Is it safe?
When we travel, a common question arises: Is it safe? But I wonder—safe for whom? Is it safe for me? For someone else? Who is this question actually about, and what does "safe" really mean in different contexts?
What gets under my skin is how often people make sweeping statements about the safety (or lack thereof) of specific places. Too often, these perceptions are based on stereotypes rather than real experiences. A colleague of mine recently went glamping in Saudi Arabia. She actually felt safer there than she had as a teenager on Hajj, yet she found herself wondering: Who, really, can comfortably travel here? Who feels at ease wearing an abaya for a five-star glamping experience, even if it’s affordable? Safety isn’t just about avoiding harm—it’s about fitting in, about the assumptions that others may make.
People sometimes ask me if I feel safe living in NW London or when I lived in NYC—in Harlem and Queens, respectively. The meaning behind this question feels loaded, as if safety is not just about location but about class, race, sexuality, and gender. For many, safety depends on a sense of belonging. Take Dubai, for example, which is often described as exceptionally secure city. But what about queer travelers? And what about monoethnic places—are they "safe" for those who aren’t mirrored by the culture? I remember my childhood travels in Japan with great affection; it was a special place for me, even though I stood out there in the early '90s. My sense of safety wasn’t about physical risk; it was more about acceptance.
What is it that we really seek when we talk about “safety” in travel, especially for queer people, for diasporic folks, for anyone who might be perceived as “other” in a given place? Are we afraid of being stared at, of feeling vulnerable, or even just of not understanding the language? I miss the travel stories of Anthony Bourdain, who travelled with empathy and curiosity. He never sought to flatten cultural differences or promote a simplistic "one human family" ideal. He honoured the distinctiveness of people, places, and cultures, not by erasing differences but by celebrating them. Differences challenge the mind profoundly; in improv, they teach “yes, and” as a difficult but freeing way to embrace the unknown. Travel, too, can expand us if we let it.
How do we balance this when it comes to safety in travel? The times I’ve truly felt unsafe weren’t always in foreign lands—they also happened when I was closer to home. For example, in the West Bank, on a tour of Hebron, I saw settlers casually carrying M-16s. Back in the U.S., in the American South, I’ve seen Confederate flags, billboards for arms sales, and political slogans signalling exclusion. Those symbols and the presence of weapons aren’t simply about difference; they’re assertions of who belongs and who doesn’t.
I understand that some places are statistically safe, but what I’m really interested in is shifting our focus. What if, instead of asking “Is it safe?” we asked who might not feel safe in a place—and why? What if we thought less in terms of cultural similarity or difference and more about simply observing without judgement, admiring the unique beauty and particularity of people and places?
There’s no easy answer, but maybe that’s the point. Travel forces us to rely on our senses in a spontaneous way, gauging safety instinctively, comparing the familiar with the unfamiliar. If we could approach travel in a way that honours both sameness and difference, we might unlock a more nuanced understanding of safety—one that makes space for the many ways people inhabit the world.