Technology makes us less observant

By Amir Sidharta

JAKARTA (JP): Tourist attractions are dominated by tourists with video cameras glued to one eye. They are obsessed with the idea that they have to document every event they see. But wait a minute. They are so busy capturing the event on video, they no longer have the chance to see anything.

With the advent of cameras and video cameras, people use their own eyes less and less. Whenever I visit ancient sites in Bali, I have often wished that I lived in a period when photography was not readily available. How wonderful to be able to work like W.O.J. Nieuwenkampf, who cycled around Bali to draw ancient sites in the beginning of the century, instead taking a simple snapshot. I wish I could draw them because drawing forces you to carefully observe the environment.

When traveling in New Mexico, I encountered one of the most beautiful sites in the world. There, videotaping, photography, and even rendering, are strictly prohibited. The only way you are allowed to record the site is in your memory. Prohibited from photographing or drawing the site, I was forced to take a good look and meticulously observe the elements of the landscape. In due respect to the site and its tribal restrictions, I will not describe the site, but it is still amazingly vivid in my memory.

The reason for the stringent tribal restrictions that prohibit viewers from visually recording the site in New Mexico is unclear. Some predict that the tribe did not want the soul of the site to be stolen by transformation into visual material.

Whatever the reason, the restriction reminded me that the stress we place on the importance of high-tech visual documentation has caused us to be incredibly unobservant and even insensitive towards our surroundings.

Some fanatics of documentation will do whatever they have to get the picture, even at the cost of other tourists. At the Music in Nature festival in Bali last year, a man obnoxiously went up very close to the elderly dancer Made Cenik in order to videotape her, preventing others from enjoying the delightful performance. The man, who claimed he was a journalist, got angry when we tried to ask him to move back a little. He was adamant that what he was doing was extremely important.

Perhaps what he was doing was important, but for whom? Visitors could not enjoy the show. Instead of seeing the exuberant dance of the master, we saw this burly man videotaping her. The man himself must have enjoyed the show even less. The entire show was wasted in the name of documentation.

I am sure that if the man had taken time off from his video camera and really watched the show, he would have been more sensitive toward those around him. This would have enabled everyone, including himself, to enjoy the show.

Next time you travel, consider not taking your handycam, your camera, or even your sketch book. Absorb the site and truly experience the place, and let others do the same in peace.