = pretty.
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/28/opinion/rent-a-foreigner-...
" Clients can select from a menu of skin colors and nationalities; whites are the most desirable and expensive."
this shit is disgusting.
watch what the 'locals' think of you here : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctbLEQCuJUg
> ok ? But you are white. yea?
> What you described in your original comment is a white person experience. No asian is rushing to get their picture taken with an Indian, lol. I later learned that having your picture taken or having a white 'friend' is some sort of status symbol.
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_monkey
> > The phenomenon is based on the perception that association with foreigners, specifically white foreigners, can signify prestige, legitimacy, and international status.
> > Regardless of skin tone they've been treated much better in Asia than in America.
The second quote is not in the article. But this is:
> White monkey is a term used to refer to the phenomenon of white foreigners or immigrants in China ...
Emphasis mine. Setting aside the irony of complaining about racism and then failing to distinguish between Chinese and Japanese, I don't know why you felt the need to diminish the parent's experience in Japan.
The third part:
> https://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/28/opinion/rent-a-foreigner-...
> " Clients can select from a menu of skin colors and nationalities; whites are the most desirable and expensive."
> this shit is disgusting.
> watch what the 'locals' think of you here : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctbLEQCuJUg
Ok, people prefer white skin in China. They also prefer it in India. It's pretty common in countries with a colonial "heritage", though I agree it's gross.
The second part:
> > Regardless of skin tone they've been treated much better in Asia than in America.
> This might be true but i was talking about overt racism. I've never experienced this total shameless overt racism outside china. It didn't even occur to 'locals' that totasting to white women's beauty had anything wrong with it, it just made sense to them that white = pretty.
Emphasis mine.
But then the parent comment stated:
> This doesn't align with what my friends have experienced. Regardless of skin tone they've been treated much better in Asia than in America.
> China , even to my friends of color has been amazingly great. They tell me you will get stared at, but it's nothing compared to the open hostility faced in America on a day-to-day basis.
Emphasis mine. So the parent was talking about overt racism too. They're both valid, I suppose.
I guess the reason why this comment feels weird is because it really feels like there is an undercurrent of genuine hatred for the Chinese, which you are trying to justify with an experience of colorism, despite the fact that India (which I'm assuming you're from? Since you mentioned "Indian") also has problems with preferring white skin. I guess you can hate both Indians and Chinese for colorism, but it feels like you are just using colorism as an excuse to hate the Chinese.
Sorry for being so accusatory. This comment just had a weird feeling I wanted to address.
I’m white and I still hear people occasionally insulting me in their own language, thinking I don’t understand the words they use. It upsets me and it upsets my local girlfriend too. People are a*es and racist everywhere.
That said my experience with people in Asia has been overwhelmingly positive and that’s why I live here, even with the occasional rude comment and person taking a video of me while saying “botak”
I’m in Indonesia and literally 2 weeks ago someone told me Papuan women are ugly because “they’re dark like Africans.” The Jakarta man telling me this wasn’t even light skinned.
It's like a nerd staying away from other nerds because he's "better."
I don't think it's controversial for someone to say: "When I travel, I'd rather have the company of people who live in the place I'm visiting, instead of other travelers". I struggle to see how the original comment conveyed much more than that.
Any reasonable tour is going to make a very obvious effort to make it not feel this way be allowing you the flexibility to break off and see and do different things. This enriches the experience for both you and other participants because the different experiences are discussed and others go off and try the things that you've done. It is a major driver for the whole tour economy. If it was purely utilitarian then the tour company would package every piece of the experience.
When it comes to travel more generally, many people are extremely confined by touring. They want to have a completely individualized experience that takes them further away from seeing other tourists to varying degrees. If you are a reasonably well-to-do Brit, you will be keeping a wide berth from the other Brits that are at your destination from a package holiday because of the risk of loutish behavior, or bias on that.
Many tourists will plan to visit sites when other tourists will not be present. For example, staying locally near Plitvice Lakes in Croatia, so that you can get in before the tours arrive from the coastal towns. It's not that you care about the tourists that much as individuals, it's just that you would prefer to experience the place without the intensity of people. Or, you want to photos without people because you realize you'll actually spend more time blocking space waiting for a shot. Many times I've been that tourists that gets there early to avoid the tourists, only to stay and have an even better time.
