Seth Richard Miller Photography

Tourist culture is an interesting thing. Not necessarily the culture the tourist brings with them from his or her home country, but the culture they adopt the moment they step off the plane in a new place. Tourists, myself included, treat the environment around them as if they are passive observers of the world. They think they’re knowledgeable of numerous cultures and foreign customs. Tourists such as myself believe we are perceptive, even into the minds and lives of those unlike us. Yet despite all of our insight and worldly wisdom we completely lack self-awareness.

We rarely realize the unnecessary space we’re taking up on the train or how loudly we’re speaking at the restaurant. In famous cities like Paris and Rome we tend to be safe because the majority of the people that surround us are other tourists. The few locals we interact with are accustomed to tourists and their odd habit of not having proper predictable habits.

When you go to the Louvre you see the Mona Lisa. It’s what you do. If you don’t, you’ve done something wrong. But in reality, it’s an odd experience. Imagine an architecturally astounding building that is ornate without being garish. The ceilings that tower above you could be considered a work of art worthy of study in and of themselves. The placement of the pieces is an intricate tapestry woven together under intentional landscape of lighting. As you begin to walk up the stairs to the second floor your head lifts to see The Winged Victory of Samothrace at the top of the landing. Underneath the headless statue are scores of people, congregating before it like worshipers drawing close to something sacred. Once you reach the top you turn right because a black and white photocopied sign tells you that’s where you’ll find the Mona Lisa. You don’t really need the sign, because the shoulder-to-shoulder crowd is going that way already.

The hall of Italian painters is packed, but you can see people funneling through a specific doorway ahead and on the right. You wade through the guided tour groups and the families and finally you’ve made it to your destination. On the right and on the left the walls are saturated with giant pieces, framed in gold. However, straight ahead there is a nearly naked wall, save for an unassuming picture of a girl. The painting is only about twenty inches by thirty inches and to get to it you have to trudge your way through huddled masses armed with cameras, cell phones and selfie sticks. There’s a thick plate of glass and a velvet rope separating the crowd from Davinci’s work. Once a group of people reaches the velvet rope they have about a minute and a half before a curator guides to the side of the room and let’s the next group have a turn at getting pictures and making memories.

The Mona Lisa is possibly the most famous painting that has ever existed. You have 90 seconds. How do you spend them? Do you take a picture so that you can remember this incredible trip? Do make sure to get a selfie so that Instagram knows that you were here? Or do you just stop and stare? Do you contemplate the deep earthy colors? Do you think about her curious half smile and the skin complexion that has darkened with age? Do you take the time to wonder what made the Mona Lisa accumulate the fame that it did?

The Mona Lisa is possibly the most famous painting that has ever existed. Yet, there are no aspiring painters here, studying it and trying to comprehend Leonardo’s genius. There are no art critics to consider what this piece might mean for us today. There are no renaissance historians awestruck by where they are standing. There are just a lot of people taking pictures and getting selfies. We’re consuming without considering. We look at art but never contemplate its beauty. We get our obligatory pictures and souvenirs but never really experience what we see. We order amazing food that grows cold while we take pictures of it, and then we chew and swallow so fast that we barely know what it tastes like.

What really worries me about tourist culture, is how often I carry it into my everyday life. I treat my life like I’m a passive observer. I take pictures of what I do with my friends but am rarely mentally or emotionally present for them. If I see a beautiful building I stop being amazed by it the moment it’s on instagram. I treat stages of life like tram stops, only focused on the next destination. I act as if I know a lot about the world around me, but then try to stay as uninvolved as I can. I try to observe without participating all the while failing to realize that my presence has unintended consequences for the locals.

For me, my tourist syndrome stems from my own personal insecurity. I long to be admired and liked, so I make myself busy projecting a good life on social media. I want people to think I’m interesting so I fill my life with pictures and knickknacks of interesting places. I remain only a passive observer because I assume that people don’t want to actually get to know me. I assume that others wouldn’t value me enough to deal with my mess so I just watch from the outside without engaging or getting involved.

We don’t need to live this way. As a Christian I believe that I am loved and that that love is given and not earned. When I recognized that I am loved and am accepted I live out of a place of love and acceptance. I stop striving to earn appreciation and instead can live more fully. I can accept that life is messy and let my life get tangled up in the lives of others. Others may see my mess and I may even be wounded by their mess, but it’s only in that vulnerability that we can bless one another. The tourist’s life is only a half-life, and I find that it’s better to be at home where God has placed me.