One major reason I’d not want to go to India is that there seems to be a significant crowd of Nationalists that would rather deny any issues than face and fix them, and can be quite hostile to anyone that points then out. I don’t really care for the “apes” commentary as that seems racist AF, but if tourism is a goal then cleaning up regressive bullshit like caste and gender discrimination (and not conducting assassinations on foreign soil then getting hostile when called on it) would be a good start.
Why would you go to another country and talk about their politics with the locals? Don’t point out issues with a country you are a guest in to nationalists.
Because human rights don’t stop being important when you cross a border.
Mhmm. Enjoy your vacation arguing with strangers…
Why does it have to be an outside complaining? I’ve seen an Indian actress complain about sexism and was told to “shut up. You’re making us look bad”.
Paying higher prices than the locals pay is just part of being a tourist, especially for a lower income country. Tourists are bringing cash into the tourist sector of the local economy. If you can’t afford to pay what is a pittance to an outside tourist, maybe travel isn’t for you.
The sexual harassment I can sympathize with more. That’s not just cool. Unfortunately, though, it’s far from unique to India.
Some of these are legit, but the money ones are bullshit. Especially entrance fees to national monuments. I think of it not as an extra charge for tourists, but as a discount for locals.
I live in the US, but was able to travel to India 25 years ago. It was an unforgettable experience for me, and I would love to return someday. I must say however, that my wife is less excited by the prospect. I would like to think that India’s reputation along these lines is both exaggerated and improving.
The money one would be perfectly fine if it was an explicitly stated official policy where Indians get cheaper access to their own tourist attractions and cultural sites. I think it probably starts to get annoying if everything you pay for is marked up by some amount on the spot by chancers who are taking advantage of your naivety. I haven’t been to India so I don’t know if this is a big problem or a rare occurrence, but I have heard of it happening before, typically in poorer countries.
Lifting people out of poverty by giving them honest jobs with livable wages is probably the only way to fix this, because poverty creates desperation and desperation can lead some people to petty theft, or a host of other personal and social problems.
I guess I just don’t care that much. Nobody forced you to go visit the country, and buy trinkets or visit landmarks. If the price is too high, either negotiate or don’t pay it. I’ve seen so many people getting upset about whether they are being ‘screwed’ out of what amounts to a dollar or two.
Well yeah, nobody is forcing you to visit any country.
But if I voluntarily travel somewhere and feel like I’m constantly battling against the risk-reward schemes of dishonest merchants (who aren’t just selling trinkets or tickets to toueist attractions, but also potentially inflating the price of basic things like food, drinks and transportation at every opportunity), I’m personally far less likely to have a good time or return for a second visit. The amount of money isn’t even the problem, it’s the feeling of being taken advantage of or needing to haggle over a bottle of water.
(Again, I haven’t been to India so I have no clue to what degree this is or isn’t a problem.)
If you don’t care then that’s fine, but I’d rather spend 10x the money traveling to a place where I have friendly and honest interactions than save money by visiting a place where everybody is looking at me like a potential mark or some kind of loot goblin. That’s all I’m saying.
This is more about how you feel. How would you know if you’re being overcharged? If you can’t overcome that feeling that people are constantly out to take advantage of you, then you’re gonna have a bad time. Like I said, the best way to approach transactions in unfamiliar settings is to ask yourself “is this worth it to me”, rather than asking yourself “would locals pay this much?”. You can always walk away. If the vendor wants the sale, they’ll let you know.
Wow your argument is not great.
Put yourself in the USA, a person in front of you gets charged $5 for a coke, you see this transaction happen.
Then you get to the stand and he says $10 for a coke… how would you feel?
I mean, I live here. It would be weird, and I’d probably ask why it’s a different price. Depending on the answer, I might or might not buy the coke.
I do not understand your argumentation.
The quora question is about how to attract more international tourists. People stated why they avoid visiting, you said “if you don’t like it don’t come”.
I will flip it back to you. If you don’t like the complaints then don’t ask for international tourists to come.
Indeed, I think that people in a country should be able to see their national monuments/treasures at a reduced cost. It’s pretty likely that at some point their taxes paid for some of it, and making such things only for tourists is lame.
During Covid here (Canada), locals were given free access to national park, and the restricted tourist traffic meant that people were actually able to find camping spots (many of them get gobbled up and pre-booked by tourism agencies/bots). A lot of people realized there was a lot of the country that they had been missing simply because the industry prioritized tourists over locals. If you’re going to a country as a tourist, budget and plan to pay as a tourist!
