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 EDITORIAL:
Definitions, Urban beauty & the eye of the beholder.
 This
September, ECOCLUB co-sponsored the first Urban Ecotourism
Conference, as we feel that Urban Ecotourism, in more
ways than one, can be more ecological than what often passes as
Ecotourism.
It is
annoying to read the 'official' long-winded definitions of
Ecotourism starting with 'Ecotourism is travel to natural areas'. This
could not be more irrelevant. Ecotourism, is ecological tourism,
period. And thus, it covers urban areas just as well. Urban areas
after all are
not unnatural, they already go back 10,000 years. Urban areas are
usually more efficient, and can become even more so, in terms of
consumption of raw materials and production of raw ideas. Urban areas
are where all new ideas are born and where most revolutions begin. Not
to mention that most Ecotourists live in urban areas. They say charity begins at home,
and so does Ecotourism.
So can
urban be eco? Of course: Isn't it
far more ecological to take a 6 km walk in the urban jungle of your
city on a Sunday morning and meet friends rather than to drive alone
your suv through a national park some 200 km away to be isolated in
the 'wilderness'? But if many would believe so, what would happen to
all those glossy tourism mags, their adventure gear, cars and other so
useful accessories that make 'beautiful life' for 'beautiful' people,
the very people you are not likely to meet in your down town stroll?
'Urban' may
not only define ecotourism in terms of geography, but in terms of
philosophy as well, as "urban" stands for fusing cultures,
for constant change. Most urban centres are
nowadays poles of globalisation where tradition and natural areas are
harder to define.
There is
obviously a conceptual line between green living and green tourism.
Home is Living, Tourism is Leaving. We could thus say that
Urban Ecotourism is Ecological Tourism that takes place within a city
(as opposed to in nearby natural areas). As a phenomenon, it includes
those visiting, (as opposed to living in), a city for tourism, and
those people, organisations, processes and facilities that serve them,
as long as the same basic ecotourism criteria that apply for rural
areas are met.
In practice
and beyond definitions, you can never and nowhere be far from nature
and its anarchic manifestations: A pigeon freed during the Athens
Olympics opening ceremony was found a few days later by a
farmer in the village of Racoasa in central Romania, over 1000 km
north. Most would admire the beauty of nature and human kindness
right? Wrong, what the farmer then did was to create a beautiful cage
for the athletic pigeon.
Whereas at
the Olympics closing ceremony something else was freed: thousands of
colourful balloons. Most admired, some worried about the cost, but few thought like
the wildlife rehabilitator who asked one of our Experts: "How
can the Olympics be o.k. with releasing over 1/4 million balloons at
it's closing ceremonies. The marine life will suffer from this
careless act. I am shocked that this was overlooked."
Indeed, but the
sad(?) truth is that it is so difficult for anyone to be shocked by
anything these days.
Antonis
B. Petropoulos
ECOCLUB Editor
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