Every summer Mrs Zero and I rent a cottage in the Isle of Wight, if it’s not too dear. This year we’re venturing further afield, taking in Nepal and India. It could be a chance to get away from it all, to leave behind the woes of life with all its agonies, politics, injustices and hand wringing. But not if I have anything to do with it.
Even on their holidays humans commit horrific fouls against each other. According to Tourism Concern we risk global warming from plane emissions, deforestation from holiday parks and the seas getting a kicking from water sports. We risk new complexes displacing indigenous people, long showers bringing water poverty and complete arseholes exploiting women and children caught in the sex trade. Spend too long thinking about it you’ll believe tourism’s towards the top of the Evilometer, placed somewhere between the holocaust and Bill O’Reilly’s narrow mind.
The obvious solution is to cancel the trip and spend our holiday in the cupboard under the stairs flogging ourselves for even thinking about inflicting these horrors on an unsuspecting developing world. But there must be a middle ground. There must be a choice we can make. We could spew plane carbon halfway across the world, land on endangered toads, stay in a massive hotel owned by a massive corporation paying its workers a pittance and spend a fortnight raping locals and punching orphans in the face. Or we could fly on the back of Gwaihir the Windlord, stay in a locally owned place to support a local entrepreneur, use water responsibly and not at all when there are shortages, and generally be the upstanding/uptight types we are at home.
So here’s the plan: we will travel overseas on a big fat carbon spewing plane because the world’s an interesting place and I want to see more than the end of my street. Besides, Gwaihir apparently doesn’t do outward flights or we wouldn’t have had to sit through nine hours of Hobbits orienteering their way to Mordor. To make up for it we’ll buy carbon credits on the off chance they make some kind of difference and aren’t just a cheap ethical placebo. We’ve got about five and a half tonnes to account for. Then we’ll rent a room from someone local, eat from locally owned places and respect the water shortages when they hit. Last time I was out there I went four days without a shower and, damn it, I can stink that hard again if it’s in the name of self-righteousness.
That’ll do as a compromise because I aim to minimise the impact I make on the environment, not deny my existence completely and only visit places accessible by donkey or pure thought. Now if you’ll excuse me I’ve got a hanky hat to pack; style doesn’t come without effort.
Even on their holidays humans commit horrific fouls against each other. According to Tourism Concern we risk global warming from plane emissions, deforestation from holiday parks and the seas getting a kicking from water sports. We risk new complexes displacing indigenous people, long showers bringing water poverty and complete arseholes exploiting women and children caught in the sex trade. Spend too long thinking about it you’ll believe tourism’s towards the top of the Evilometer, placed somewhere between the holocaust and Bill O’Reilly’s narrow mind.
The obvious solution is to cancel the trip and spend our holiday in the cupboard under the stairs flogging ourselves for even thinking about inflicting these horrors on an unsuspecting developing world. But there must be a middle ground. There must be a choice we can make. We could spew plane carbon halfway across the world, land on endangered toads, stay in a massive hotel owned by a massive corporation paying its workers a pittance and spend a fortnight raping locals and punching orphans in the face. Or we could fly on the back of Gwaihir the Windlord, stay in a locally owned place to support a local entrepreneur, use water responsibly and not at all when there are shortages, and generally be the upstanding/uptight types we are at home.
So here’s the plan: we will travel overseas on a big fat carbon spewing plane because the world’s an interesting place and I want to see more than the end of my street. Besides, Gwaihir apparently doesn’t do outward flights or we wouldn’t have had to sit through nine hours of Hobbits orienteering their way to Mordor. To make up for it we’ll buy carbon credits on the off chance they make some kind of difference and aren’t just a cheap ethical placebo. We’ve got about five and a half tonnes to account for. Then we’ll rent a room from someone local, eat from locally owned places and respect the water shortages when they hit. Last time I was out there I went four days without a shower and, damn it, I can stink that hard again if it’s in the name of self-righteousness.
That’ll do as a compromise because I aim to minimise the impact I make on the environment, not deny my existence completely and only visit places accessible by donkey or pure thought. Now if you’ll excuse me I’ve got a hanky hat to pack; style doesn’t come without effort.
Photo credit: The Zero
