Where Shouldn’t You Go?

The traveler’s dilemma

The author, looking entirely out of place in Mingun, Myanmar.

I am chatting with a British woman at a small backpacker lodge by the Mekong River. The water glides silently by, the dark forests of Laos on the opposite bank. Enjoying the cool evening air, I feel at peace in this tiny riverside Thai town.

The subject of Africa comes up. I mention that I traveled there and lived in South Africa for a few years.

“How could you do that?” She says, shocked.

I think, Oh no, we are going to have one of THESE conversations.

“I had a job there.”

“OK, but why did you go? How could you support apartheid?”

Well. First, South Africa abandoned apartheid halfway through my residence, and second, I didn’t go because I liked their governmental system. I went because it was a job, a free airline ticket to a place halfway around the world, and an opportunity to see and learn things I had never been exposed to. That I witnessed a historic political transformation during my time was an unexpected bonus.

But her stance was at the core of the traveler’s dilemma: Should a traveler boycott visiting or working in a country that denies human rights, or commits major atrocities it still denies or justifies? Or is it better to go anyway and demystify the place and people?

The controversy of South Africa is a moot point now. Since this conversation, Mandela was elected president, and the Truth and the Reconciliation Commission did what it could to put past grievances behind. And they got a new flag that looks much cooler than the old one.

But there are other nations today that remain problematic. If you want to be picky, many countries make the list in some way or another. My own country is a glaring example.

While planning a trip to Myanmar in the mid-1990s, I tried to find other travelers who might have been there and hence had helpful information. This was in the days before the internet was usable for such knowledge. The people I talked to fell into two camps: those who had been there or wanted to go, and those who recoiled at the thought of going because of the infamy of the ruling military government.

This gave me pause because I knew there was a mandatory currency exchange at airport customs for all foreigners at the official rate, which was well below the black-market rate. In other words, it was a cash gift to an oppressive regime. And accommodation for foreigners was restricted to a limited list of hotels that took payment only in US dollars. I didn’t for a moment believe these hotels would keep this money.

Street market in Inle, Myanmar.

These negatives did not entirely cancel out the positives in my final decision. I paid what I had to and pried open the lid of one of the world’s most insular nations. I met, honestly, friendly individuals with hopes and dreams like everyone else, caught in a place where time had been forcibly slowed. I was delighted to enter a roadside store and see not a single recognizable Western brand, but saddened by how no one could talk about politics for fear of reprisals.

I learned a lot and did not regret going.

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Our family trip to Saudi Arabia elicited a strongly mixed reaction from people I knew and those I met while traveling in the months that preceded it. In this case, the question why would you go there? was partly due to the kingdom's habitually draconian policies. But people also questioned what there was to see anyway. In other words, glaringly few positives to balance out the negatives.

I went because any country off the beaten path is bound to be interesting and because the government was letting ordinary tourists in for the first time. It was begging to be explored.

Unlike Myanmar, there was no sneaky system of cash gifts to the governing body, and no one I met had any problem speaking their mind (both Saudis and foreign ‘guest workers’). Our most pressing obligation as visitors was to dress conservatively, especially my wife. I know that some women would refuse to go based on that alone. But we were prepared for it, and my wife was fine playing along. Ultimately, this dress code was more relaxed than we were led to believe.

A father-daughter bonding moment while crossing a flooded road near Tabah, Saudi Arabia.

We saw and heard things we didn’t like, but also many beautiful things, and I found people relaxed, curious about what we were doing there, and easy to talk to. I learned a lot in three weeks. Again, I strain to find regrets about going, despite the specters of repressed women’s rights, second-class treatment of foreign workers (an abuse shared with Qatar and the United Arab Emirates), and the horrific state-sponsored assassination of dissident Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

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I don’t hear travelers talk about avoiding Türkiye for what the Ottomans did to the Armenian population just over a century ago or the current issues with the Kurds. I never avoided it either, preferring to see those parts of Türkiye for myself, where the evidence of what happened is observable.

Same with India, considering its rough treatment of ethnic groups in the northeast provinces like Assam. Or Morocco and its repression of independence seekers in the Western Sahara and the erasure of their culture. Or China, for a litany of issues.

You can always learn a wealth of information and opinions by going somewhere new. Especially somewhere controversial. Unless you are overly impressionable (think of the character Tom Tuttle in the 1985 film Volunteers), you’ll exit with a better and more balanced understanding than when you went in. The evil, despotic leader making a few bucks off your visit is not as important.

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My only genuine concern is the threat I might pose to the citizens I interact with in those countries. I worried about it in Myanmar, where government spies were imagined to be everywhere; I walked on eggshells in Iran (even though many people I talked to there were eager to spill some grievance or another), and if I were to go back to Russia now, it would be the most pressing issue of all, given Putin’s newly minted penalties for trash talking the war in Ukraine.

Even in the case of the genuine concern I voiced above, that of posing a risk to a country’s citizens, much comes down to using my own restraint. If someone doesn’t want to talk about their country’s politics out of fear, cajoling them to do so, so that I can write about it, is hugely irresponsible. And if someone wants to invite me to their home, even though that is officially not allowed, or show me some cool thing that is forbidden to foreigners to see, the decision needs to be their own, not promoted by me. People are better at assessing their own risk profile when not under pressure.

I do not belittle the views of some travelers I meet, who strive for zero-level tolerance of racism, ethnic bullying, sexism, homophobia, animal cruelty, state-sponsored repression, and many other offenses that are unacceptable to their own sense of justice. If that traveler chooses not to travel to certain countries as a form of protest, they have made their point. I understand them, but will not follow their example.

I feel I am a better person for having had the experience. And maybe I’ve encouraged the people I meet in those countries to feel more connected with the rest of the world.