On The “Authenticity” of Experience

Sanitizing reality for tourist consumption.

River Limin’

Last year, as part of Trinidad’s Tourism Development Company’s (TDC) subsidized initiative to encourage more tourism activity amongst locals, my cousin and I took part in an “authentic river lime”. Put together by “Gail’s Exclusive Tours Services” (Suzan Gail Mohammed), the tour took us on a winding, educational drive to the picturesque Yarra River/L’Anse Martin Bay along Trinidad’s North Coast. Accompanied by Michelle, a very informative guide, we spent the journey there learning about some of the history of Trinidad and Tobago, the topography, the changing cultural landscape, and the demographics of the island republic. My cousin, who is a born and raised Trinidadian, was initially skeptical of the price of such a tour, as many Trinidadians, in my experience, tend to be. However, she later remarked that it was worth every penny as the tour was so informative, complimenting both Michelle and Gail on a wonderful experience. Indeed, as an educator myself, and as someone who consistently seeks out a myriad of unique learning opportunities, I enjoyed all that the tour had to offer.

L’Anse Martin Bay

While guests were encouraged to stretch their legs along the river’s edge, or enjoy a dip in the scenic bay, the most notable part of the trip, and indeed the highlight for many, was the sumptuous spread of food cooked on-site. Guests were invited to partake in a mixture of curries, rice, paratha roti, salads, and cold drinks, all while sitting at nicely laid tables festooned with flowers and table cloths, or on colourful blankets spread across the ground, shaded by gauzy, patterned curtains which flapped lazily in the breeze. In truth, the entire experience was a mixture of magic and romance, and, as a tourist, you would be hard pressed not to enjoy the lime meant to capture what was supposedly quintessentially Trinidadian.

However, yesterday I had a very different opportunity to partake in a river lime. Joining a group of friends on an outing to Caura River, we set out at 7am in the hopes of securing a spot at one of the established picnic grounds adjacent to the natural pools. While Trinidadians rarely need an excuse to “lime”, a long-weekend beckons many from their homes in a haphazardly organized fashion. Beaches, rivers, and parks bring people out in droves; so many that in truth I am surprised that this many people live on such a small island.

When we arrived, shortly after 8am, it was to an already bustling riverside. Trinidadians know how to lime in comfort, and many walked with (or had otherwise catered) picnic chairs, folding tables, table cloths and potloads of food. But the similarities to my previous “authentic” river lime ended there. While our guided experience was idyllic and peaceful, this was a cacophony of sound and a frenzy of activity. Cars made parking spots out of every piece of grass, in every divot, and along every edge of the riverbank. Music, a heady mixture of chutney and soca, blasted from all sides, in some cases from the same music trucks seen playing mas during Carnival season. Simultaneously raucous and entertaining, noise polluted.  Children laughed, horns screeched, pots clanged, and food scented the air. Some walked with their camping stoves and gas, while others preferred to make campfires on stone out of dried bamboo or whatever else was on hand. Many cooked, or were in the process of cooking, as we were, but some preferred an easier outing, walking simply with coolers of drinks and buckets of KFC. It was a lime, for sure, but a very different one than I had experienced last year.

Paw paw groves

The Sanitization of “Authentic” Tourism

As a recovering academic I have long given thought to the way in which “authenticity” is portrayed to the tourist gaze and the ways in which tourists interpret their experiences. The trip with Gail and Company, while recommended by me in many respects, is as far from an authentic Trini lime as one can imagine, aside from the food itself. Her crew, which set up the area long before any guests arrived, decorated and cleaned. The beach and the riverbank were free from litter which is typically strewn around many parts of the country and tables were set out for convenience. There were blankets on the ground for lounging against pillows and  there were even changing areas partitioned by curtains for the comfort of more modest guests. This was a significant departure from the “changing by the side of a car while wrapped in a towel” that I have encountered on most of my adventures around the country.

Tourists, it must be acknowledged, expect a certain level of comfort. While Trinidadians themselves recognize that there is a lot of room for growth where their tourism industry is concerned, to the extent that they understand the need for, and subsequently demand, more facilities such as washrooms or changing areas in public areas, there exists a disconnect between what is “real” and what is performed as “authentic” for the consumption of tourists to a given country and this experience was certainly emblematic of that fact.  Paying guests expect certain privileges, a particular kind of exclusivity, one which noticeably erases from the landscape any hope of authenticity. While Gail’s group were gracious hosts, there was a kind of performance spectacle to the experience: friendly “chefs” in whites serving a good “home-cooked” Trini meal in a pristine setting. Hovering in the background might be one or two locals, but their interaction with guests is kept to a minimum via a relationship brokered by the tour company itself. It is, in some respects, akin to the waiters who serve tourists in all-inclusive resorts across the Caribbean and I, for one, could not help but think of the ways in which this erasure both reifies and obscures long-standing colonial subjugation, however accidental this might be.

While arguably less problematic than in cases of cultural and heritage tourism, the offering of “river limes” as part of tourism activities is one example which calls into question the authenticity of the tourism experience, and calls for greater scrutiny of the delicate balance between providing an educational experience and a comforting one. As Crick (1988) has illustrated, the concept of tourism has itself been mired in criticism, with mass tourism being particularly subject to scrutiny.  MacCannell (1976) argued that “[T]he term tourist is increasingly used as a derisive label for someone who seems content with his obviously inauthentic experiences” (p.94), and it is this inauthenticity that contemporary tourism, marketed under new labels, has sought to get away from. There is something both damning and dangerous to this erasure, yet it is seemingly inescapable. While, yes, spaces of consumption typically need to be sanitized for enjoyment (and there is, arguably a lot more room for local people to take pride in their spaces by keeping their beaches and parks clean), to what extent is this sanitization necessary and at what point is it too far? Locals in conversation with me have often remarked that beaches and rivers were dirty, crying foul at what “man had done to the environment” when they looked at felled trees and refuse-laden shorelines. In many respects, something akin to hope emerges when I see such attention paid to the ways in which the environment is despoiled and the ways that people are necessarily critical of their home. Simultaneously, this observation is bittersweet, because it comes with the knowledge that too few people care about the effects upon the environment, a fact which would serve to only hinder tourism development within this country.

References

Crick, M. (1989). Representations of International Tourism in the Social Sciences: Sun, Sex, Sights, Savings, and Servility, 18(1), 307–344.

MacCannell, D. (1976). The Tourist: A New Theory of the Leisure Class. University of California Press.

Ever thinking,