Conscious travel: How not to be the tourist everyone hates
147 countries and counting, photographer and Instagram sensation Yvan Rodic on the best way to get around
A few months ago, I was travelling through the emerald city of Gangtok, Sikkim where every bend in the road looks like nature was experimenting with Instagram filters. As I jumped out the car to take a photo, en route to a monastery, my headphones fell out. But I didn’t realise until we were 15kms away. I turned to the young local ferrying us around who insisted they’d be where we left them. In Mumbai where I’m from, handbags are strapped on tighter than straitjackets while travelling in public transport so no one unceremoniously rips your arm out, along with your bag. Naturally, I was skeptical.
An hour and a half later, we stopped at the scene of the crime, and a man walks up to me from his parked car offering up the headphones, having waited there, expecting us. My driver, with a proud grin announced, “I told you they’d be here. Log yahaan aise hi hain.” A cultural defect, perhaps, I thought as my cynical heart secretly swelled in size. It’s a story I keep retelling, like I discovered the holy grail of humanity.
Having explored over 147 countries—Yvan Rodic, aka the Face Hunter, believes it’s these human experiences that infuse life into our travels. The Switzerland-bred photographer, who has spent 13 years documenting his immersive travels, explains his raison d’etre, “While it started out as a style blog, I now try to capture the spirit of people who have a positive impact on their community, who live and think, differently. The internet is filled with entertaining but meaningless things—influencer culture tends to encourage the superficiality of travel. I felt that if I have a small voice on a public platform, I should use it to create awareness—to share meaningful information and start conversations that go beyond discussing the prettiness of a place.”
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Conscious travel
Rodic doesn’t rain selfies on his 2.4 lakh followers. Instead, you’ll be making eye contact with locals and gazing at poetic landscapes, with each caption telling a vivid story.
He explains, “When I started, I was a little afraid, because I thought I might be bothering people, but actually, if you ask politely and keep your request simple, people are quite receptive. It’s like an exchange—I ask them for their time and they get a photograph, and we’re both left with a memory.” A proponent of travelling intuitively, he’s still surprised when he hears of tourists who don’t even make the attempt to speak to locals—they’re more interested in taking photos, and taking off. “It feels like you’re not even interested in the place you’re visiting,” he says. “You’re investing your money, but not your time.”
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His post on Sao Tome, an island used as a slave transit camp for over five countries, delves into the concept of conscious tourism— and how the privileged few who can afford travel for leisure approach it. Is it enough to gawk over the gorgeous sunset in Senegal, or should we acknowledge the issues that plagued the country for years? He asks, “What’s your mindset when you travel? How do you navigate between hedonism and consciousness?”
The question both drives and defines his travels. In the interest of sustainability, he’s committed to flying less and staying for longer spells in the countries he visits. Walking around is his suggestion for how you can immerse yourself to get a better sense of the place you’re visiting. It also means looking up from your phone on occasion, and leaving the Instagram swiping for later.
Think local
His approach to conscious travel has unraveled a world of opportunity. Walking around in Uzbekistan and spotting a family at tea in their garden scored him an invite to share in their meal. While travelling around Iran, he chatted up a stranger—and ended up staying at the his family home in Tehran, enjoying local delicacies and hospitality.
That doesn’t mean you’ll be sharing cheese croissants with a cigarette-smoking artist in France, instantly—being a white male does afford him a certain privilege and the promise of safety. Rodic recommends using social media to connect with like-minded people and locals, researching a place before going there (duh), asking pertinent questions and making sure you stay in safe areas. A big part of conscious travel is, well, being conscious. Have your wits about you while travelling, and in life, is one of the lessons fairytales and Disney films should have taught us. That, and try not to flaunt your electronics in crowded street and dark alleys, no matter how great you think the selfies on your coral iPhone are.
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When it comes to exploring, you’ll find Rodic outfitted in least one item of clothing that he’s found at a local store. From a hemp dress made in Pokhara, Nepal, to a kilt from Scotland and a beret from the streets of Paris—if you’re a shopaholic on vacation, direct your attention to indigenous crafts to populate your wardrobe so you won’t show up to work in the same Zara outfit as your colleague. His food recommendations come from his couch surfing / Airbnb hosts and he’s a fan of local delicacies even when that means letting live ants bite his tongue before he could swallow and enjoy their lemony taste while in the Amazon, Brazil—or taking three visits to Philippines before he drew up the courage to try Balut — a developing bird embryo, sold as a warm egg to be cracked open and consumed, tiny feathers sprouting, and all.
Rodic has taken his unique brand of conscious travel to more than half the countries in the world and is hoping to spread the message across borders with his conscious travel kit. Brazil is his favourite (“It’s a country with a very poetic soul – in love with its music and people”). And with Yemen, Syria and many more on his wish list, he has no plans of stopping anytime soon. As I think back on my own travels—the street side tea of Gujarat springs to mind as does our driver Panku, who told us more spine-chilling local ghost stories than I’d ever heard before. I think of the Indonesians in Komodo island who are bigger Shah Rukh Khan fans than me, and broke into Bole Chudiyan while on a trek. And of the lady in Mukinje, Croatia whose homestay we didn’t get a room in, but who decided to pick and drop us off at the bus station because she felt bad. As important as catching up on sleep and margaritas is, on holiday— it’s also the mush-inducing local interactions that tend to leave a lasting impact. Like being in a jungle in the middle of Borneo—and hearing locals serenade you with Kuch Kuch Hota Hai as they see you walk along.