Travelling is like online dating - you see a place online, you read about and it all sounds amazing, you assume it looks exactly like its' picture. So, you finally decide to go visit it -the city doesnt know you're comming and you're going to surprise it at the train station!    

 

Uh-oh- that's awkward. You turn up only to find the city was completely unprepared for you - it had a hard night, forgot to clean up and the worst part is,  its just letting it all hang out and you say 'EWW you look NOTHING like your postcards - you didnt tell me you had stray dogs and a homeless problem! And you smell terrible......Shocking ! You're worse than the city I left. 

 

Sounds familiar yes. 

We've all had that online romance with a Place ( or multiple Places at the same time). I blame the Travel Porn industry responsible for images that lure us in,  gain our trust, just so we take that next big step; pack our bags, exchange our currency and decide on a face to face meeting. Then its more or less a moment of truth - it's either going to be true love or a false misleading one week stand, built on the premise of fornication over lurid twighlight images exploited in a brochure, a preoccupation with tourist attractions and trying to get you interested in all sorts of souvenir 'toys'.

 

And what's worse you find out your City has invited everyone else to the party too- because it's vain,  shallow and is having it off with countless other people just because they have a camera and lots of money to throw around. Don't be jealos. 

 

Indeed the travel industry is rife with these sort of postcard scams. And it's not just cities that are doing it- islands do it, whole countries do it, even Sub continents do it. (I'm looking you South America - stop teasing me with your Carnival and your Inca Trail)

 

And you're more or less trapped once you've clicked on the picture- the only way youll see through the rubbish is to go see it for yourself.

 

That's the best way I can explain the fundamental difference between a traveller and a tourist - the desire to peel back the facade beneath the lights and glitter and see if this place you've rolled up in is someplace you actually connect with. Has it got good stories and what are the people like? You have to turn on the Wanderlust at first, charm your way in via the beaten path to the postcard stand but from there you can either join one of the various tour groups, have a camera frenzy OR you can dissappear up a backstreet- take the road less travelled. Take the second option and youll eventually get to see past the make up of glitzy lights and airbrushed rivers to the local people, idiosyncratic subcultures, past mistakes and current messes. The things that are the art and soul of a place.

 

Only then can you decide whether or not this relationship you've started with this place is long term and if you'll see it again.

 

That is why we travel

    And also my reason for compiling this section of DriftingWorldInk.com -to start photographing my favourite Cities with and without make up. 

 

Shall we start with Prague