American portrait

It's mid April and the realisation that I most defintely won't be going to Spain in early May, nor Myanmar in September, has really sunk home. Also the trip at Christmas to Queenstown, New Zealand is looking decidedly shaky . But worse still is the lurking thought that my international travelling days may actually be over, or if not totally over, very limited, Going forward as the impact of covid-19 may well linger for years decimating economies and international travel and tourism.

I count my good fortune that I have done so much leisure travel particularly in the past 12 years. I really feel for all those retirees who have been eagerly anticipating their long planned retirement trips only to have their plans totally stymied. Particularly distressed must be the cruising enthusiasts. It's difficult to see the cruising industry ever fully recovering after what has happened in the last two months. Going forward many Australians may well be nervous about getting onboard a Sydney Harbour ferry yet alone a cruise liner.

Many will argue that it will be a good thing that the cruising industry will be decimated because cruising has a serious environmental impact and is the major contributor to massive overtourism in many places such as Venice.

Forced into more time than I enjoy on my computer I have been looking through photos from my travels of the past ten years and have found some thought provoking photos including the one above which I have titled, due to a failure of imagination, American Portrait.
It was taken in Port Townsend in Washington County USA-a pretty little town very dependant on tourism which I visited in 2015. The guitar man was playing for himself on a seat in a small park outside a cafe where we had lunch. I find myself wondering what will happen to Port Townsend and the hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, of similar towns and villages across the world which are very dependant on visitors. Even in the most optimistic scenario international travel will be seriously disrupted for years.

It would be wonderful to believe that the covid-19 shock will result in a more compassionate and equal society with most of the excesses of the past few years relegated to the garbage bin. Sadly we all know this will not happen. The little businesses-the cafes-bars-souvenir shops-restaurants- bed and breakfasts-tour operators and similar will be left decimated and the big boys-and girls- with their mulitimillion dollar salaries will be out there asap screwing the last dollar out of us. Indeed, some have not stopped screwing the dollar out of us even with the pandemic raging and others are desperate to end the lockdowns -even if there is still a serious risk to health-so that they can continue to make a buck for themselves.

There is no better example of this than the Australian company, Transurban. The extract below is from the Australian Financial Review of 17th April 2020. For overseas readers I should explain that the AFR is the Aussie equivalent of the Financial Times and the Wall Street Journal- it is staid and business orientated. For the AFR to use f***in a story is very unusual and perhaps even unprecedented.
I am still recovering from reading that the CEO gets a salary of A$7.2m (US$4.3m). What does he have to do? Surely toll roads and toll tunnels run themselves? This is the sort of disgusting greed the world does not need going forward. Good on the AFR for calling it out so eloquently.

We don't need sports stars earning hundreds of million dollars per annum and actors earning $20m for a film and CEO's earning obscene salaries. Let's cut the crap. We are all going to suffer and so should they.