What Do We Owe the Places We Visit? Rethinking Cultural Travel Beyond the Aesthetic

[0:00] We're beginning to hear the phrase cultural travel appear more and more right now, but I want to ask a harder question: what do we actually owe the places that we visit? Because cultural travel isn't just about eating the local food or learning a few phrases. It's about how we move through other people's homes, and whether we leave places better, unchanged, or worse than when we found them. Today's episode is a solo one, no guest, just a real conversation about responsibility, discomfort, and what intentional travel actually demands of us.

My name is Kiara, and I am the host of Put the Guidebook Down, brought to you by Kultura Travel. And I want to start today's episode by naming the problem. Cultural travel is slowly becoming more performative, optimizing for content creation rather than genuine connection, and this is happening because of "immersive travel" being thrown up as a buzzword, creating content to be watered down online for consumption. What does this mean? It means we're seeing people just throw "cultural travel" or "immersive travel" or "authentic" everywhere without any real substance behind these words. So people are preaching that they are going on these immersive travel experiences where actually they're just having the culture, these landscapes, as a backdrop, rather than actual genuine relationship-building. So this is the problem with becoming more performative, because we're creating these facades or cookie-cutters that make people think they are actually learning more about the culture and the place they're visiting. But in reality, they're still focused on getting the perfect photo or video, and just having something to show when they go back home. Now, if that's what you're looking for in travel, that could be okay, as long as you're not throwing "cultural travel" onto it, because that's not what you're doing.

It goes back into what I said earlier about "authenticity" — this is now becoming a big buzzword in the travel industry, where people are using the word authentic to get more sales or more people traveling to the destination, but not having any genuine content or credibility to back up that authentic claim. So one of the problems that comes with this is travelers want that authenticity, but not the accountability. And we saw this in the ecotourism or eco-theatrics episode a couple of episodes ago now, but people are just using the label and saying that they're going to this destination or experience on cultural travel because they want to appear that they're doing it authentically, but they're not taking accountability for what their actions are really doing by supporting a tour or experience or group that makes those labels without actual authentic intentions behind it. In terms of ecotourism, that was companies or agencies throwing "ecotourism" onto it, but then none of their tour operations, or what they do, is actually good for the environment.

So this really comes down to the difference between consuming culture versus participating in it. And this goes into the accountability segment — are you just going to this destination to take photos and videos, using these experiences as a backdrop for your photos and videos, without actually engaging with the experience, or trying to learn about what you're witnessing or participating in? That type of content, where people focus on the perfect photo and video, is what we start to see rewarding surface-level engagement — you're creating that facade, it may not be genuine, and you're not learning about anything, and potentially adding your own opinions or viewpoints on that experience without you actually having done any participation in it. So while people may have good intentions behind what they're doing in their posts and videos, or being a traveler in general, it doesn't necessarily equal good impact. And this is why we're seeing more ethical tourism and travel coming up in discussion in travel forums — because people are going to these destinations, taking videos and photos, but not necessarily taking into consideration what the impact is that they're leaving by participating with that tour agency, or by going to that destination, by taking all those photos or videos. It's starting to create this "cultural travel" vibe, but that's not what cultural travel is. So then what is it?

I've talked a little about what cultural travel is in some of our initial episodes for this podcast, and it's all over Kultura Travel's website, because this is what's at the core of cultural travel — authentic cultural travel, and being immersed into the culture genuinely, with good impact. Now, for the sake of this episode, we'll define three pillars of responsible cultural travel: the first being preparation, the second pillar being presence, and the third one being participation.

