Innovative tourism is about helping the locals
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At present Paul & Tara are in Pakistan exploring the cities of Islamabad, Peshawar, Lahore, Multan & Karachi. Aside from seeing key historical sites they are enjoying local food experiences delivered by locals who have the know how & passion about their culinary delights. One such experience is directly helping a single mum who provides catering to local businesses & colleges, she says such experiences in her home with tourists gives her monthly income a significant boost.
The focus of tourism experiences should be how one can create creative unique experiences, which are authentic for travellers & not burdensome on locals, these should be focused on helping them earn a top up on what they do anyway but may be a novelty experience or foreigners.
The key objective of world travel should be about removing ignorance & to encourage dialogue and interaction with locals, this can only be done by being innovative and creating local experiences which enable travellers to do this. One such example is an experience we have in collaboration with Swat Valley Guild, whereby our customers can visit the local trade at work from weaving, to embroidery, dying of fabrics etc. They take a great deal of pride in telling tourists about the processes and involved, this always takes place with lunch as food brings people together. Over a local authentic lunch foreigners can have conversations to understand the local culture.
Our Food Tours & Food & Shopping tours are created in collaboration with knowledge of local eateries which are made up of saluberious venues but also local street food places which only the locals know of. This enable people to appreciate local cuisines and also helps small local businesses.