Traveling More Responsibly with Your Children
E-Book, Englisch, 272 Seiten
ISBN: 978-1-6678-4420-6
Verlag: BookBaby
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: Adobe DRM (»Systemvoraussetzungen)
Autoren/Hrsg.
Weitere Infos & Material
Chapter 1:
Why Should
You Care? Why travel? Those of us who love to travel know that it is an experience that not only lets us see the world but can also bring us closer to our loved ones and friends. Some of our best memories, funniest stories and most impactful moments happened while we were travelling. Travel can teach us a great deal. We can become more aware, and therefore more accepting of people different to us, and we can learn about geography, history, architecture and cuisine by visiting attractions and doing activities. And through actively experiencing different places and cultures, we are more likely to remember what we have learned. Rachel (mother of one child): We visited Paris when my daughter was four years old, and four years later, she still recognizes the Eiffel Tower when we see it on a TV show or in a movie. And she also knows what city, country and continent it is in! I also learned a lot travelling while I was young. I still remember learning how to spell sphinx after I visited the Pyramids in Egypt and that was a looooong time ago! ••• Julianna (mother of four boys): While in Italy last October, my four-year-old son, Leon, saw someone begging for money. I explained why this person may have been in the situation to beg, and I said to him that our family lives in abundance and that giving to people in need is important. This is not an extraordinary story, but we would never see beggars at home in Switzerland. Thanks to that tourism experience, my son could learn something new in an authentic way. And hopefully something that
I can nurture as a parent is to be more generous. While we must be mindful that there are issues associated with travelling that can have significant and often unseen impacts on the places we visit (which we’ll talk about in the next chapter), we should continue to travel because travel has benefits both for the traveller and the communities hosting the traveller. But we should travel responsibly. By opening ourselves up to the idea that we can travel in a better and more responsible way, we are making an important decision that can benefit us and the places we visit in many different ways. Why travel with children? We, the authors (Rachel and Richard), are parents, and Richard is also a grandparent. We have travelled around the world, and our travels, combined, have covered well over 100 countries to date. What’s more, we’ve travelled to 30 of these countries with our children and grandchildren. As parents and grandparents, we have realized that travelling, even to places close to home, exposes children to new things, activities and people. It helps us teach our children about values, and about empathy and responsibility. We know that many of the lessons we learn as kids stay with us as we grow up. Rachel (mother of a girl): I had the opportunity to go to a beach town in Mexico when I was young. It was my birthday and we were walking down the beach back to our hotel when I noticed a terrible smell. I asked my dad what the smell was, but instead of telling me he said we should go and investigate. It turned out to be a pipe taking raw sewage from a hotel straight into the ocean. When I realized it was the hotel we were staying at, I asked my parents to change hotels. As a child, all of life’s problems seem simple, but it is not always that easy to solve them, especially in situations such as this one, in which you have already paid for your night’s stay (as our family had). But my parents started my journey to be a more responsible traveller that day. We went to the front desk, told the staff about the sewage problem, and explained that because of this issue we would be moving to another hotel the next day. This was a memorable experience because it was when my parents helped me to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem. I think it might be why I chose the career I did and why I am interested in finding ways to reduce waste. I learned that if we don’t take action, we can’t complain about what’s wrong. ••• Richard (father of three children, grandfather of seven): As a kid, we often went for day trips to the seaside and every place had big stone pipes going into the sea. It was great fun jumping off them into the water (always from the sides, as the ends disappeared into the sea too far out of my depth), until I found out that they were sewage outlets. Many are still there, although most now only carry treated wastewater and storm water out to the sea. It was a bit off-putting to realize later that the fish I was trying to catch off the nearby piers were probably there because they were eating the waste! Fish and chips never tasted the same, and it left me wondering why people would do such a stupid thing as to let sewage enter the sea at all, let alone at a beach. ••• Janet (mother of two boys): I’ve always thought that we’re an earth-friendly family, and we’ve raised our boys to understand the importance of action. On a trip to Asia, we went to Khao Lak, a beautiful coastal region of Thailand. We were walking along a beautiful beach one day and saw plastics littering the beach, and also saw plastic beside the narrow streets and even in the catch of the fishermen who were bringing in crabs, prawns, fish etc. My 5-year-old said, “That’s littering! People are throwing garbage where the fish live??!!! That’s BAD!!!” Yup, that is bad. He got it! We then asked our children some questions: “What do you think happens to all this garbage and plastics? How do you think the fish feel when they get caught in this?” My two boys got to see the impact of how plastic can hurt the earth and its animals, especially those in the sea. And they got to see what action can look like first-hand. We watched resort staff and locals collecting trash and cleaning up the shore – day after day. My kids saw what we can do to make things better for the earth, and their experiences have reinforced lessons about recycling, and ways we can reduce garbage – essentially, ways in which we can all do our part. I love travelling with my boys. I love seeing these valuable imprints they’ve connected and processed on their own, based on their personal experiences. From the delight of new friends, food, animals, landscapes and languages so different from home, to the ability to determine for themselves, what feels good, bad and important. On this trip, they figured out why we all need to do our “fair share” to take care of our earth, starting with not littering and also making less garbage. By visiting attractions and doing activities while travelling, we have seen our children also learn about subjects like geography and history and architecture and cuisine. And we know that through doing and experiencing, they are more likely to remember what they have learned. When travelling, whether it is a day trip to the beach, visiting a rural farm or a weekend away in a new city, we can use particular strategies and practices to inspire, educate and entertain our children and grandchildren, keeping in mind that travelling should always be fun! What are the pros and cons of tourism? This section sets the stage by talking about some of the benefits of tourism and also some concerns. Later chapters will discuss how to travel more responsibly. We also share some stories about what others have done too – to provide inspiration! Until early 2020, travel was a fast-growing industry. International tourist arrivals had increased from 25 million globally in 1950, to 278 million in 1980, 527 million in 1995, and almost 1.5 billion by 2019 – that’s a 57-fold increase! When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, however, the amount of international travel suddenly dropped. It has since restarted and while some of us are scared to travel, some of us can’t wait to travel again! Tourism has many benefits for people at the destinations we visit, as listed below, but we need to know about the harmful things too, so that we can avoid doing them. We will get to the how-to tips and ideas later in this book. What are the benefits of tourism? Economic benefits: Tourism creates jobs and income. In 2019, travel and tourism represented approximately 10% of total global Gross Domestic Product (GDP) (including tourism-related businesses,
e.g. catering and cleaning). This equals approximately
US $7 trillion – that’s 12 zeros! Jobs and money going to locals is always a good thing, especially when they go to the less advantaged. In Costa Rica, for example, more than half (60%) of tourism jobs are held by women and most (80%) tourism revenue benefits the lowest fifth of the population. In Canada, the tourism industry employs many women. They make up between 58% and 70% of those working in the travel services, accommodation, and food and beverage sectors. Furthermore, between a quarter and a third of all tourism employees are newcomers to Canada, so tourism has allowed them to get a start in their new country. Social...
