9 Cultural Travel Experiences To Tick Off While Traveling

It’s understandable that when you travel to a new place, you don’t want to skip the main attractions. At least, I am not one to miss all the touristy stuff. I don’t mind being labelled a tourist, because hey, I am one! But from my days on the road, I have also gathered a list of other things I wouldn’t want to miss while travelling; after I am done taking selfies in front of the city’s landmarks: all the cultural travel experience.

9 Cultural Travel Experiences To Tick Off While Traveling

Visit the local market

If you want an authentic cultural travel experience in a new city, visit the local market. Here, you get to see how the locals interact, learn the traditional norms, and score local delicacies to try or take home with you. There is no sugar coating on the local market. It’s the real deal.

The local market is the city’s cultural centre. A market visit at times includes the fishy smells, price haggling aunties, and crumpled bills of the local currency; it is not for the faint-hearted, but the reward is well worth it.

Also, with all those colours, it’s a golden photo op! Bring your camera and snap away. Just make sure you buy something from a shop where you took twenty pictures.

Eat traditional food

Every country has its own delicacy food. It’s usually been mentioned a gazillion times in the media, be it Pad Thai in Thailand, or Schnitzel in Austria. Most probably you will encounter these foods, even without trying, when you travel. I suggest you try the lesser-known dishes, or what is generally considered traditional food, like Appam in Kerala, or Khmer Bor Bor porridge in Cambodia.

Those are some things you might miss if you stay in the International hotel chains, where you are served either Continental or English food. Eat Western food when you visit the USA, otherwise, skip it, and head out to the nearby local restaurant for some good old traditional food.

Hit up the drugstore

The drugstore is where I shamelessly stock up on my souvenirs in many countries, from the Paris Pharmacy to Japan Lawson. Because, hey, who wouldn’t want a snail face mask or a green tea KitKat? Your friends will love you more for getting them Argan oil or beeswax hand cream than a weird trinket that will just collect dust on their table.

This is also the best time for you to try the local products, which is why I never bring toiletries when I travel, I stock up on the soap, shampoo, face wash, tissues, and candies from the local stores. If I really like something, I will bring another pack home, or else I will just leave it there.

Stay in an Airbnb

Aside to the breakfast, do you know what else I dislike about chained hotels? Everything! It’s the most boring way to spend precious travelling hours. If I craved similarity, I would have stayed in my parents’ house, instead of a big chunk of my salary for a plane ticket. The solution? Airbnb, or if you are on a budget, Couchsurfing.

You get to live and experience everything as a local, you can do anything there you would at a hotel and much more, except maybe stalking your neighbour. Instead of skyscrapers, you get to wake up to the view of dusty old buildings; instead of limited room service options, you can choose whatever you want from the convenience store downstairs. It takes your travel to another world, doesn’t it?

Make and meet local friends

Seeing a new place with a local friend (paid tour guide doesn’t count) is a whole different experience. You get to skip the unnecessary parts with the added satisfaction of knowing that even the locals don’t like them, and instead, get to go the hole in the wall places.

The reason I love Hong Kong so much is because of a local friend of a friend, who was nice enough to take me to all the, not on the map places.

Another way is to hit up your social media accounts and ask people; friends, local bloggers, and other travel junkies to hang out with you at your new destination. If your online personality doesn’t come across as too crazy, and they are free, they might want to spend some time with you. Let them lead the way, and be sure to return the favour someday.

Mingle with the after office hours crowd

If you don’t have any local friends, make some! Or at least mingle with them after office hours, because some of them, at least the fun ones, usually hang out in places. Most won’t be tourist places, but still might be really happening. You can get seriously good food topped with cultural travel fun if you keep your radar up. Google it or use your foursquare for starters.

I remember a small bar in Roppongi where the yuppies hang out. Them with their suits, and me with my silliness, but still the atmosphere was great. There were even a couple of acceptance nods! If they welcome you, it might help you in the romance department as well.

Say Hello to strangers

Finally, something, which is completely the opposite of what locals typically do, for an authentic cultural travel experience befriend the strangers you meet on the road. Your fellow travellers, coffee baristas, and even the people you go touring with.

The world is filled with amazing people, admittedly, some are creepy, so just weed them out, and be friends with the rest.

It can be a simple hello, or a short lunch in between your travels; you never know what will become of it. I honestly can say my life has become richer from the people I met on the road.

Take a peek outside before sunrise or after midnight

You know how your own city looks at 3 PM and 3 AM, but do you know what the city you visit looks like after hours? How’s the sky, who is in the crowd, and what is the vibe?

This might be a little weird, it definitely takes extra effort, but if you can, you should see how the place you travel to, which you paid an arm and a leg to see, looks late night at or at dawn. Especially if you are visiting for more than a few days. Trust me, it’s a whole different feeling, a 2 for the price of 1 experience. I walked around Phi Phi Island, the party island of Thailand at dawn when the sellers or boat guys were not there yet. It’s like I was in a different world altogether.

Try the local beer

If I had a bottle for each time I heard someone say they want to try the local beer while travelling, I’d still be drunk right now. Okay, that’s a little exaggeration. My point is, I have heard it enough that I feel like shushing them, shushing them bad. But today, I am here to tell you that yes; you really should try the local beer, because most of them are really good; it’s just, don’t stop there.

You should also try another local drink or snacks. Drinking Soju on a particularly cold night in Korea was good, but it was nothing compared to the delicious pumpkin tea latte I had the next morning, which helped to nurse the hangover.

If you must visit Starbucks for an afternoon fix, don’t order your normal triple grande, hot decaf triple five-pump vanilla non-fat, no foam whipped cream, extra hot extra caramel upside-down caramel macchiato (that is an actual drink available in Starbucks) but instead, choose their local version, like peach blossom tea latte in China. Sipping it was a life-changing moment for me.

Otherwise, try microwavable food, chips, and even bottled drinks. The easiest place to find it? The neighbourhood supermarket.

See how I started at the market and ended up back at the market too? Sneaky, eh? Wait, that’s not the end.

My two words of cultural travel advice is to GO LOCAL!

Don’t miss out on living like a local when you get the chance while you are travelling.

You are still allowed to see the top ten must-visit places, even Instagram the clichéd tourist picture, but after that, go hang out with the locals. Who knows, if you are lucky, it might be the start of a lifetime friendship, a holiday romance, or an epic story of that time when you almost got killed by the crazy psycho you met on the road.

What is the one thing you don’t want to miss while travelling?