tourists
Tourists Flood Ladakh
While some of the peaceful societies portrayed in this website receive relatively few visitors, for others, tourists are very important. The people of Ladakh are among the latter, as numerous news stories over the years have indicated. One report in 2016 pointed out the differing attitudes toward tourism among the Ladakhi. They appreciate the positive […]
Tourists at Tsomgo Lake
The Lepchas living in villages near the massively popular tourist destination Tsomgo Lake in Sikkim were included in a news story on March 30 along with their neighbors the Bhutias and the Sherpas. The article, published on Mongabay.com, the prestigious international nature and environmental news website, described the local initiatives to protect the lake environment […]
Ladakhis Protect Wildlife
A Ladakhi man who made one of his life goals protecting wildlife in the Hemis National Park told his story in a blog post on February 21. He and his co-villagers in the mountains of Ladakh decided that increasing the numbers of wildlife would promote tourism and provide economic benefits to the local economy, as […]
Tourism Declines in Ladakh
Many peaceful societies have learned how to contend with tourists. People welcome them into their communities, build businesses and festivals to attract their money, and try to figure out how to preserve their own ways in the face of visitors and their need to be entertained. Ladakh is a good example of a society that […]
Guelaguetza for Tourists
A news story in August 2016 indicated that the world-famous Guelaguetza festival of the Zapotec had become so commercialized and made for tourists that the Zapotec themselves were forming alternatives. Called “People’s Guelaguetza” festivals, the alternatives also celebrate in a party atmosphere the Zapotec tradition of sharing and giving but without so many outsiders. A […]
An Israeli Visits Tristan
A news story published on the Tristan da Cunha website on December 23 has all the attributes of a nice yarn for the holiday season. It is an account by an Israeli man who won a contest and earned his dream: visiting the world’s most remote inhabited island. His narrative of his visit is a […]
Solar Lighting for the Batek
Three different Malaysian news sources over the past month featured a story about gifts of solar-powered lighting for Batek villages that are off the electric grid. In its report dated August 30, the Malaysian Insight, a news website, said that the Batek in Kampung Aur had received the electric lights on August 8 as a […]
Protecting the Dzongu: A Recent History
In 2006, the Lepchas of Sikkim became alarmed about proposals to build dams in the Teesta River basin, including ones in their Dzongu Reserve. Their protests, and their other responses to the dam-builders, form the subject of an article in Live History India, a digital platform that launched in 2017 to examine and reveal the […]
Gharb Sohail: Nubian Tourist Village
The English language edition of Al-Ahram, a prominent Egyptian newspaper, published a brief photo essay last week about Gharb Sohail, a traditional Nubian community near Aswan. The village, with about 3,000 inhabitants, exposes visitors to a smattering of Nubian foods, crafts, culture, arts, and traditions. To judge by the photos that accompany the article, the […]
Training Inuit for Tourism Jobs
The government of Nunavut recently organized a pilot program to train Inuit in a variety of skills that will qualify them as guides for adventurous tourists. The course, which lasted for two weeks and ended November 4, taught 5 men and 5 women such skills as piloting zodiacs from cruise ships, making landings in indigenous […]
