Chuck Thompson - Smile When Youre Lying: Confessions of a Rogue Travel Writer

Confessions of arogue travel writer

CHUCKTHOMPSON

HoltPaperbacks
Henry Holt and Company, LLC
Publishers since 1866
175 Fifth Avenue
New York, New York 10010
www.henryholt.com

HenryHolt and areregistered trademarks of
Henry Holt and Company, LLC.

Copyright 2007 by Chuck Thompson
All rights reserved.

Libraryof Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Thompson, Chuck.
Smile when you're lying :confessions of a rogue travel writer /
Chuck Thompson.
p.cm.
ISBN-13: 978-1-4299-2487-0
ISBN-10: 1-4299-2487-X
1. Thompson,ChuckTravel. 2. Voyages and travels.
3. Travel writing. I. Title.
G465.T59 2007
910.4dc22 2007006600

HenryHolt books are available for special promotions and
premiums. For details contact: Director, Special Markets.

Designedby Kelly Too

13 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

smile when you'relying

Aftersomewhere between ten and fifteen visits, this is my favorite anecdotefrom Bangkok. Every word true.

We'rein a small, dark bar, an Aussie expat hangout. Across the table is mygood friend Shanghai Bob, American expat and Old Asia Hand ofdistinguished order. To the right, a pair of astonishingly wasted guysin ridiculous bush hats (are there any other kind?) are sparking upwhat is certainly not the first joint of the evening. To the left, ayoung Thai girl is giving a rapid-fire, beneath-the-table hand job to apoker-faced German. Throughout the event, the German swigs his beerwith a nonchalance that suggests he's back in Bielefeld with his lovingSchnuckelputz and adorable rug rats Klaus and Liesl frolicking at hisfeet.

TheGerman looks like he's in for the long haul and sometime during thegirl's indefatigable ministrations a door opens near the rear of thebar. Out spills a porcine gent, half a century old if he's a day,accompanied by a slightly disheveled teenager modestly hitching up herbrightorange halter top. Behind the door one can see into a narrow room, theprimary features of which are a naked lightbulb swinging from theceiling and a stained mattress on the floor.

It'sat this point that Shanghai Bob looks at me and says, with uttersincerity, with complete lack of irony, "You want to get another beerhere or go someplace kind of sleazy?"

ThoughI've spent the last decade writing about travel for national magazines,this is the first time one of my priceless Shanghai Bob anecdotes hasever appeared in print. If you're surprised that a veteran of thetravel trade wouldn't have exploited this sort of golden material moreoften, it's probably because you don't possess the keen insight thatenables you to determine instantly that stories about colorful Aussiesin bush hats surrounded by drugs, booze, and Thai whores (to saynothing of Shanghai Bobs) are considered absolutely off-limits by allbut a handful of travel publications. Whereas stories about colorfulAussies sporting bush hats and delightful accents, surrounded by koalasand 'roos, and perhaps sipping one genteel glass ofFoster'senjoyed at sunset overlooking the enchanting operahouse on the last perfect day of your magical visit toSydneyare considered absolutely on the money.

Thisbook is for those who understand that, no matter what they read in thetravel press, no matter what they expect to encounter once they plungeinto the Byzantine world of international tourism, there's nothinggenteel, ever, about Foster's, bush hats, or Australian accents. Andthat even koalas will bite when properly provoked.

In1995, nontravel writer Sallie Tisdale wrote an incendiaryarticle titled, "Never Let the Locals See Your Map: Why Most TravelWriters Should Stay Home." Published in Harper's,the piece was an unsparing evisceration of the travel-writing racket."The modern reader," Tisdale wrote, "has the misfortune of living in atime when travel literature is booming and good travel writers are fewand far between." Warming up to her theme, Tisdale proceeded to savagetravel writers as self-important nihilists who put themselves at thecenter of their stories, ignored anything of genuine interest toreaders, and contrived "trips taken largely to be written about, tocreate stories where none existed before."

Withher arch tone and unsympathetic opinions, Tisdale upset a fair numberof people in the travel industry, but her story was of particularinterest to me inasmuch as it was published at roughly the time I wasstumbling into the business. A magazine had flown me to New York toproduce a feel-good feature on a group of Russian classical musicianswho'd fled the chaos of Moscow and formed a successful orchestra in theshadow of the Statue of Liberty. While I was in New York, the magazineasked me to drop by the newly opened Rose Museum inside Carnegie Hall,as well as a highly regarded Indian restaurant somewhere in the EastVillage. I wrote a feature about the musicians and short blurbs on themuseum and restaurant. The magazine ended up liking the blurbs morethan the feature. Would I have any interest, they asked, in reviewing arecently remodeled four-star restaurant in Toronto?

Sincethen, I've traveled on assignment in more than thirty-fivecountries, written two guidebooks, edited two others, worked as aneditor at four magazinesincluding a year as editor in chiefof Travelocity.com's short-lived newsstand magazine, at the end ofwhich I was drop-kicked out the doorand been involved aswriter, editor, or photographer in a conservative count of two thousandtravel stories. I've hunkered down with airline execs, watchedmarketing campaigns being slicked up, looked behind the curtains ofsome of the world's largest airports, schmoozed with resort managers,and been badgered by publicists to produce reams of favorable copy. Inother words, I've watched the travel world spin from more angles thanmost people know it has. Travel writing has changed in the decade or sosince Tisdale's attempted wake-up call. But not for the better. Brightpatches excepted, it's instead settled into a period of weary decline.

Thepoint was driven home some years back by a University ofPennsylvaniasponsored travel-writing conference. Bright-eyedhopefuls expecting to attend edifying lectures, hear war stories fromindustry heavyweights, make contacts, and generally advance theircareers were treated instead to lectures from severalpresentersBritish author Colin Thubron, travel editors fromnewspapers such as the Philadelphia Inquirerwhoexpressed the opinion that most travel writers were not talented enoughto write for "real" publications. They were press junketeers, starvedof original thought, incapable of ending any sentence without a phonenumber, Web address, or other transparent plug for whatever touristboard happened to be picking up the tab for their latestvacation"talentless freeloaders" who inhabited "the lastrefuge of the hack" from which they produced "journalistictiramisu." From a convention of Mississippi Baptists mulling over gaymarriage, OK. But it's not a good sign for your profession when thissort of vitriol comes out of a gathering of peers presumably intendedto profit those in attendance.