With a click of the button… (a contest sponsored by sponsors). It’s an empty landscape. With pyramids. About these ads
Pinkwashing South Africa
May 24, 2012 By 6 Comments
By T.J. Tallie and Maria Hengeveld* This week BBC News reported on the rise in Cape Town’s status as a premiere international gay tourist destination. The article itself went on to report at length from gay South African hoteliers and organizers, many of whom lavished praise on the progressivism enshrined in the country’s constitution, and […]
Revolutions are no good for tourism
March 10, 2011 By 2 Comments
Is this what we can expect from Tina Brown? What drove Newsweek’s editors to commission and publish a feature–in the latest issue–on “Five Places to See Before the Revolution.” In breathless prose, reporters Dan Ephron and Claire Martin list five countries–Morocco, Jordan, Gabon, Ecuador and Nepal–that modern seize-the-day Hemingways should get to soon, before agitation […]
T.I.A. @ The Liberty Bell
February 2, 2011 By Leave a Comment
The Liberty Bell, a symbol of the American Revolution, is housed in a complex on Market Street in Philadelphia, reminding us of liberties gained and liberties denied. It’s one of the few historical exhibits I’ve seen that explores and expresses the contradictions in American history clearly, including explicit references (rather than a vague skip-over) of […]
“Rhythm like you’ve never seen before”
February 2, 2010 By 2 Comments
I stand corrected, but no one mixes nationalism, tourism and sport in a feelgood cocktail quite like the South African advertising industry. Like in this TV commercial for South Africa’s national tourism authority, where Diski, a South African style of playing football–which in real life has only reaped bad results on the field–is roped into […]
WHO WILL BENEFIT FROM 2010?
November 11, 2009 By 1 Comment
Just as the football at the 2010 World Cup will be great, someone will make lots of money. It is not going to be local businesses for sure. This excellent 13 minute short documentary (“Trademark 2010″) for Dutch TV channel, VPRO, covers the fantasy that local people–small businesspeople, informal traders–will make money or get jobs […]
FILM: A PANTHER IN AFRICA
September 29, 2009 By 1 Comment
SLUM TOURISM
September 29, 2009 By 1 Comment
In Kibera, the large informal settlement in Nairobi, the residents are paraded like animals on safari for foreign tourists: “The Dutch tourists came well prepared for the walking safari: strong shoes and sunscreen, backpacks and bottled water. Ahead lay an afternoon visiting one of Kenya’s most recognisable sights – but one that rarely features in […]
