Chinese tourists fib the most about their vacations
By M.D.
A HOLIDAY is a pleasurable experience, generally, a chance to slip the surly bonds of the office for a couple of weeks (three if you’re lucky, a month if you’re French), clear the head and rejuvenate the body. And if your trip was less like “A Year in Provence” and more “National Lampoon’s Vacation” there is always the delight of looking forward to posting a scathing write-up on TripAdvisor. It is clear by glancing through some of the reviews of terrible hotels on the internet that sometimes it really is best to settle on a staycation (spending by Britons choosing to stay at home on their holidays rose by 18% between 2008-12).
One hotel visitor to New York reported: “Weird screams in the morning, possible blood drips on plastic mattress covering. This was the most frightening experience, seriously debated sleeping in Central Park instead.” A traveller to Brussels, home to Europe’s bureaucrats, found that the location of his hotel “Leaves a lot to be desired, unless you happen to be a freelance exotic dancer. Nestled in a district of sex shops and strip clubs, the area attracts the sort of people that you would cross the street to avoid. As you enter the hotel, you are greeted by decor that is almost medieval, and a strange old man who is always angry.”
And although Britain’s hotel industry has vastly improved, this review from TripAdvisor about a hotel in Bournemouth, on the south coast, revived some of your correspondent’s repressed memories of childhood holidays: “If buildings could speak, this one would be screaming, run away!…[the bathroom] resembled a dirty cupboard designed by the inventor of Tetris…one would need to be a practised contortionist to use the sink or the shower”.
Not all reviews are entirely fair. One website that collects odd or bizarre holiday reviews, tripadvisaargh.tumblr.com, found one visitor to Portmeirion village in north Wales griping that: “The place is quite pretty, but you can’t get in most of the buildings due to people living in them.”
American and European tourists are well versed in how to complain, and loudly, about a bad holiday. On the other hand, a survey just out from Hotels.com reveals the extent to which people from various countries lie to friends and family about the marvellous time they had, even if their hotel screamed “run away!”.
Mexicans were the least likely to stretch the truth, with only 8% fibbing about how great their vacation was. Around a quarter of vacationers from America and France embellished the truth, as did 31% of Brits. Curiously, the survey found that Chinese tourists were the most inclined to exaggerate their holiday experience. In fact, most Chinese travellers, 67%, did so.
Chinese tourists are travelling abroad in ever-greater numbers; 97m in 2013, according to separate data from Hotels.com. Chinese international travellers were the seventh-highest spenders by nationality, paying $180 on average per night on hotel accommodation. And the majority of Chinese now prefer to travel independently, moving away from the herd of group travel that accompanied the start of the boom in Chinese tourism.
The survey didn’t give a reason for why the Chinese exaggerate the most about their holidays, but the status of being able to afford to go abroad, ensuring you keep one step ahead of the Wangses, may be a factor. Another explanation could be that the Chinese tourist is a relatively recent phenomenon who could learn a thing or two about complaining from travel-hardened European and American holiday-makers and write a review like this one, from a visitor to Tumon in Guam: “It’s a great beach, just too sandy”.
