Everyone has received, depending on which country, the advice of a hotel receptionist or a taxi driver not to set foot in certain areas of a city. Even in New York, it was said to avoid being on the wrong side of Central Park when night began to fall. Of course there have always been people willing to ignore advice and take risks. “There are those who are averse to risk, others who are indifferent, but there are also people who feel a preference for experiencing risky situations when they travel,” explains Ricard Santomà, vice dean of Tourism at the IQS of the Ramon Llull University.
Spaniards traveling to countries in conflict or considered unsafe continue to be a minority, “about 5,000 go to Afghanistan a year, 1,700 to Iraq and about 3,000 to Iran,” says Santomà. Even so, they have a good range of options and destinations proposed by specialized travel agencies.
“A standard trip to Vietnam is something that is available to many more people today than a few years ago, and travel nuts are increasingly looking for the most extreme trip,” says Santomà. And on the other hand there is “the National Geographic effect”. “The highest aspiration of a traveler is to go to a place where other tourists are not found,” says Santomà.
In this sense, they are trips that are often presented as anthropological and ethnographic “expeditions,” and in the information that the different agencies offer, the itineraries, prices and dates are explained in detail, but nothing is ever said about the risks involved. They are assumed when visiting countries like Afghanistan, Nigeria or Yemen. On the contrary, they sometimes minimize the warnings that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs makes on its travel recommendations page, in which it recommends not going under any circumstances to any of these countries – in some of them the Spanish embassy has even been closed. and reminds intrepid travelers that in the event of any problem, including repatriation, they will have to fend for themselves and bear the expenses. “It is unethical on the part of the agencies,” warns Santomà. “The tourism agent has to be your friend and give you all the information, and it would even be good if he had his clients sign a document – like doctors do before an operation – confirming that you are aware of the risks associated with that destination” , Add.
Precisely, José Manuel Albares, Spanish Foreign Minister, said in statements in El Món a Rac 1 that “it is difficult to prohibit these trips. Citizens can move wherever they want. We advise against going. We do not want to restrict freedom of movement, but we do recommend that your vacation be this, vacation.”
But in the opinion of the vice dean of the IQS, “the person who decides to go on a trip to Afghanistan, the risk and dangers matter very little to them. He may even think that there is a point in going sightseeing in one of these countries, and that if he has to put on a helmet and a bulletproof vest, then even better.” And he adds that we are used to watching armed conflicts from the couch at home – whether it is a film, a documentary, or a war chronicle – and that can mean that we have demystified the danger.”
And finally there are the well-intentioned. “For many of these countries, tourism is a source of income and an opportunity, and there may be those who think that visiting them helps them,” concludes Santomà.
