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Posted on by Rick Steves

Tonight It’s Leftovers

I’m just wrapping up this trip. And my refrigerator is cluttered with still-edible blog scraps. So tonight, we’re having leftovers.

Just like Americans used to clap when a plane landed safely after a long flight (back in the 1970s), on two successive Turkish Air flights I noticed that Turks clap today as they land safely.

English drivers monitor their driving record carefully to maintain their favorable insurance rating. Moving violations are given various points (e.g., 3 points for speeding). When they get 12 points, Brits loose their license. Points stay on their record for four years. Everyone I talked to in Britain was nursing their record along with somewhere between 3 and 6 points.

 

London’s emerging Manhattan at Canary Wharf.
Enlarge photo

Back when Britannia ruled the waves, London’s Canary Wharf was the world’s biggest shipping harbor. Then it became a run-down wasteland. Now it’s hosting my nomination for Europe’s most impressive urban development. London is shifting east. There’s a whole new Tube network evolving east of London. The 2012 Olympics will be the district’s coming-out party, as most of the events and venues will be there. Wandering around the Docklands (Tube: Canary Wharf) was like finding a slick, futuristic Manhattan with an English accent.

I found the English were really caught up in the American presidential campaign. They say this is in part because of the popularity of the TV series The West Wing,which has educated an entire generation of Brits on American politics, and is still very popular in the UK. When I told an English friend I thought American travel to England was down, he disagreed, saying, “Americans are still coming to the UK because as Americans are less popular in the world, England is a refuge…a place where Americans can tell if people are talking about them.”

When I meet backpackers, I quiz them on shoestring travel in 2008. Most find rooms via www.hostelworld.com, which lists and assesses the countless hostels that house people who don’t stay in hotels. And most are enjoying Europe on $80 a day.

I’ve never seen a car with a bumper sticker on it in Europe. Why are we so into bumper stickers, while sticking what you think about something on your car never even occurred to any European?

I don’t make a habit of responding to comments on this blog, but Ken’s question (responding to my previous entry), implying that I was contributing to the Russian Bear’s economy and image by choosing this “monumental” time to start our tour program there, deserves an explanation. Yes, we have just added a Best of the Baltics tour that includes St. Petersburg in Russia. And it happens to be our best-selling tour right now. (You can find out more about this new itinerary on our 2009 Tourswebsite.)

Like most people, I didn’t anticipate the Russian aggression against Georgia. But, to answer Ken’s concern, this breaking development makes me more enthusiastic about a tour including Russia, rather than less enthusiastic.

I believe many people, when confronted with an enemy, are predisposed to shut off communication, hunker down, and fight. And I believe that when you travel into “enemy territory,” you can make connections that help encourage understanding and dispel fears. (That’s why I took our film crew to Iran this spring.) I believe people-to-people communication (along with the costly-but-successful US battle of economic attrition and our hard military stance) helped us get through the Cold War with the USSR without it going hot.

We will always have enemies and people whose goals are at odds with ours. While interviewing Lord Alderdice, Member of Parliament and architect of the Irish peace, for my radio show (which will air on the weekend of September 6), I learned that the only alternative to needless wars (which ironically make us weaker on the international scene) is perpetual negotiation and compromise and creative waging of peace — which, I believe, will make us stronger.

Comments

27 Replies to “Tonight It’s Leftovers”

  2. The 1970s? People still clap when plans land today. Not quite as much as a few years ago, but they still do. Thanks for all the posts this summer!

  3. Thanks, Rick, for including Russia in your 2009 itinerary. I agree that the best way to understand a country is to go there and experience it personally, especially by talking to the locals. I went to the Soviet Union in 1984 on a college tour, and then to Russia in 1993 on a People-to-People International tour. What a difference those few years made! It was like two different countries: in 1984 the best food was in the local market — courtesy of some black marketeers we met (the grocery stores had empty shelves). The wide boulevards had almost no traffic, and it was completely safe to be out at night (policemen on practically every corner). In 1993, the food was much improved, but there were elderly and disabled people selling their household wares near the metro stops because they couldn’t survive on their government pension. Also, a lot of cars were filling those previously empty boulevards.

  4. Yeah, why is it that we as Americans don’t want Europeans to make judgments about us based on our government, but we make judgments about them (Russians) based on the actions of their government?

  6. Yeah, why is it that we as Americans don’t want Europeans to make judgments about us based on our government, but we make judgments about them (Russians) based on the actions of their government? Who’s making judgments about Russians based on the actions of their government? I spent a week in Russia earlier this summer and loved not only experiencing the culture and history, but meeting the people, who were unfailingly friendly, polite, and eager to talk. Condemning the Russian incursion into Georgia isn’t at all the same as “judging” the Russian people…and, happily, most every European I’ve met who has justifiably negative judgments about our government goes to great lengths not to judge “us.”

  8. The clapping thing is funny and yes i used to hear it all the time when as a child in the 70 and 80 we flew Aer Lingus back home to family in Ireland ..but then a few years ago i I heard the clapping on flight when we landed in San Juan PR…then it finally dawn on me there not clapping out of safety but because there back home….

