AIESEC in the University of Colombo premiered its highly anticipated virtual event titled “Travelify”, from 7-9 p.m last evening (10). The event was made available both via Zoom and Facebook livestream.
The event was launched under the organisation’s “Impactful Traveller” project, which focuses on travelling in the new normal. The audience in attendance was largely young volunteers from different parts of the world who plan to volunteer in Sri Lanka, and local youths interested in volunteering in other countries in the future. With this participation of local and foreign travel lovers, as well as guest speakers and famous YouTube/Instagram influencers, the event attempted to create a conversation to bring focus towards travelling in the new normal.
Happening for the 10th consecutive time, Impactful Traveller is a project based on the eighth Sustainable Development Goal – Decent Work and Economic Growth – initiated by AIESEC in Colombo Central (in the University of Colombo).
AIESEC is the world’s largest youth-led organisation advocating for youth leadership through cross-cultural exchanges. AIESEC in the University of Colombo is a part of AIESEC in Sri Lanka that is working towards realising the AIESEC goals and providing leadership opportunities to undergraduates in the University of Colombo to make a positive impact on the Sri Lankan community as well as the world.
The organisers shared that in putting together this event, they took into consideration the very real and unfortunate circumstances that have befallen our country’s economy, as during the period of the pandemic, we are currently facing one of the worst economic downturns, with tourism being among the most affected sectors.
With tourism being one of the major segments contributing to Sri Lanka’s economic growth, they shared that it is a vital challenge to bring tourism back on track, and therefore their goal via this project is to promote sustainable tourism and local industries in Sri Lanka, while promoting local culture and products.
The virtual event included two sessions, including health protocols and travelling, and the event, moderated by Sharon Mascarenhas, featured a distinguished panel of experts including Government Medical Officers’ Association (GMOA) President Dr. Anuruddha Padeniya; Sri Lanka Police Deputy Director – Administration DIG Ajith Rohana; University of Colombo Department of Community Medicine Head, Specialist in Community Medicine, and Senior Lecturer Prof. Manju Weerasinghe; Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority (SLTDA) Director for Tourism Planning, Development, and Investor Relations Unit Dr. Prasad Jayasuriya; and international travellers/content creators Chiranthana Arsakulasooriya and Nadi Haputhanthri, a husband and wife duo known as “Binario 12”.
Speaking with one of the panellists, Binario 12, who currently reside in Italy and are maintaining several travel-related content pages on Instagram and YouTube, shared their thoughts on travel in 2021.
Being in the thickest of it during the time when the pandemic hit, especially with Italy suffering quite notably during the earlier days of the pandemic, the duo shared that they were able to see firsthand how the travel industry – which was something anyone would have bet on as a sure thing – crumpled to the ground. They spoke of how they too felt the cold fear of not being able to travel, which would greatly affect their freedom of creating content.
We asked the duo to share with us their personal experience in adapting to the “new normal”, to which they said that, as we could imagine, whilst they had the freedom to go and make videos quietly pre-Covid, the situation is different now.
“When we are on a journey and we want to resume, we have to be very careful, very often we cannot stop for long in the same area; even inside the restaurants and bars, there is no possibility to stay long to make a video. In airports and bus stations there is always the same thing; certainly the rules must be respected for the safety of all. So you have to be very agile and accurate when recording,” they said, shedding light on the unique struggles experienced by content creators when capturing their footage, and how they would ordinarily opt for multiple takes to capture the optimum footage – but they are no longer afforded that luxury.
They also shared that the other main difficulty is the wearing of masks, another technical element, where they have to remove the mask to speak clearly and ensure that their audio is not distorted. Once again, this is a challenge, as they are very much aware of the risks and importance of safety, especially considering that they are travellers and are “perhaps more likely to infect others and ourselves by going from one place to another”.
The duo stated that they hope in sharing their experiences though programmes like Impactful Traveller, they are able to get the word out about responsible and sustainable traveling, “because the game changed with this pandemic situation. If we travel, we have to travel with much more responsibility. In 2021, we plan to make a lot of trips for our projects, so we hope the global situation improves.”