1,250 Generations of Storytellers | Ian Graham

There was much discussion of the region's tourism assets – places to visit, sights to be seen, experiences to be enjoyed. The air and rail routes into and out of the destination were explored. The potential or actual gaps in particular parts of the tourism offer were also discussed, as was the role of the local community in the delivery of a high quality tourism experience. Local people of course are and should be the financial beneficiaries of tourism. The challenge of managing such an area and such a community in a way that is sustainable to the community, the land and to the tourist, was also discussed. We were fortunate to have in the room representatives from other destinations in Spain and the UK, enabling the delegates to learn from excellent benchmarks.

Actually I should use the word "debated" rather than "discussed" because this was a conference in which the delegates joined with the speakers in a vigorous exploration of the issues. As the day evolved it was evident that each of the owner / operators (hotels, trains, boats, vineyards, museum, etc) were strongly energised to promote the destination and that some contribute to and leverage the umbrella tourism organisations that exist to promote the region and country. There was at least one speaker who started to explore the role that social media can play in promoting a destination. With a congruent vision of the whole now evolving, the conference will go some way to enabling such a picture to be framed and for ownership, accountability and responsibility to be agreed and assigned.

One evening we were taken to see the prehistoric rock paintings and carvings and they were explained by one of the passionate curators – in the dark!! This enabled us to see all the cuts and shapes of the carvings by the light of a torch, which cannot easily be seen in the 'flat' light of day. In the open air one can see carvings of animals drawn around 25,000 years ago by people just like us. And the oldest carvings are not a one-off – there are carvings and drawings from all the ages including some dating from as late as the 20th century. It was a vivid portrayal of our species' need to tell and hear stories.

It got me to thinking that this new thing "social media" is just all about story telling – reflecting simply the use of current technology to fulfil something that is embedded somehow deep in the DNA of all us humans.

Memories

Later in the conference I suggested to the delegates - owners and operators of the tourism assets - that each of them has a role to play to encourage and enable the visitors to their regions, their asset, to take away pleasurable and meaningful memories. I don't know about you, but for me significant memories stay with me when I have been emotionally touched by an experience. Some unique mix of the sight, the sound, the taste, the smell, the touch of an experience stays with me and is reinforced as I think about it and play it back in my mind. Sometimes I even embellish it like a fisherman does with his stories about his catches!

How can hotels and other tourist businesses encourage and foster such memories? Well for me, it would start with the event or experience itself being designed and delivered by people who really care about their customers/visitors. For me, this is what hotel management is all about – but let's not forget the management of vineyards, cruise ships and the plethora of other businesses that go to make up a tourist's overall destination experience.

Positive memories are reinforced by the breakfast waitress, the check-out clerk, the tour guide all asking about what I did yesterday and what they can do to help make today's experience perfect for me. Not just asking, but caring about my response. Maybe they will enquire what I will tell my friends about? In my own case it won't be through asking me to fill in a questionnaire, because for me it is an inanimate object. If I share my memories and my emotions it will be with other people, people who show a real interest in me and my life as a traveller and my curiosity about other people, their cultures and their environment.

Stories

Memories will become stories, either around the kitchen table back home, around the office water fountain, or in social media. If a city, a region, or even just a single tourism business (yours!) can focus on encouraging and enabling positive story telling by its visitors, then it will have a sustainable future.

Stories need, like the rock-art drawings, to transcend generations, cultures, language. I think stories that stay in the mind reflect memories that have started as strongly felt emotions and had some higher meaning to us in the context of our own lives.

It's happened for me in airport hotels, pavement cafes, as well as at Taj Mahal and Petra. It happened when we stayed with the Bushmen in Namibia, and yes it happened at Foz Coa. It has happened when I least expected it, when I paid nothing for it and also when I had paid a fortune to experience it. It's drawn me in and draws me back. So yes, I have such memories from some of my tourism experiences. I tell the stories and I am sure you have your own.

If our leisure guests and tourists tell their friends stories following their stays in our hotels, their meals in our restaurants, their treatment in our spa, their experience in our destination, then the destination and its tourism assets will have a sustainable future.

End of this story

If you found this interesting, and if you read Spanish, you might be interested in this thoughtful blog from one of my fellow speakers at the conference:

http://turismosinergico.blogspot.com

For our part, after the conference we spent the weekend exploring the old city of Porto – but that's another story…!

Contributed by Ian Graham