Tourism is all about marketing

"Welcome to (insert country)", would be the standard greeting in most countries which promotes itself as a tourism destination. Do you live in such country? Unless you are somewhere where no airline flies to or not even on any map (which I don't think any of the extreme adventurer will let you be if they even get a whiff of you), I think nearly every country is a potential tourism destination.

But, in Asia, where every country tries to be THE tourism destination, including mine, which goes by the name of Malaysia, I sometimes wonder why are we being passed over for countries like Thailand, Vietnam and Indonesia. 

One of the problem that I can see is the value of things in those countries and ours. As Malaysians, when we go to those said countries (and a few others around ASEAN or even Asia), the value of our money is more than theirs. You can say that we have a better standard of living and we are paying for it by not having cheap things available to us anymore. But, in contrast, we are still have cheap travel options.

So, it must be that they have better service or better grasp in English language? Fat chance. I just came back from Thailand, where it is so famous that rarely will you not find a Thai restaurant in any one of the European countries in the world. The Thai province I went to is so famous among Eurasian people that I couldn't find any Malaysian. I talk to them in English and in every 10 persons, only one will speak proper English. You actually have to speak using sign languages just to get the message across (my wife actually took pictures of signs which used laughable English, and they are everywhere).

Their service? I have been to islands around Malaysia too and have stayed from supposed 5 stars hotels to budget accommodations. Nearly 80% of the places I stayed in Malaysia have better trained staff and better facilities (I know, this may surprised a lot of Malaysians who always never think anything good about the service industry in Malaysia).

And if it is about the view or the unexplored or the activities, if you are Europeans or Americans, we have whatever Thailand or Indonesia (except the volcanoes) or Vietnam or Laos has to offer. For me, I do have places still to explore either in Malaysia or in ASEAN countries and is guilty of trying to go places near enough fly just a bit but far away enough to not meet any Malaysians.

So, I think, the best explanation is the marketing of our destinations. Just that. As simple as that....

We are bad in doing it and we maybe too complacent in our promotion. Or we are just too expensive...

Whatever it is, it is NOT the language barrier or the service. Those are the same nearly everywhere in Asian countries and whatever you call these foreigners either as farang, mat salleh, gwailo or whatever, they do bring those tourism money which is always welcomed....