If you hate them, you need to join them.
With their worldly sophistication, cheap fisherman pants and penchant for being smiley all the time, tourists are a much-hated group.
But before you laugh too hard at the lost look in their eyes, or mock too much the clattering chaos of their attempts to board the roof of a minibus with five bags and three cameras swinging from their torsos, understand this: they don’t care.
They’re having the time of their life. And we all know why. Being a tourist is awesome.
1: You get to go on and on and on about how amazing India/Paraguay/France is without actually having to live there.
2: You can eat like a feudal lord every night, and still lose weight from all the walking.
3: Whether you’re terrifying yourself on local transport or basting yourself in the sun next to a bag of beer, it beats what you’re friends are doing back home.
4: Freedom from the tyranny of socks.
5: The guilt attached to not utilizing your gym subscription is way less severe than it is back home.
6: You can ensure you return home looking svelte and lean by seeking out the town’s dirtiest street vendor on the penultimate night of the trip.
7: Visiting a foreign country is way more stimulating than staying at home all year. And if you don’t like it, you can at least sound exotic when you moan about it.
8: Cold beers on the beach/in a hammock/in bed/in a bar/on a road trip in the middle of the afternoon? Don’t mind if I do.
9: Breakfast buffets. Fresh fruit and muesli then hash browns and sausages then perhaps some blue cheese and ham. It doesn't make sense, but so what? You’re on holiday.
10: If you don’t like someone, you never have to speak to him/her again -- unlike the person who sits next to you at work.
11: Bringing home a tan and worldly knowledge is like dousing yourself in pheromones. Just be sure to cover up with mosquito spray, to avoid unsightly welts.
12: No matter how linguistically challenged you are, the words “beer,” “toilet” and “hotel” work nearly everywhere.
13: Getting drunk excused under the guise of “testing the merits of local brews over homogenous imports.”
14: It’s easy, in fact it’s imperative, to flick the off switch on the depressing news and awful TV shows that otherwise fill your life.
15: If you’ve got any sense, your destination of choice will be significantly cheaper than your own country.
16: If you look as if you’re going to spend some money, even locals who don’t like tourists will pretend they do.
17: You can finally finish that book you’ve been falling asleep with every night for the last three months.
18: You can bolster your social networking cred by Facebook-friending lots of exotic foreigners.
19: The weather. Even the rain seems somehow exotic when abroad.
20: The buzz you get walking around a new place knowing you're not at work is one of life’s greatest highs.
21: You can get a foot massage every day without anyone thinking you’re a fetishist.
22: You can finally wear those expensive sunglasses without fear of looking like a poser.
23: In fact, you can wear anything. Baggy Thai pants with a singlet? Go on, no one will bat an eyelid.
24: You can indulge passive-aggressive tendencies by posting lots of pictures on Facebook of yourself paragliding or surrounded by Hawaiian dancers or [insert jealousy-inducing image here].
25: You learn about the country you're visiting through experience, rather than National Geographic.
26: Stories about eating still-beating snake hearts and downing tequila straight from the bottle are pretty rock ‘n’ roll.
27: You finally get to use those foreign phrases you learned in junior school, like “Voulez vous couchez avec moi, s’il vous plaît?”
28: There’s a good chance you’ll be allowed to smoke cigarettes indoors.
29: Happy hour is actually worthwhile -- half-price drinks starting just before sunset and extending for at least two hours.
30: An afternoon siesta is not just acceptable, it's a necessity.
31: You get to try local specialities previously only seen on TV: balut (Philippines), fried monkey toes (Indonesia), tete de veau (calf’s head, France) and roasted ants (Columbia).
32. Those childish antics people get up to in pictures -- fingertips on the top of the Eiffel Tower, posing with fake gladiators at the Coliseum -- yep, you get to do them too now. Cool.
33: The lack of decent television channels in your mother tongue means you’ll have no choice but to go out and enjoy life.
34: Taking part in a drunken karaoke session becomes an appealing prospect.
35: The nearest you get to cooking is pointing at the fish you want grilled for your dinner.
36: You can slob out safe in the knowledge that someone else is getting paid to make everything spotless for you again the next day.
37: The local eye candy is exotic and different.
38: You get to mingle with a range of nationalities. Then escape them the next day.
39: Your sense of appreciation for your surroundings returns.
40: You get to buy silly hats, small plastic mementos and other ridiculous trinkets without guilt, because they were designed specifically for you.
41: With minimal effort -- such as sending a postcard -- you make your friends and relatives think you really care.
42: You can feign incomprehension when a suspicious taxi driver tries to convince you that a 10-minute journey really does cost US$75.
43: Those 1980s iPod playlists you compiled especially for the trip go down particularly well with others.
44: You get to mock other tourists who say things like, “By discovering the world, I am actually discovering myself.”
45: If you travel long enough, you get to say things like, “By discovering the world, I am actually discovering myself.”
46: Write something nice about a bar on TripAdvisor on your first night and you might never have to buy a drink for the rest of your stay.
47: Tanned fat looks better than pale fat.
48: You get to wantonly fritter away money with the sudden knowledge that experiences are so much more valuable than things.
49: Whether it’s sniffing out a great sunset spot or a backstreet bar or restaurant, there are always new discoveries on the horizon.
50: You can finally jettison your mobile phone and laptop without stress. Phileas Fogg wasn’t online for hours at a stretch every day and neither should you be.
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