Now, talking about preparation — this one's kind of easy and straightforward. It's talking about what you have to do before you arrive at your destination, that country you're visiting or maybe moving to. So what responsibility do we have as a traveler before we arrive? And this really comes into — don't think of it as homework, but just educating yourself: learning about the history, or maybe the power dynamics, cultural norms, etc., that are still relevant in the country today. And then learning what you need on a safety component, or also just language phrases to get around. But ultimately, to educate yourself so you know where you're going, and you can fit into it as much as possible. Now, this is a personal, maybe hot take, but being a tourist doesn't give you the excuse to say, I didn't know, or to just be like, well, I'm going to be sticking out anyways, why do I need to make an effort, I'm only going there for a short period of time. This is literally the problem, and this is why we have this discussion around cultural travel. Saying you didn't know, or not doing your education before, is no longer just neutral — it could be leading into that harmful impact you could potentially leave when visiting a destination. It all ties down into respect, and learning the context about the place you're visiting, because this is what matters, rather than thinking about where you need to take your Instagram photo spots. You came there for a reason — maybe some people just think about the photos and videos, but most people go there to learn something new, and they come back as a changed traveler, more open-minded. Now, part of that is actually learning while you're there, but a lot of the work comes with the preparation, to help maximize your experience there and really leave with knowledge.

Whenever I am starting to plan for a trip, I always have this itinerary in the back of my mind with room for the spontaneity, as we discussed in the past, but I also have a whole section of my travel planning dedicated to educating myself on the culture of the place I'm visiting, as well as the destinations I'm going to try to visit. So I literally have a section in terms of cultural greetings, and then what aspects of local items or art is known to the region — this ties more into souvenirs, just because I collect art. But this helps with giving understanding towards the history — what type of historical events happened there, and what are some of the local recent news, and how do different people feel about that. So you have more sensitivity when going there, because people are going to ask for your opinion, not just on your own local politics, but then also maybe on what's happening in their region. So learning about the people, what's happening locally, will help prepare you to learn more about not just the past, but the place you're in.

The second pillar is presence — so what does it mean to truly be present in a place? Everyone who's listened to my episodes in the past knows the first thing I say is put the phone down, look up and see where you are, engage with your five senses, and really take in the place you're in. You spent all this money and time to get over here to that place — why don't you want to look at it? Your text can wait, most likely. Put it down and start to enjoy the sights, the smells, the different languages going on around you. I believe that being truly present in a place is when you start to forget about what's happening at home that you left at home — so you're not thinking about work, you're just thinking about trying to take in everything you're seeing at once, that's where I think presence is. Now, everyone knows that I like to talk more about language and the perks of learning the local language — the language barrier actually improves this presence, because tuning into the sights and sounds, hearing the different language going on around you, helps you stay more in tune with the place you're in, so you're more aware of where you are, and more ready to absorb content, just because your brain is getting more triggers, keeping it alert and ready to absorb information, just because you're trying to process these unknown sounds. And the language barrier also helps you step out of your comfort zone, and challenges you to find a way to mutually communicate and understand one another — because if you have a language barrier, you get more creative with how you're going to communicate with the person, whether that's body language, maybe pulling out the translator, or just trying to work across a similar language. I know in some of my destinations, my friends and I, we have multilingual people — myself, I'm multilingual — and when we go to a destination we may not speak the local language, but then we play this game with the locals, and we try to figure out which one of us can find a mutual common language. So we go through all the languages I know, all the ones my friends know, and eventually we end up finding some kind of language we have in common, which is the beauty of language learning, let me tell you. But that helps you then create more facilitation and communication and understanding between the people in the local community, but then also with the place that you're in.

Where does this also help? Listening causes you to pay attention, so you're not so focused on documenting — not trying to get those perfect photos, perfect videos, because you're really just listening to the place you're in, and you're tuning into your observation skills. So you're noticing the different types of birds flying in the sky — maybe you looked up and there was a peacock in the tree, true story — maybe you're seeing how people are paying for their bill in the restaurant, or how they eat the food, as we talked about before. You have to learn to be okay with discomfort and the slowness, because that's where you're really going to learn and truly immerse into cultural travel.

