Home
Archive
Newsletters
Video
Blogs
Discuss
About
Search
Donate
Advertise
Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement
  • AlterNetYour turn

Support AlterNet
Do you value the information you're getting from AlterNet? Please show your support with a tax-deductible donation.


Feedback
Tell us how we're doing.

Advertisement
Advertisement

Exotic Tourism with a Twist: Travelling Through the 'Axis of Evil'

By Jared Ferrie, The Tyee. Posted June 27, 2007.


Tony Wheeler traveled to Iran, North Korea and Afghanistan and found that the media's image of the countries has very little to with what daily life is like in those places.

Share and save this post:

      

      

Share on Facebook       

AlterNet Social Networks:
follow us on twitter
find us on Facebook

More stories by Jared Ferrie

Advertisement
Upcoming AlterNet stories on Digg

It's been a hectic day for Tony Wheeler. He missed his morning flight from Portland; he almost didn't make it on the next flight, and now his luggage has been lost.

Wheeler touched down in Vancouver just in time for a telephone interview with local radio. By the time he sits down with me (five hours late), he's only had 15 minutes to freshen up in his hotel room.

"It's been quite a while since I missed a flight," he says, clearly unfazed by the whole ordeal.

Then again, he's no doubt seen worse. Indeed, Wheeler's life is the stuff of backpacker mythology. Born in England and raised in Pakistan, America and the West Indies, he left business school in 1972 to travel to Asia with his wife Maureen. They intended to travel for a year and then settle down.

By the time they reached Australia they had only 27 cents left, but their wanderlust hadn't depleted in the least. After being bombarded with questions about their journey, the couple wrote Across Asia on the Cheap. It became the first in a series that eventually grew into a guidebook empire. Lonely Planet now boasts 500 titles, and dog-eared, dirt-streaked copies now grace bookshelves in hostels throughout the world.

Wheeler's latest book is in a different vein, however. Part guidebook, part reportage, with occasional drifts into political commentary, Bad Lands: A Tourist On the Axis of Evil sees Wheeler drift through some of the world's more notorious locales. But it comes with a warning.

"I don't think anybody's going to go to Iraq and Afghanistan without knowing what they're doing," Wheeler says, recommending instead that novice travellers stick to such beaten paths as Europe and Thailand.

Jared Ferrie: Let's talk about the concept. Why did you call it Bad Lands?

Tony Wheeler: It's ironic. And it's a takeoff of the Badlands in South Dakota. I mean I could have called it Naughty Countries or Evil Nations. The thing that's amused me is that it is being translated now in a number of different languages and they've all said that "bad lands" doesn't have the same connotation. They're calling it various names and the one I really like is the Dutch title. It translates as "countries where scoundrels govern." I rather like that.

Ferrie: Do you think a country can accurately be called evil?

Wheeler: One of the things I was trying to show is the difference between the country, the people and the media image of it. With Iran in particular, you've got a president going around denying the Holocaust and saying Israel should be wiped off the map. It's not that the media are misrepresenting it or getting it wrong -- that's what the news is. The fact that everyday life goes on isn't news. But everyday life is often very interesting. I point out repeatedly how friendly the Iranians are and how outgoing they are.

North Korea was just as delightfully amazing as I thought it would be. It's such a movie set. You just feel like it's been put up to be looked at on film, but it's not really real.


Digg!    Share on facebook   submit to reddit    Bookmark on Delicious   Stumble This  

See more stories tagged with: iran, afghanistan, north korea, tourism

Jared Ferrie has twice travelled to post-Taliban Afghanistan; his reporting on Sri Lanka recently earned a citation for excellence from the Canadian Association of Journalism.

Liked this story? Get top stories in your inbox each week from AlterNet! Sign up now »

Advertisement
Advertisement

 

Comments Turn comments off sitewide Give us feedback »
Comments closed.
The comments for this story have been closed. Thank you to everyone who participated.
View:
It is always best to go see for yourself
Posted by: Bobsays on Jun 27, 2007 12:46 AM   
Current rating: 5    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I would agree with him about Iranians: every Iranian I have met has blown me away: they are generous, friendly people. It is a grotesque stereotype that the media peddles.

I do think more Americans should not only travel to places, they should also live there amongst the locals to see the world through their eyes. It is of course easy to turn up somewhere and immediately describe it as a shit hole because it lacks American conveniences. But it is another to see what life is like when you have to live under different laws, customs and culture.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

I’d like to visit Egypt
Posted by: White middleclass male on Jun 27, 2007 3:03 AM   
Current rating: 1    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
What I don’t want, is ending up on Al Jezzara with a scimitar held over my head, as I tell the world “my name is now Christopher Mohammad and I hereby declare fatwa on the Great Satan”.

I’ve been to 3 third world countries. In Iraq, and away from the tourist places in Mexico and the Bahamas, it has always reminded me of a post apocalyptic zombie movie. Except instead of filthy zombies in tattered clothes moaning for “braaaainnnnns” you have filthy children in tattered clothes moaning for choooooocolate or “give me dooooooollar”.

