Rick Steves: ‘Happy Travels—Even to Tijuana’
Travel Blog • Jim Benning • 06.14.07 | 4:20 PM ET
Can you smell it, the sweet smell of success? Or at least the semi-sweet smell of partial success? Earlier this week, in our Speaker’s Corner section, I invited travel guru Rick Steves to a full-on, mano a mano Tijuana-Off after he suggested off-handedly that my favorite Mexican border city was a hellhole.
Steves didn’t take me up on my invitation to visit Tijuana—I don’t think he liked the scary white mask—but he did e-mail a thoughtful reply, which we’ve posted in the comments section of the story.
In it, he vowed to reconsider his use of Tijuana as a metaphor for all places corrupt and ramshackle, particularly “as globalization pulls South-of-the-border-villes out of their squalor and hard work by self-respecting local citizens give these former embarrassments pride.”
Rick, on behalf of the good, hard-working, self-respecting citizens of Tijuana: Muchas gracias.
There’s certainly plenty of squalor in Tijuana, but a careful visitor can find plenty to appreciate, too.
Now, how about a new guidebook/video project: “Tijuana Through the Creaky Front Turnstile.”
Catchy title, no?
Related on World Hum:
* Rick Steves, It’s Time For a Tijuana-Off!
* Smackdown in Tijuana
* Tijuana: Beyond Avenida Revolución
* Q&A with Andrew Steves: Travels in Dad’s Footsteps
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Jim Benning is the editor and co-founder of World Hum.
Jose 06.15.07 | 3:05 AM ET
Jim,
I can’t agree with you more! TJ a hell hole? Hell no! I was just there with a friend who had some lap-band (weight reduction procedure) and I was impressed with all the cosmetic surgery clinicas! TJ has become the nip and tuck spot. In the old days I would think about buying tires in TJ, but I now think I may get rid of one very bothersome one around the waist!