That’s just semantics, like businesses being banned from giving a surcharge for using a credit card, but they can give a discount for cash. It amounts to the same thing.
A lot of places even in the US give discounts to locals. And locals often pay taxes that help support these places. So really it makes sense that locals get a discount, or tourist get a surcharge. However you wanna call it.
Ok, but if they were being even kind of accurate, the numbers aren’t akin to a discount. One is equivalent to about one quarter dollar, vs the other being the equivalent of nine dollars. That’s gouging, not a locals discount.
It’s an apples to oranges comparison, though, since in India there is a much lower local median income than tourist median income. In the US, tourists and locals are likely to have near parity in income. And it’s worth putting some perspective on it, that it’s US$9 to visit a stunning world famous jewel of India. If someone pays to travel all that way and is complaining about coughing up US$9 then I don’t know what to say.
I guess. But either is fine with me. Credit cards have leverage over small businesses who often have tight margins. As for up-charging tourists who visit places in foreign countries, I think of it as a subsidy. If they normalized the entrance fees so that all paid the same, and the total maintenance costs were met-- this may well ‘price out’ poorer locals. A nicer solution might be income-based, but how would you verify such information at a park entrance?
I also want to add that where I live in California, there are some local attractions that offer discounts to local residents. I really can’t understand the fuss.
I think of it not as an extra charge for tourists, but as a discount for locals.
Of course the tourist who can obviously afford to spend hundreds if not thousands of dollars on a vacation doesn’t want to be asked to spend 5 more fucking dollars on something and would rather shift the responsibility on to the locals. But why? When locals probably hardly ever go, and tourists are the one they not only depend on for income, but who are the ones putting the added strain on the local infrastructure?
Because you’re a cheap selfish privileged yet oblivious individual who is there because you can get a lot more for a lot less money, and some just don’t care why or how or who is really paying the price, that’s why.
Judging from the train videos, I don’t think they can entice me. Too crowded. No hate intended. I don’t like crowds.
a lot of those trains date from when India was British property. India needs trillions of $$$ investments in infrastructure
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Yeah we wish we had Indian trains.
Crowded in general? Yes. But I’m pretty sure those train videos are mostly a thing in Mumbai. I hear that the North East is a bit of a hidden gem
India is murdering people in Canada and the US. I’ll hold off visiting until they stop with that.
ITT: South Asians
Why does this website look like a newspaper? Does Quora print a newspaper somewhere.
No, I think some general newspaper included the quora question in its paper edition.
I think this is an Indian newspaper which has printed this question from quora to show it’s readers. I say indian newspaper because the design looks familiar.
FYI: RS 750 is $9. Doesn’t seem that unreasonable to me 🤷
In fact, India should charge every foreign tourist RS 830 (~$10) except the British who should have to pay RS 1660 (~£15) but it comes with biscuits and have little shops that sell overpriced tea 👍
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I’m from Pakistan so it’s not like I can ever get a visa to India in the first place but why do this? Why make an entire nationality pay more money because of events they were never involved in? If this is supposed to act as “reparations” then again, why are you charging people who are already paying a lot of money to get to the country?
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With the exception of a select few historical places, no other place should charge you more.
Do you know why this is? My first thought would be to make crowded historical places more accessible to Indians by increasing the cost of admission for tourists.
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They do this in Thailand. When you live here & don’t pull in the same income as before but can speak the language & whatnot, it feels awful to be treated as such an other when your local community accepts you. You also need to understand how they check which is normally just a skin color check—I’ve spoken to Filipinos that never get the foreigner rate. The worst one for me was in Laos where I was joking in Lao with the staff & had to pay the price, but some ethnic Lao folks from France got the local price despite not speaking a lick & asking me local culture questions in English. I didn’t hold it against them personally, but it really sucks.
Ok folks, keep your comments focused on the money and ignore the sexual violence. Great job.
There’s like 4 threads here, If you want to talk about it, talk about it. don’t whine that someone else didn’t start the conversation
You’re whining about him starting the conversation.
Yeah if that’s a conversation starter I’m an eagle
I’m an eagle
Me’rica. Fuck yeah!
