Definitely Not Cambodia
“This is just like Cambodia,” one travel writer said to her photographer friend.
Really?
I was traveling with them and a few other writers on a press trip in Nicaragua. We were slowly boating up a narrow estuary lined with mangrove trees. Great egrets and tiger herons combed the banks. Whenever the trees parted, we could see silhouettes of the volcanoes that dominate any Nicaragua skyline.
We had just come upon a huddle of thatched-roof shelters, three tethered pangas, and some children playing in the brackish water when the writer spoke.
Just like Cambodia? No! This was absolutely Nicaragua.
Here’s a tip for you as a writer, whether you cover destinations or not: Be where you are—nowhere else. And be inquisitive. Discover what is definitive and particular to any place or situation. Because as soon as you decide that one place, person, or thing is just the same as another, you’ve stepped off the path of discovery. You’ve stopped asking questions. You think you know something. But all you’ve accomplished is a bit of place-dropping that speaks, “I’ve been somewhere you haven’t been.” Who cares?
It’s lazy writing to say any place reminds you of anywhere else. But worse, once you make that decision, you’ve shut off the flow of curiosity that is your lifeblood as a writer.
You owe it to your readers to dive deeper than “This is just like” anything else. It isn’t.
