International tourism is the biggest industry in the world now. Unfortunately, international tourism creates tension rather than understanding between people from different cultures. Do you agree or disagree?
Travelling abroad for relaxation prevails recently because of the stiff competitions among white-collar workers. Under this situation, some people are concerned about the clashes that cause between the locals and the visitors. From my perspective, these worries sound reasonable.
Apparently, visitors spend one or two weeks in traveling to an exotic country. In the limited time, it is fairly difficult for tourists to get familiar to the local culture. Also, it may cause misunderstandings in mutual communication due to language barrier. It is well-known that different places have its own communication pattern including gestures and expressions. Thus understanding well of these distinctions in an alien culture is unrealistic in such a short time for travelers as fewer of which are willing to grasp the information regarding the destination in advance.
On the local residents' standing point, the influx of international tourists may constitute intrusion to the inhabitants. Naturally, local people tend to sell souveniors to the travelers instead of dedicating to crop yield due to the fact that the international tourism increases the local residents' income and spurs the local economy. However, the visitors seems understand slightly. Take Chinese visitors for example, they form a habit of bargaining for everything, particular the souveniors. These behaviors would contribute to tension easily because of the difference in different culture system.
Although appropriate communication between visitors and the local people may help establish better understanding in differing countries and some stereotypes may be eliminated as well, the limited time of travel and the difference in culture pattern would cause clashes in more cases. In order to maintain the intended goal of enhancing mutual understanding, I believe, the visitors should learn the culture difference beforehand.