Passive aggressively bitching about other people not doing something is not the same as actually doing it. In fact, it’s often detrimental to that cause because who the fuck wants to entertain the dickbag getting pissy with strangers for not doing what they themselves aren’t even doing?
reach U$D20K in nominal GDP per capita
So, I have been both working, studying, and spent leisure time in India about a year in total. I lived for 6 months outside New Delhi in the slums. Made interview among tribes and people displaced by established nature tourism. Together with my wife. Been to tourist spots as well.
Yea you are kind of like a bunch of school kids sometimes. Just a bit scarier. I only encountered the grandiose self image besides India in the US.
My wife could not be alone a second.
The fascist Hindu nationalism is awful to see , for a western fascist probably laughable.
Just to be plain: You think India is best in all the ways , for an outsider it’s like a bunch of people throwing everything in a pile and letting the strongest win.
Just the amount of people trying to prove forced marriage is so much better than the possibility for divorce or just marry who you want.
Of course different rules based on caste , one of my Indian friends who is kind of famous in the movie business still have a hard time based on his last name and actually trying to do some good in India.
The ads in your papers sounds like you selling cows rather than your sisters and daughters.
Don’t get me wrong there are great people , great movements and great things in India.
But overall WTF…
Today I would not return for leisure unless to visit friends there.
*Edited due to poor wordings.
Awhile ago I learned that there’s a thing called casteism. I thought racism was extremely stupid, but casteism just cranks the stupidity to 11. So instead of discriminating against someone’s skin tone or nationality, you’re discriminating against literally nothing??? Whatever, man…
Yea Hindu nationalism is kind of built around that. If you are poor you are poor because you deserve it. And we are rich because we deserve it etc…
Interviewed a guy from the Communist party about caste among other thing and even they have a hard time getting people out of the caste think among their own members.
It’s so hard rooted you need a revolution to even scratch the surface of it.
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Sure I’m no expert , just touched on the subject in my research. My focus was on the forced displacements done. Which was justified by many things caste , scheduled tribes that got “benefitted” by moved in to the desert. As I said very hard ingrained everywhere. but of course it’s about money and power. Just like everywhere else religion , social and politics, tradition and so on can justify it.
Just like money is about politics.
Bad wording on my part. King of the hill politics then if you wish.
Im just not a hippie that wants to justify shitty thing since they got high in Goa once. Who’s larping uh.
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From what I heard in podcasts this is even a serious problem in the US tech scene, which hires a lot of professionals from India. Imagine being descriminated against by your manager because of caste in silicon valley.
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Not really I did some work there. I also been around in both the north and the south. So you kind of just assumed stuff. Most my work I did in madhya pradesh.
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How’s your reading capabilities? Try again , notice “most” “and”. Read slowly. Kerala was sure better but still my wife never went anywhere alone.
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Yea I travelled quite a lot , spent as much time in Kerala as I could when writing , but fieldwork included quite a lot of not so nice places. Including everything from government officials to displaced villages. In Banglore I only saw offices and traffic unfortunately since lack of time. But made some stops along the way in-between southern Kerala and banglore. Drove a bike so very interesting trip.
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Making special accommodations for Global North tourists only really enriches the wealthy in the Global South. It may provide a few hospitality industry jobs, but I suspect that, all told, it’s a wash or a detriment to regular people just trying to live their lives.
It’s a detriment to treat women like humans and not sexual objects to grope?
No, obviously not. Don’t essentialize all accommodations down to the singular issue of groping women tourists.
Global North
What does it matter where they come from?
It’s not so much a matter of geography as the thickness of their wallets and the chauvanism of people from colonialist/neocolonialist states.
I would’ve been more concerned about the attitude and manners of the people and not so much about what their country has done in the past, regardless of where the country lies on the globe.
what their country has done in the past
You say that as if the Global North countries have stopped doing neocolonialism. They haven’t. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neocolonialism
In fairness, “you ARE rich”
most tourists don’t realize how rich they are for being able to travel and don’t really understand poverty and the depths of poverty that exist in other countries.
the depths of poverty that exist in other countries.
They rarely understand the poverty that exists in their own countries.
Judging by the downvotes, some very aggressively do not want to understand. They’re offended that you should even suggest it.
The problem is that they don’t feel rich because they compare themselves to people who are even more wealthy.
That, and they feel that this FACT that they are wealthy invalidates the “hustle” they put into getting there. Some of them ACTUALLY put in that much work, most of them didn’t. ALL of them feel like they put in that much hustle, whether they did or didn’t.