Now talking about observation leads into the third pillar of participation. Now it's important to think that maybe participation is welcome in some scenarios, and it's better to just be the observer in others. Being in a cultural experience, or witnessing a ritual, doesn't mean you need to actively participate if, one, you didn't do your preparation and research, so you don't know what you're attending, and two, to not disrupt the ceremony by trying to capture the perfect photo or video. In these instances, it's better to just be the observer. Now, of course, there are going to be situations where you're encouraged to participate, or maybe you need to become the active participant, or leader, when trying to navigate directions or face the language barrier. It's all about recognizing those situational differences, and then taking a step back to think about the intention behind what you're trying to do or accomplish. So some points to reflect on when it comes to participation: knowing when to say no to experiences that may feel extra, or maybe not genuine, or maybe unsafe — tuning into that local gut feeling, your gut intuition about what you feel in the proposal, like whether or not you should go with that person you just met to the restaurant, or whether you should go off into this bar. It's all about taking in the context of where you are, based on the knowledge you have from your previous research, what you've heard while you've been there, and then how you feel.

Now, sometimes this even comes into local guides — sometimes it's best to let them lead, even if it's inconvenient, they're taking you the long route, they have the local knowledge, that's why you hired them. But then sometimes you need to, again, tune into your gut intuition — does this feel right, does it feel safe, am I enjoying this? That's when maybe your participation needs to come into play, and you need to be your own advocate for things. But I really want to go back to the emphasis of participation — you don't always have to be the active participant, you can be the observer. This is something I've had to learn through my own travels. I am a big extrovert, as people know, and I really like to get involved and participate in local events, but this can be socially draining, it can take a lot of time and effort, and sometimes it's not your time to be at the center of attention. So that's when you need to take a step back and just think that you're actually going to learn more and experience more by just observing.

But here's the part we don't talk about enough. True cultural travel will make you uncomfortable, and that's the point of it all. Many people, when they go on their travel, resist the discomfort, or that feeling of, this is not exactly what I was looking for. This can occur because maybe you're a new traveler and had a very set itinerary that you thought you were going to follow, and then maybe your flight got delayed, or someone got sick, and this can lead you to missing things on your itinerary, and you get a little bit of discomfort with that. This can also come from the fact that maybe not everything's going as planned, or maybe you're not hitting all the spots you wanted to, and you have that feeling of discomfort and not feeling fulfilled in your trip. That's okay. Some people may feel that everything needs to go perfectly in order for it to be a successful trip, and that's part of the learning curve when it comes to cultural travel, because the real essence of cultural travel is when you lean into that discomfort and embrace the fact that things are going wrong, or not as you planned. That's what I had to learn in my initial travel — I had these itineraries, and when something didn't go as I planned, I kind of got upset. But as I learned after moving abroad, those tend to be the best moments and the ones you will remember the most. In my previous episodes I've talked about times where my transportation didn't show up and I had to last-minute change how I was getting to my next destination, or something I haven't talked about yet and probably should — more about food, and getting sick, and then now what, now you have to navigate the whole healthcare system of where you are, and that changes up your itinerary. So leaning into these moments is really where you're going to learn, and going to have the most authentic and memorable part of your experiences.

Now, it doesn't always have to be bad — I just named a bunch of things that could potentially go wrong when traveling, but it can be good. For example, maybe you're traveling with your set itinerary, and you meet this new friend who is also going through the same hostel, and you guys realize you both wanted to try to go to this other experience, but it wasn't in your itinerary because you felt like you needed another person to go, or you didn't have time, and you end up going together and getting a whole new experience. That's a positive. There are many other opportunities where this discomfort can actually be something good, and why you should lean into the discomfort — that's really where the growth happens. So if you're facing the discomfort, check yourself, make sure you feel safe, try to understand why you're feeling that discomfort, and see if you can maybe lean into that and leverage it to get more immersive into your travel.

