Ranjona Banerji | Why I’m Not Booking My Next Holiday To Barcelona

I’ve long wanted to go to Barcelona. Antoni Gaudi and Picasso are the reasons. Nothing remotely unique there. Millions visit both the Sagrada Familia Basilica and the Guernica every year. Some also want the football and the food.

But the people of Barcelona don’t want me.

Not me specifically. I mean, I hope not.

They don’t seem to want any of us. For a time now. Tourists sitting at roadside cafes have had insults and water thrown at them by locals. Graffiti on the walls reads: “Tourists go home”, “Your holiday, my misery”.

Barcelona gets about 12 to 14 million tourists per year at conservative estimates. And much as the city depends on tourism for its income, its tolerance limits have been breached. Locals have had to surrender their spaces and their lives. At a basic level, holiday rentals have eaten into their own living spaces, and the cost of living has gone up.

Thailand expects its tourist numbers to be close to 40 million for 2025. If you have visited Thailand, and since it is the eighth most visited place in the world, you may well have, you should have been beguiled by its hospitality and natural beauty. But perhaps you also noticed that it is well hidden from visitors. You may notice the sleaze of the sex trade or the cleanliness of the public transport, but the lives of the Thai people are closed to you. It’s like a massive veil over reality, so tourists get what they want and no more.

In that, I sense a form of hostility.

And since politeness appears to be more natural to the Thais than many others, you may not see the kind of angry graffiti against tourists that you hear about in Barcelona.

The state of Uttarakhand has banned all public protests for the winter season so that tourists and destination weddings are not affected. This means that a simple democratic right has been withheld so as not to inconvenience visitors. The rights of citizens are secondary to those of tourists.

The quaint little settlement of Landour has been ruined by eager visitors. Ruined for those who live there as well as those who visit. There are so many people that no one can cope. Landour lies just above Mussoorie, which of course has practically lost all its charm. And it is creaking perched as it is on a fragile mountain, as it operates well beyond its carrying capacity.

It was only a few months ago that heavy rain brought the roads down and people got trapped in the mountains. Tourists had to negotiate kilometres of dangerous hillside with almost no road surface to get down to Dehradun. But the joy of being human is that we forget. So we will see large droves of people entering once the winter holidays begin to match the small droves who visit to escape Delhi’s winter particulate matter, natural and unnatural. The upshot is that Dehradun’s particulate matter has shot up to new highs. Or lows, depending on how you look at it.

The Prime Minister of India has advised more people to come to Uttarakhand to get married. And the state government has stopped whatever paltry protests the state has to ensure no one is bothered by local issues. In Uttarakhand’s particular case, trees are being cut down and hills eroded to build more and more roads to fulfil the wishes of those on high.

The people of Goa are fed up of their state being held to ransom by every kind of tourist from the single-minded gambler to the beach lech and everything in between.

In Kenya, the great migration of the wildebeest across the Serengeti and Mara systems is awe-inspiring. To be part of the experience, hotels and tourist vehicles stray close enough to disturb the phenomenon.

In Ranthambhore, the rush to spot a tiger leads to a cacophonous circus in the forest, as screaming humans in large vehicles and speeding jeeps careen from location to location. The joy of a sighting is totally undermined by the noise and the chaos.

But in spite of all the damage and the downsides, the thrill of travel still beckons. Watching documentaries on television or videos on social media don’t slake your thirst. They leave you craving the experience for yourself.

You are reminded of all the advice about how travel broadens the mind. Without experiencing the world, are you limiting yourself to the tired repetition of the world around you? People might be annoying, but often the things that people make or do are inspiring and mind-boggling. Two decades apart, I made two visits to Paris to dive into the frisson of the impressionist art on display. The sands and the light of Jaisalmer remain the most beautiful expression of Nature I have ever seen.

There is so much that I still want to see. From the cave drawings of Bhimbetka to the ruins of Hampi. From the historic sites of Uzbekistan to the Incan city of Machu Picchu. I don’t need five-star beach resorts and luxury spas. That is not my idea of fun for the most part. Cannot make a blanket statement though. Perhaps an unaffordable hyper-artificial, satirical, scary White Lotus type experience is what I really, really want?

The trouble is that everywhere I want to go, too many people already have. The locals might be seething for all I know, ready to prey on the next idiot tourist or wishing her far, far away?

Like I am here. Dreading the jams, the reckless and rude driving, the inability to get to a hospital or simple grocery shopping because of the influx of cars from every neighbouring state. I call out the names of the states on the numberplates like they are insults.

I suppose that if I can dish it out, I have to take it. Except for going to Barcelona. I feel I really shouldn’t upset them anymore. For the rest, it’s the bank balance which calls the shots.