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Travel Blues

Do we actually enjoy going on holiday?

An Irish breakfast, like its English equivalent, is a traditional morning meal which consists of bacon, sausages, fried eggs, pudding, fried mushrooms and tomatoes, baked beans and several slices of toast. This heart attack on a plate is a completely alien concept in mainland Europe, where breakfast is usually slightly more cereal-based and significantly more cholesterol-friendly. The exact ingredients of this national icon are often impossible to find on the continent; French saucisson doesn’t quite equate to a six-pack of Irish pork sausages, while serrano ham just doesn’t cut it compared to a greasy chunk of Gaelic bacon.

Hence my complete surprise, when on a family holiday in a French campsite a couple of years ago, to wake up one morning to the unmistakable scent of an Irish breakfast in full fry. Poking my head out the front door of our mobile home, I discovered that the perpetrators of this heavenly (or diabolical, depending on your point of view) odour was the family next door, also Irish. How had they managed to get hold of the necessary ingredients? “Oh, we brought the stuff over with us, we didn’t want to go hungry”, they told me in that annoyingly matter-of-fact tone of voice which makes you think that it is you that has asked a stupid question.

“If you reject the food, ignore the customs, fear the religion and avoid the people, you would better stay at home” - James Michener

Being a set-in-my-ways teenager at the time I naturally agreed with these enterprising neighbours, cursed my own family for being so short-sighted, and went back to eating my crusty breakfast baguette. Looking back now, however, the episode makes me question why it is that people often travel thousands of miles only to do exactly what they would have done (making a significant saving to boot) if they had stayed at home. For example, every summer planeloads of British (to name but one nationality) tourists fly to the Costa del Sol only to fry beside the pool with their fellow countrymen, drink gallons of the same lager that they drink every weekend back home, and generally do everything possible to avoid eating paella. If not to actually discover a new culture, why do people go on holidays?

First, I hear you say, the sun for which the Costa del Sol is named is generally a tad stronger and a lot more consistent than the occasional rays with which Northern Europe is blessed each summer. And second, people go on holidays to relax and to escape the stress and monotony of everyday life. Valid arguments? Maybe so concerning the search for the sun, even if most holidaymakers from the British Isles are completely unable to handle such dazzling weather conditions and often return home an unhealthy shade of peeling pink rather than a fresh tan-brown; but in terms of relaxation most holidays are in fact the complete opposite. Families who cart the kids off to a campsite in Brittany each summer reach unhealthy stress levels trying to navigate utterly foreign road-sign systems before receiving a crash-course in claustrophobia when crammed into their one-room mobile home. A more adventurous holiday such as interrailing also involves a significant number of logistical headaches to ensure that the right train in the right direction is taken at the right time.

So do we actually enjoy holidays or do we simply convince ourselves that we enjoy them?

British author David Lodge, in a seemingly irrelevant passage from his 1991 novel Paradise News, touches on this exact question when he has one of his cynical characters deconstruct what is essentially the “ritual” of going on holiday. “People have been brainwashed into thinking it will do them good, or make them happy”, he says. In other words, we go on holidays because we think that is what we are supposed to do with our annual leave in August, whereas in reality we would probably be much happier staying at home and spending time doing our favourite hobby. “Tourism is the new religion”, he continues; as the popularity of actual religions has declined, people have developed a new and illogical belief in the importance of seeing (usually through a camera lens) the Parthenon or the Eiffel Tower.

Lodge may have written this with his tongue firmly wedged against his cheek, but he nevertheless makes some valid points. Although it would be foolish to say that nobody enjoys themselves on holiday, often the thought of departing is more satisfying that the actual act, and people often return home disappointed, stressed or even disillusioned. The Paris Syndrome for example, which primarily affects Japanese tourists who visit the French capital, is a bizarre psychological condition which can result in anxiety, hallucinations, delusional states and even fainting. The cause? The utter shock and disillusionment of arriving in a city (Paris) which is not only cultural light-years away from urban Japan, but is also nothing like the idealised image of the City of Lights which the tourist in question had built up in his head beforehand. This “condition” affects an adequate amount of visitors each year to warrant its own medical term, yet the tourists continue to come in droves; because they believe it is what they are supposed to do. They can say that they have been to Paris.

So although this all might seem either ludicrous, cynical or just funny, the truth is that we never, or rarely, question why it is that we go on holidays. We say it is to discover a new culture, yet we rarely mix with the locals. We claim it is to behold magnificent sights, yet we usually just have a quick Kodak-moment before ducking into the nearest touristy pub for a pint. We say it is to relax, but we end up fighting over whether to take the second or third exit off that roundabout that we could swear we’ve already seen ten minutes before. Thus, the next time you are on holidays and trudging wearily between two 15th century cathedrals in a Renaissance Italian town, ask yourself the question; am I enjoying myself?

by Domhnall O'Sullivan