The extremes are when people think they can assimilate into a culture immediately without effort. The growth in travel and Instagram trend has seen a rise in the number of checklist travelers who just drop in. People will go as far as inviting you into their homes in many places, but you need to make a genuine connection. During Ramadan in Istanbul I've seen tourists eating all day in pretty conspicuous fashion which they are free to do. By being more conscious of the fasting going on and being out and about for iftar you are going to be seen in different light by locals and the door will open to experiences you wouldn't otherwise get.
You should be trying to focus on learning about the culture and the places and people, not some followers you’ll never meet and making sure to get ig photos the whole day. That’s not connecting, it usery, to grow your internet fame. No surprise you can’t find willing participants.
Are you projecting? Maybe you haven’t met locals that wanted to take you around because that is the way you are treating them? I lived abroad for over a decade and I never had problems meeting locals or making friends with them. Generally I tried to avoid the selfie taking crowd of loud American tourists and brash military guys out on leave, like the other locals did.
It's a gig-economy thing where locals get paid to hang around and talk to you at popular tourist sites. For example, four older gentlemen playing dominoes at a small table in Santorini, and they let you join in on the game and converse in broken english. Or an older woman working at a pastry shop in Florence, and she invites her beautiful 19-year-old granddaughter Francesca to translate your questions. All of them: rented locals.
what are you talking about? I've been a digital nomad for a few years and locals LOVE meeting travelers. I get invited to parties and events more often in foreign countries than when I'm in my hone town. They themselves want to meet new people or practice their english skills.
When I travel abroad, it's for months at a time. I avoid the 'scene', not for disdain for tourists or other travelers, but because you miss some things. Not gonna say I specifically avoid ex-pats, just don't seek them out either. Some ex-pats form groups because they want a social life and are too lazy to learn the language, I'm not about that. But if I meet one, that's fine too.
I'm not traveling for Instagram clout, I just like it. My typical MO is to book a one way ticket, then spend months off the beaten path, working remote all the while. It's what I like. I meet people because I'm social (enough anyway, in many ways I'm introverted), not because I want something. And sometimes (usually) I just have a 5 minute conversation and it goes nowhere. Because people do have lives, yes. That's ok though. Same back home, if I sit at a bar and someone else strikes up a conversation, I engage or don't, depending on my mood. That's life. Truly good friends are rare anyway. And traveling 'friends' are usually just people who want a favour, in my experience. So I go places, am completely self-sufficient the whole way, I meet people, sometimes they stick around, often they don't.
I am a local in the town I live in. I like to meet new people. I organise meetups for locals, tourists, travellers, whatever. I help people out if I see them staring at the Tube map.
Some of my friends don't do this, they have hobbies or work or whatever that they prioritise over it. Or they're just not that interested or social in the first place.
So when you are travelling, look for me and not my friends.
There are ten million of us, we are quite varied here.
I enjoy being the stereotypical Brit and waffling on about pubs and where the best chippy is and all of that.
I've found that just being a tourist, I was kind of an inconvenience to everyone. But when I was there for a purpose, as when I did most of my traveling for ski racing or training, it was natural to make connections. Much less so when traveling to conventions, and least as a tourist.
It was also cool that the schedule of the purpose would take me to places I'd otherwise never go.
So, perhaps take up an activity, whether sports, academic, hobby, whatever, that often has events or meetings around the country or world, and follow that... Kind of becomes a double benefit...
I actually think interacting with other travelers is one of the best ways to connect with other cultures. It's one of the few situations where people from all over the world end up in a similar situation, at a similar level, doing similar things. With locals, there's invariably going to be a large disconnect, even when you can speak the language (and in most countries, few tourists do). You're always going to be a tourist visiting their home, whereas with a fellow traveler, you're a peer.
It's not unlikely that someone would have a more productive cultural exchange hanging out with a Japanese traveler in Peru and a Peruvian traveler in Japan then trying to meet these people in their respective countries.