By Ramadhani Kupaza
Environment & Development Consultant
+255784892338
Many constraints prevent people from traveling for tourism. Yet, tourism enables people to learn through exposure in order to acquire freedom of mind.
Key hurdles that prevent traveling for tourism include budget limitations, fear of crime, health risks, complex travel logistics (visas, flights), discomfort, loss of business time, loss or misplacement of luggage at the airport, unfavorable weather, overwhelming tourism choices, and lack of motivation to travel for tourism. Solutions exist to encounter the hurdles.
With regard to budget limitations, many people, especially youths, join volunteer organizations for opportunities to travel abroad. Volunteer organizations process visas, arrange for volunteer flights, accommodation, and the relevant insurance for volunteers at destinations, thereby eliminating logistical tourism complications. Overseas volunteer organizations often establish or collaborate with local entities, which inform and provide volunteers with guidance on safety, security, and health precautions at the host country.
Other youths obtain sponsorships from their relatives or through college academic programs, which students join in order to travel overseas. An example is the International Development Programme [IDP] at the University of California at Berkeley (Haas), which sponsored six students to travel to Tanzania recently in order to study and prepare a feasibility report for a marketplace rehabilitation project. The students arrived at their destination for work a couple of days earlier in order to make a private tour of Zanzibar. Then, the students stayed a few days more after completing their assignment in order to do shopping in Arusha town. The students went on safari to the national parks before their departure to the USA. By the way, the only weather condition that may prohibit traveling for tourism in Tanzania is the occurrence of heavy rainfalls, which often prevents access to tourism locations. Heavy rains occur in Tanzania between mid-March and May.
With regard to the problem of loss of business time, businesspeople can justify traveling for tourism as an opportunity to expand or diversify their businesses, albeit in the future, by observing demand for their products or related products and services at destinations.
Speaking of discomfort as a hurdle in tourism, flying first class can be fun if the relatively higher cost of the ticket is not an issue. Impolite immigration or customs officials may annoy tourists. The negative experience is an opportunity for tourists to test their humility, which is an important aspect for wellness.
On the other hand, tourists can visit the prestigious national parks like Serengeti in Tanzania by flying from towns and between parks in order to avoid traveling discomfort on rough roads. There are regular operating national airports and flights in all regional towns in Tanzania.
There are fewer incidences where flights misplace visitors’ luggage these days. Misplaced luggage is often recovered timely. Thus, loss or misplacement of luggage is not a frequent hurdle when traveling for tourism.
In the case of overwhelming choices of places to visit as a hurdle in tourism, the starting point in solving the problem is for tourists to identify and match their tourism motivations with the opportunities offered by the five continents of the world and with the various countries in each continent. AI can generate general basic information, which would be used to identify where to satisfy the various tourism motivations. Reliable tour agents would verify the information thereafter. The topics in this book are examples of tourism motivations for reference. The topics, or rather tourism motivations, include induction into tourism, choice motivations, connection with nature, spirituality in nature, human relations—faith, human relations—science, personal growth, personal transformation, escape, and retreat. Other tourism motivations to consider are leisure, relaxation, culinary, health, opportunities, business, entertainment, sports, and nature. Additional tourism motivations are natural history, documentation, indigenous knowledge, networking, learning through exposure, immersion, cultural exploration, visiting family and friends, community empowerment, community support, communication, environmental support, and personal reflections.
Regarding people who lack motivation to travel for tourism, it would be helpful to refer to the Socrates quote on marriage as a synonym.
Socrates' marriage quote encourages people to marry. It states, “By all means marry. If you get a good wife, you will be happy. If you get a bad one, you’ll become a philosopher.” In view of the quote, “By all means travel for tourism. If you acquire a positive experience during your travel, you will be happy. "If you encounter a bad experience, you will become a philosopher.” It implies that all forms of tourism experiences are beneficial in different ways if the Socrates marriage quote is something to go by.
It follows that, as philosophers, tourists acquire intellectual humility rather than intellectual arrogance during and after traveling for tourism. In addition, as philosophers, tourists become open-minded, and they develop courage to challenge established beliefs or social conventions. Such attitudes provide the tourists, turned philosophers, with freedom of mind. Freedom of mind is the most vital human freedom outside established institutions such as civics, politics, or law. Freedom of mind emerges from the power to define oneself, to formulate one’s identity rather than having it imposed by others. Freedom of mind implies that the pursuit of freedom of mind as a motivation for tourism is fundamental.