  9. AS FOR DRIVING IN EUROPE === Among the problems of driving on the wrong side of the road in England, Wales, Ireland, and Scotland, is that each morning we must figure how to do it all over again. In one area there were high hedgerows (10 to 15 ft. high) and high stone fences right at the left edge of the road, and the road was very narrow. In our vehicle with left hand drive, I was inches from those hedgerows and stone walls, so had no chance to see far enough around a sharp curve to see what was happening down the road, ahead of me. The passenger just can’t remember it’s her job to see what is around the next curve, but she does serve other very useful, and really delightfully curvy functions. === If we watch the drivers in Paris, Berlin, or Rome, we can see how their Army acted and reacted during WW II. === The German drives as if the street is his, and the law says this lane goes here, and that stop-sign means they will always stop, so he pays little attention to the needs of others, he just follows orders and plows ahead. === Most countries have traffic “Laws and Regulations.” Italy has traffic “Hints and Suggestions.” The Italian drives as if there are no rules, and when there is a traffic jam or some other problem, he just gives up, throws his arms in the air, smiles as if to say, “No big deal, I wasn’t going anywhere anyway.” === We have seen traffic jams in Paris, where, if one driver backed up a little, and the other driver turned a little, the jam would disappear. But when the Paris driver arrives at, or causes a traffic blockage, he will not employ any initiative to solve the gridlock, he just sits there with a pained expression on his face, waiting for someone to help him out of the mess. === When you near the top of a mountain in Yugoslavia, you can be sure that just around the next curve there will be a little old lady in the middle of the road herding two goats. Drive as if you expect that, and neither of you will be surprised.

  10. Thanks Rick, I have searched for a long time, trying to find a way for my friends who seem to have a “militant reaction default setting”, to see things from a different perspective. Hopefully, they won’t have to learn the lesson the hard way. The good news is, there are people like you who just keep spreading love. Terry “You must be the change you wish to see in the world.” ~ Mahatma Gandhi ~

  11. Rick, you are correct in your mention of “Bunker mentality”. My solution is to require all high school graduates to go to another country for 6 months or so. Exposure to another culture will open the eyes of young people forever and actually make them more appreciative of their own country. They’ll see that “our way” is not the only way.

  12. Terry, thanks for the great Ghandi quote. Rick, thanks for a great summer blog. No trips to Europe this year but will travel the New England states and Ohio Valley. Next year back to Europe!

  14. Jim, what does driving on the wrong side of the road have to do with this subject? We want to hear comments about what Rick is discussing at the moment. Thank you.

  15. Rick wrote, “English drivers monitor their driving record carefully to maintain their favorable insurance rating. Moving violations are given various points (e.g., 3 points for speeding). When they get 12 points, Brits loose their license.” If you drove there, or elsewhere in Europe, you would know it is so very different from driving in the USA. As the lady we talked to at the Swiss Air office in Zurich who had just returned from a vacation in the US, said, “The people are genuinely friendly and polite, and American drivers, especially in Southern California, were a pleasant improvement over drivers in Europe.” Well, I thought it would be of interest.

  17. I’ve never seen a car with a bumper sticker on it in Europe. Why are we so into bumper stickers, while sticking what you think about something on your car never even occurred to any European? Let’s carry this question to its logical conclusion… why do people blog about various issues, including travel and politics, when it never even occurred to do so by many people around the globe? Rick, why do people express their opinions about anything in myriad ways? Because they can and because, for some reason, they (we) think others might want to read or listen. After a while, Rick, it does get tiresome of hearing how we Americans do things or don’t do things the opposite of Europeans and how it’s either inferred or suggested outright that the way Americans do it is wrong. Sincerely, Bumper-sticker driving American who loves his country, but is desperately itching to visit Europe for a month some time over the next couple of years.

  18. First of all, Russia isn’t really considered an “enemy” now. Secondly, there are two sides to this current Georgia-Russia conflict. Both sides have acted aggressively and who actually started the hostilities is up for debate. I hope the hostilities don’t spread (I’m afraid they will), but it’s still extremely important for the commoners/civilians of the world to maintain communication and achieve whatever the governments/politicians can’t or won’t achieve.

  19. Thanks Rick, for pointing out another “difference” in culture. Interesting to ponder. Contrary, to another posters reaction, I don’t see any negative content in your bumper sticker comment. Oversensitivity problems arise when we get stuck at one end of a polarity continuum or the other. This is usually because of a “should, must, or ought” rule picked up somewhere in life. Just a little Gestalt Psychology for the day, in the interest of freer and happier lives for all.

  22. Communicating with the USA doesn’t do much good as long as the President and his men ignore, subvert and go around the rule of law. That is kind of dictatorial too, isn’t it?

  23. Rick is correct. The Republicans are trying hard to spin the Russians as the new enemy. Rumor has it that the USA was assisting Georgia in precipitating the Russian invasion.

  24. I must disagree with the bumper sticker comment…I saw a few while I was living in Spain! Does “Bebe a bordo” (Baby on Board) count as a bumper sticker?

  25. Dave, rumor also has it that: BigFoot is in a couple of good ole boys’ freezer, and Obama eats babies, and Elvis is going to take over the Demokrat convention. Rumors are always so much more interesting than fact.

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