Tourists are everywhere, and it doesn’t take much travelling to meet your fair share. If you live in a big city, or a picturesque small village they will even show up at your doorstep. There’s no stopping them. If it’s worth seeing, and most things are, expect to find tourists.
What probably amuses me the most is that after travelling hundreds of kilometers, many long hours of being squeezed pushed and propped into uncomfortable and painful positions, you can expect to see about the same thing anywhere you go. I don’t mean the beautiful promenade, natural wonder, or incredible feat of engineering that is the destination. But the tourists, no matter where you go, are all just about the same. A mixture of gawking, exhausted looks, excited smiles, bored faces, an endless number of silly poses I will never tire of, accompanied by (of course) a photographer to capture that wonderful moment. Also, selfies. As a street photographer it usually doesn’t take very long for my attention to switch from the beautiful view, to that all-to-familiar play that unfolds at every tourist trap I visit. When travelling the tourists have become all the fun.
For better or for worse the tourists of today collectively soldier on, tirelessly dedicated to spread out and gawk and photograph every corner of this world, so that it can be documented on social media. This project is an ode to those tourists.
