Disrespectful Tourists

I'm not sure if you guys had seen this already but apparently some time back, a US vlogger called Logan Paul made a video about his trip in Japan. Among the places he visited was a forest called Aokigahara (青木ヶ原) aka Sea of Trees or what's popularly known as Suicide Forest where he came across a suicide victim. He then uploaded the video onto his channel, but soon took it down due to the immense backlash.

Logan Paul in a screenshot taken from his deleted video

In case you are not up to speed on the news, here are a few news articles you can check out:

1. YouTuber Logan Paul apologizes for filming suicide victim, says ‘I didn’t do it for views’
2. Suicide prevention group slams YouTube celebrity Logan Paul over controversial video
3. YouTube punishes Logan Paul over Japan suicide video
4. YouTube star Logan Paul apologises for film of man's body in Japan

Now, suicide is no joking matter but apparently this man saw fit to make light of the matter and uploaded it online. And that's not all, on top of this particular video, the other parts of his trip in Japan on video were just as cringe-worthy. You can watch a super cut here where he even took off his pants in the middle of the streets in Tokyo and threw a Pokémon ball at random passers-by including a Japanese policeman. >.<

I'm sure you've seen or heard of disgraceful behaviours but this really takes the cake for me. Whether you are a tourist or frequent traveller, the most important thing to do is to respect the place you are visiting and NOT pull stunts like this for the sake of eyeballs. He's not alone either. You have American tourists who bared their butts at a Buddhist Temple in Thailand, Chinese tourists who shake, kick and climb trees to create cherry blossom 'rain' for photographs etc. Seems like common sense is not so common after all.

So how do you become a respectful tourist? Well, Tailwind by Hipmunk has a rather insightful article on this so I'd suggest you have a read. In other words? Always remember to treat someone else's 'home' with the sincerity and respect that you want others to treat you with and people will return the same favour.

Oh ya, this reminds me of a movie I recently watched. You can catch it on Netflix but you can watch the trailer below. =x