Lessons for Travel's Recovery From Anthony Bourdain's New Book
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Look (and learn) before you leap into a new trip was the mantra of the late Anthony Bourdain. That kind of thoughtful travel can prevent a lot of headaches this summer as the world gears up to exercise its pent-up vacation demand.
There’s an episode in the 10th season of the late Anthony Bourdain’s Parts Unknown where he was having lunch in a restaurant in southern Italy but refused to give up the name of the spot — a rarity for a show known for driving awareness to different cultures around the world and the small businesses populating each.
Bourdain, breaking the fourth wall, acknowledged he didn’t want to ruin the vibe of the restaurant by blasting its whereabouts to the universe via the airwaves of CNN.
His posthumous travel guide released late last month — World Travel: An Irreverent Guide — has a similar message that can just as easily translate to how the world should plan its return to travel following the devastation from coronavirus.
This being Bourdain, he and cowriter/longtime assistant Laurie Woolever cynically recognize there are only so many spots around the world than can be saved from the grips of Instagram and TikTok influencers. But that doesn’t mean travel has to live by the rules of audience engagement in its return from the pandemic.
“In some cases, a business has succumbed to the ‘Bourdain effect,’ which is to say, once a low-key restaurant or bar or sausage kiosk was featured on the show, its number of customers often skyrocketed, with Bourdain-inspired pilgrims showing up in droves to try the thing that Tony had on camera,” Woolever writes in the introduction. “In theory, this was a good thing, a coveted thing for businesses, but it could also utterly disrupt a beloved local institution, turning it into a sideshow or, depending
