There are things that I found to be interesting while doing solo traveling in my home country. You need to understand I initially am planning a short escape from the hustle and bustle in the big city but, I ended up discovering a whole new world as it unfolds in front of me;
Those things that would elude and slip through my attention if I had chosen to travel in packs.
I realized the tendency to travel in big groups, visit touristy cliché places (not all but most), stay at luxurious starred hotels, and eat out not minding the cost of whether the food are appropriately priced or not. These are the tall tell sign of tourists. While what they do can be justify all under the reasoning “Halah, sekali-kali nga papa” (translated “It is not like every day we do this”). However, for me personally this mindset is quite damaging in sense that locals in the area will see tourist (local and foreigner) as walking wallets who carry tons of money (which inherently they are), this then made those who travel to think you need to carry certain amount of money because the living costs will relatively be higher and etc.
This affects people like me greatly who is single-handedly trying to path her way the sort of holiday of her own while backpacking the nation whilst holding little currency. First because I don’t have the same mindset as most local tourists, you could say, I am trying to find the cheapest alternatives and are not willing to pay more than what is necessary (but, how do we know, we are charged accordingly, this is what I found to be baffling). Second because I am a woman thus I have to prioritize a safe passage over anything else in which comes at a cost, time, money and energy because you have to double check the hostel you’re about to stay and what not. Third they will see me the same as foreign tourists, however with much less interest, and respect in knowing where I am from, what I do. Oh I love the satire in the air!
I can see patterns emerge, and it proves my point that it is somewhat different for local backpackers to travel in her own country. The situation poses different problems as opposed to what foreign tourists have to face while travelling in foreign countries.
Well, I can only say as much that Asian do have preference to travel in such style (I am an Asian myself, this is not a racist comment). While most foreign tourists purposely avoid touristy spots unless those are the places they have in mind prior of coming. These deep pocketed local tourists cluttered at particular places, concentrated at places that are manmade in pursuit to capture the best picture, the craziest moment of their lives.
This brings us to my next point, do you realize that many places recommended in Google maps are touristy crowd gathering places, the sort of experience that can be bought by going to the ticketing booth.
If you are like me who limit the scope of your search to cultural exchange that are reasonably priced if not free ha ha ha. You’ll be stranded to find you’re close to almost nothing.
Since I’m trying the soil, and so far I have only visited two cities in my solo travelling journey (I have just started my whole quest in this February of 2019) those are the findings I can pinpoint at the moment.
I cannot say much of where to go, cool places to stay whose visions share the same goal as mine to good places to eat in a particular city yet. This is the reason why from that gap thus I decided to list all the places I have visited, and the list will grow as I progress my personal solo journey. However, mind you I am still a college student and I only could travel during University break thus I am not a full time backpacker.
From that henceforth I made a promise to myself, as a local, and a woman solo traveler in the making, I vouch to travel with mission to find the safest, cheapest and most fun route available for both local and foreigner alike. In a way I am trying to redefine what my fellow holiday seekers should think of what short escape could look like. By opening up to a new perspective that to travel does not mean you can tolerate certain prices just because you’re there once in your life time and have to stay at starred hotels just because you can.