I really wish they would gentrify some of the third world. Then I could visit the Rain forest.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

» RE: I’d like to visit Egypt Posted by: richholland
» RE: I’d like to visit Egypt Posted by: White middleclass male
» RE: I’d like to visit Egypt....er Posted by: Captainmagic
» RE: I’d like to visit Egypt....er Posted by: White middleclass male
» come visit downtown san francisco Posted by: veggiegrrrl
» RE: I’d like to visit Egypt Posted by: opeluboy
» RE: I’d like to visit Egypt Posted by: lessbread
global profit v/s community values
Posted by: richholland on Jun 27, 2007 4:56 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
if moneymaking is americas value nr 1, you will meet in Asian countries probably the wrong guys because family means something there.

It is the tragic now the communistic party has the power in China and they work together with the American capitalists.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

Mr. R.
Posted by: RDVSR on Jun 27, 2007 5:47 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Capitalists, including American, are what have driven the advances in the world, which have made if possible for you to afford to travel, and enjoy the good life.
Chinese have been good of recent years at using the developments to their benefit, but under communism they are not the innovators.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

» RE: Mr. R. .......and Posted by: Captainmagic
Wheeler aides in spreading disinformation...
Posted by: Wesley69 on Jun 27, 2007 8:00 AM   
Current rating: 5    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Ahmadinejad never said the quote so often assigned to him by the media and our government, and Wheeler assists in spreading the disinformation that foments the very hostilty that he writes about.

So what did Ahmadinejad actually say? To quote his exact words in farsi: "Imam ghoft een rezhim-e ishghalgar-e qods bayad az safheh-ye ruzgar mahv shavad."

That passage will mean nothing to most people, but one word might ring a bell: rezhim-e. It is the word "Regime", pronounced just like the English word with an extra "eh" sound at the end. Ahmadinejad did not refer to Israel the country or Israel the land mass, but the Israeli regime. This is a vastly significant distinction, as one cannot wipe a regime off the map. Ahmadinejad does not even refer to Israel by name, he instead uses the specific phrase "rezhim-e ishghalgar-e qods" (regime occupying Jerusalem).

So this raises the question.. what exactly did he want "wiped from the map"? The answer is: nothing. That's because the word "map" was never used. The Persian word for map, "nagsheh", is not contained anywhere in his original farsi quote, or, for that matter, anywhere in his entire speech. Nor was the western phrase "wipe out" ever said. Yet we are led to believe that Iran's President threatened to "wipe Israel off the map", despite never having uttered the words "map", "wipe out" or even "Israel".

THE PROOF:

The full quote translated directly to English:

"The Imam said this regime occupying Jerusalem must vanish from the page of time".

Word by word translation:

Imam (Khomeini) ghoft (said) een (this) rezhim-e (regime) ishghalgar-e (occupying) qods (Jerusalem) bayad (must) az safheh-ye ruzgar (from page of time) mahv shavad (vanish from).

Here is the full transcript of the speech in farsi, archived on Ahmadinejad's web site

www.president.ir/farsi/ahmadinejad/speeches.

The Bush adminstration, and it's complicitous lackeys in the MSM, refuse to not only speak with our "enemies", but consistently misconstrue the statements they make. It should be no puzzle why even intelligent people in this country have a difficult time figuring out what the hell is going on in the world right now...

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

Touring can be great fun, if you pick the right times and spots.
Posted by: HughScott on Jun 27, 2007 11:18 AM   
Current rating: 3    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
During my many years as an Air Force pilot and airline crewmember, I traveled all over the world, most often with my wife on vacations.

In Amsterdam, we got caught in the 1968 May Day riots. Pretty hairy.

The worst experience was in Medellin, Columbia, when a pedestrian punched out my wife while we walking on a main downtown street. The assault was witnessed by dozens of bystanders and not person came to our aid.

The most thrilling place we visited was East Berlin, after entering through Checkpoint Charlie. It was like going behind enemy lines, more commonly called The Iron Curtain.

One city I would never visit is Baghdad -- not even a hundred years from now. if I could live that long. It will be centuries, if ever, before Iraqis stop hating Americans and rightly so.

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

» But we brought them democracy. Posted by: White middleclass male
"Delightfully Amazing" N. Korea
Posted by: montanaron on Jun 30, 2007 4:41 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Is the country "amazing" and "delightful" to 10s of thousands and more who have died and are still dieing of starvation and are suffering from malnutrition? A movie set? Unbelievable that a man of Tony's reputation would say something like this. Mr. Wheeler should have seen beyond the facade that the N. Korean government has erected to hide the REAL facts of daily life there. Here's an Amnesty International report on the travesty. A bit old (3 years), but still relevant, IMHO.

http://web.amnesty.org/library/index/engasa240032004

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]