Now, another one I need to kind of clear the air on is when you're not understood, praised, or welcomed immediately. So sometimes, I've got to put it out there, people feel that when they go to a country they should be special because they're the foreigner, and that they should be getting all this excellent treatment because of that, especially as tourists — entitlement, we'll call it. But sometimes on the flip side, you can be seen as foreign and therefore not special. So what does this all mean? Because this can also feed into that discomfort feeling — you are not everyone's priority. They have their day-to-day lives. You're the priority of the tour guide or the people you're with, but you are not the number-one priority of where you're visiting. So you have to learn — again, that's where the preparation comes in — and just being able to assimilate and immerse into the local culture is starting to get into the day-to-day. Now you'll have an outsider view of being able to observe what's happening around you and your surroundings, which can be a really cool experience. If you want to just be the observer, if you want to be the active participant, jumping into that day-to-day will help you understand more about the place you're visiting. But the world does not revolve around you, so don't have these expectations that just because you were a foreigner, that you are going to be special and getting special treatment. So let go of your control with that, let go of things that go wrong, and your expectations sometimes, because that's where you're going to grow and really immerse into your experiences.

Now, for me, I've had that experience where you show up and people just don't really care that you're there — they're just like, okay, cool, another person visiting, we're just going to keep going about our day. I've had the other side, where because I was visiting an area where maybe there weren't a lot of people who looked like me, I became the center of attention. There's a lot of jokes about this where people visit the Taj Mahal and end up getting more attention than the Taj Mahal, just because you don't look like someone they've ever interacted with — so then they want to take photos and videos of you, or with you, and that can also be overwhelming and not very comfortable. So that's where you start to see yourself change, and how you approach different situations, and how you overcome that discomfort — and that's really where you see your growth, and you come back home with this new open-mindedness and experiences that have helped you change in a positive way.

So what does this mean for how we travel going forward? We're not trying to create this vibe of "cultural travel" where it loses the authenticity and the accountability. This is where Put the Guidebook Down was started, the podcast and also Kultura Travel. We want to encourage people to become a traveler who immerses in authentic cultural experiences, who is there with the good intention to actually learn about the places they're in, the people, the language, the food, all of that good stuff, rather than just consuming it for their own benefit, using the culture as a backdrop to get more Instagram followers. We are not interested in promoting that behavior or that type of vibe. Kultura Travel is challenging this mainstream travel culture, because we want you to actually put the phone down and look up and engage with the place you're in. We want you to learn about where you are, so then you grow as a person and leave with more knowledge and a better sense of who you are than when you left — and recognizing that this might put you in this weird middle zone, as we've talked about in a previous episode, of you not being the exact same person you were before you left, and you're never fully going to fit in with the local culture if you move abroad. But you now have this middle, where all these other authentic cultural travelers exist, because they've learned about the places they've traveled to, they've adopted some local customs, cultures, languages, etc., and added them into their own day-to-day. Because of this, they also have relationships and friendships across the seas, across countries, which is a testament to how deep their cultural travel went. This is what we strive for, with both the podcast and the company, because you are therefore learning and leading a positive-impact documentation of the place you are in, and therefore helping with culture and language preservation — not leaving a trace of the track you took in the country, but instead leaving it untouched, real, and genuine.

Most importantly, we want you to be curious, even if it's just one trip — we still want that to feed your curiosity, and we want travel to be a way that you seek to understand people, and not escape them. Cultural travel isn't about doing everything right. It's about being willing to do things differently, leaning into that discomfort. It asks us to slow down, to listen longer, and to accept that we are guests in most of the world.

If this episode made you pause, question, or reflect, that's the point — I told you this was going to be a little bit deeper of an episode. If you're navigating what intentional travel looks like for you, I'd love to hear from you — you can send us a message on our Substack, or to Kultura Travel on our website or social channels, or even just share this episode with someone who travels and wants to maybe travel more thoughtfully or deeply. Until next time, put the guidebook down, step into the space, and try to travel more deeply, more meaningfully. Thank you.