Rear View Mirror: Retrospective

Jabal Haroun trail

           Been home “a work week” for the good folks of Petra Archaeological Park (PAP) and Wadi Rum Protected Area (WRPA), and they’re enjoying a Friday (“holiday”). Of course many are working, being year-round operations. I’ve been thinking about the many challenges facing PAP & WRPA. They are both World Heritage Sites, being managed by a local (“Region”) Development Authority that is very knowledgeable about the positive aspects that tourism has on the local economy. When we talk about “economic engines” and infusion of outside capital these are prime generators.

vendor & mother (breaking rocks)

           However, there are forces at work that makes one ask: is it sustainable? While in-country the authorities often cited the realities of “Arab Spring” in nearby countries for their justification to move slowly & softly with the enforcement of conservation regulations put in place to protect the character of their special places. Meanwhile pressures are knocking on the door wanting a piece of the action. Various activities and pursuits, that aren’t in keeping with park/protected area principles, want a slice-of-the-pie here-n-there. I recall seeing about a dozen young vendors each day (usually young girls that should’ve been in school) selling colorful rocks quarried from the wadis (canyons/arroyos) of PAP; sometimes you’d watch their parents hammer the stone from its ancient location right in front of you. Sure, the place is called Petra and there is plenty of rock, but there used to be a lot more petrified wood at Petrified Forest National Park (Arizona) too. The fact is that parks & protected areas can’t be “all things for everybody.” They need to be conserved in such a manner as that will retain the integrity for which they were established, and that will provide the desire for visitors to continue to want to experience. Otherwise, they’ll take their tourist dinar/dollar/euro/pound/shekel/yen/yuan to someplace that will provide them with their desired results.

           Case in point: at present ATV’s operate outside WRPA, in the villages and buffer zone that encircles the “Protected Area.” One of the degradations that they’re grappling with at present is the exponential growth in tour trucks, and of course the tracks they leave behind (almost everywhere, including management areas designated as “wilderness”). I certainly hope the ATV can be kept in zones outside WRPA, for they’ll certainly have a potential impact on that World Heritage Site (I wonder if any World Heritage Sites allow ORV or ATV recreational use?). “If” allowed in (for economic growth sake) they’ll be jeopardizing: unique ecology, World Heritage Site status, visitors wanting to make this a destination. It is not too late, but pro-active change in management needs to be nurtured and allowed to grow with local partnerships. It is in everyone’s best interests. After all, eco/heritage tourism is sustainable given you protect the resources that made it viable to begin with.

           Being home, I’ve also been exposed to our euro-centric mass media. I heard an interview with a spokesman for “Occupy Oakland” the other day on NPR, and I was struck instantly by the rhetoric that took me back to the VVAW (Vietnam Veterans Against the War) daze. I recall many instances of calling for action & social change (plus being tear-gassed at an outdoor Jethro Tull concert) back in the day of ‘Revolution Now!” Some of the built up anger and verbal expressions are all-too-familiar. But, things have changed with Americana over the past 4-decades/2-generations, as they did from the 4-decades before that (seems wealth-gap and a call for socialism was a concern 80-years ago too). As the chants & slogans changed that evening to Molotov cocktails, I wondered what the difference was between the <.1% involved here with those recruited by “freedom fighters” elsewhere. I came up with one-word: geography.

Here is a link to a catchy tune direct from Buffett Hotel: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xGbrCJfgH8s 

Ad-Deir (The Monastery)