How Tourism Has Changed for Tourists and Their Guides

Saturday––Jeff

I’ve been blessed in my forty years in Greece to have many friends involved in the tourist hospitality business. By that I mean hotels, restaurants, shops, transportation and personal services. When it comes to capturing a sense of where tourism is-–and possibly headed–– at the top my “likely most knowledgeable” list are Greece’s professional tour guides. 

Day in and day out they lead disparate arrays of tourists––made up of different nationalities, education, physical capabilities, and interests––along paths they’ve guided thousands before them.  Yet, these guides still manage to keep everything fresh. In no small measure because their experience has given them incredible insight into what will likely satisfy their groups’ independent interests and innocent peccadillos.

Yesterday, I read an interview conducted by Ekathimeri Editor-in-Chief of Cultural News Sakis Ioannidis with professional tour guide Konstantinos Sfikas, titled “Tourists don’t want museums anymore, just fun, fun, fun”

Chief Editor Sakis Ioannidis

In it, Mr. Sfikas talks about how and why the experience of exploring a new destination has changed for both tourists and their guides.  Here is that thoughtful interview.  I loved it.

Professional Tour Guide Konstantinos Sfikas

Konstantinos Sfikas found himself in the limelight recently as the guide who took movie stars Juliette Binoche and Ralph Fiennes on a tour of Thessaloniki during their appearance at the northern port city’s annual film festival last November. He took them to the historic quarter of Ano Poli and the Rotonda, as well as to a service at the Church of Agios Dimitrios, Thessaloniki’s patron saint. But Sfikas also took Binoche to visit the Monastery of Saint John the Baptist on the outskirts of Thessaloniki, which is home to the tomb of the Greek Orthodox Saint Paisios. The French actress’ reference to the visit on the festival stage the day after prompted a storm of commentary on social media and beyond.

“I really don’t understand people’s reactions sometimes. She converted to Orthodoxy and has every right to take a pilgrimage to the saint’s grave, which she waited three hours to see. We live in a democracy,” comments Sfikas over breakfast at the Acropolis Museum during a recent lightning visit to Athens.

Sfikas is discreet when talking about the celebrities he’s taken on tours, including Oliver Stone, William Dafoe, John Sayles, Chris Cooper and Alexander Payne. “My favorite, by far, was John Malkovich,” he admits to Kathimerini, looking back on a memorable incident.

“I’d heard from a colleague that Malkovich drinks three cappuccinos at a time, so when we sat down for some refreshment at the Museum of Byzantine Culture and I placed the three coffees in front of him, unasked; he smiled for the first time on the tour and asked five questions about history and architecture. They were very good questions. He displayed a kind of interest that we rarely see in tourists,” says Sfikas.

In fact, many of the foreign visitors he guides around Athens confuse the Acropolis Museum with the National Archaeological Museum. “Athens’ heart may beat here, but the flagship of all our museums is on Patission Street, even if it is only rarely included on group itineraries,” he says.

The omission of the country’s most important archaeological museum points to a growing trend in tourism, he explains. “Everything is simplified. The demanding programs we had up until just a few years ago are being changed because people want less. Americans, for example, want to have ‘fun, fun, fun’ and then maybe see a couple of sights. And everything needs to be done fast.”

Sfikas says that in the past, tourists coming to Greece were well-informed about its ancient monuments and museums. “Now, most of them are more informed about where to take the best photo. If you don’t show them where the three blue domes in Santorini are for their photos, it’s as if they never went,” he says, referring to a specific spot in the picturesque town of Oia that’s a favorite among snap-happy tourists.

“They go crazy when I tell them there’s a fourth dome,” he adds.

Is he at all concerned that people can find the domes and anything else they want with a simple mobile app and may not need his services?

“Not at all. Multimedia can only provide a small part of what a tour guide offers. A guide will answer every question you have – your phone won’t. A tourist might not remember a monument they saw after leaving, but they will remember the impression their guide made on them.”

The tour guide’s greatest curse is the “indifferent tourist,” he says, going on to talk about how much he enjoys his work and the contact with his clients.

“But once the season is over, I want to curl up at home or go on a long trip – and not speak to a single soul.”

According to the accredited guide, tourism did anything but slump as a result of the Covid pandemic. “People cannot seem to get enough of traveling,” he says. Critics even say that Greece has become saturated, but surely this is good news for a tour guide, right?

“I think that overtourism is bad for Greece. There’s no point in charging a passenger a few euros if they want to leave the cruise ship. They’re here. You can’t say, ‘Don’t get off at Mykonos or Santorini, or you’ll have to pay.’ They’ll pay. It’s a revenue-raising measure only. Cruise ships need to be scheduled to arrive at regular intervals, not seven of them at the same time,” he comments on one of the biggest challenges facing the more popular Aegean islands.

“We can’t take so many people; we don’t have the infrastructure. We can’t take so many swimming pools; we don’t have the water. We can’t take having to walk for half an hour to cover a distance of 200 meters on an island.”

We watch people climb up the Sacred Rock to the Parthenon across the way. It’s chilly and they seem to be enjoying the walk in the sun. But what about in the summer, when daytime highs can hit 40 degrees Celsius?

“We either go at 8 a.m. and leave at 9.30 a.m. or later, in the early evening,” says Sfikas, adding that the introduction of slots has helped regulate traffic at the popular archaeological site. “Things are very reasonable right now. We’ll see how it goes in the summer.”

Sfikas, whose parents came from Kozani and Olympus in northern Greece, had nothing to do with the tourism sector until the age of 40. “I had been in banking for 20 years,” he says. This changed with a voluntary redundancy and a visit to the archaeological site of Aigai, which prompted him to enroll at a state guide school.

Now aged 65, he has experience and know-how, taking discerning tourists across Greece’s mountains and seas – occasionally even taking them underground. “I’ve already conducted four tours of the Thessaloniki metro and have more booked,” he tells Kathimerini. “People loved what they saw. We fought hard so that the ancient artifacts would be kept in situ, but now it is what it is. We accept the situation and move on.”

As we wrap up our working breakfast with a slice of almond cake, we ask Sfikas what his impressions are of Greek tourists. Do they pass muster?

“Let’s just say they’re demanding,” he laughs. “We’re not the best tourists and we often have the attitude that we own the guide and don’t care if there are other people with us.”

––Jeff

Jeff’s upcoming events

2025

All Live Events

 

September 3 – 7 | Bouchercon 2025 | New Orleans, LA
Friday, September 5, 4:00-4:45 p.m.
New Orleans Marriott—La Galeries 5-6
Panelist, “Tips and Tricks for Keeping a Series Fresh,” with Anne Cleeland, Marcy McCreary, Charles Todd, Tessa Wegert, and Moderator Deborah Dobbs

Saturday, September 6, 10:30-11:25 a.m.
New Orleans Marriott—La Galerie 3
Panelist, “No Passport Required: International Mysteries and Thrillers,” with Barbara Gayle Austin, Cara Black, Joseph Finder, J.L. Hancock, and Moderator Mark Ellis

 

Wednesday, September 17, 6:30 p.m.
Greek National Tourist Organization
Presentation of the literary work of Jeffrey Siger
Ilias Lalaounis Jewelry Museum
Kallisperi 12, Acropolis