#do we really think people (or other Nations) wouldn't use that vulnerability to gain something from them

[nordickies]

The thought of “young Nations desperately wanting answers about their existence, find a purpose and a place/community to belong to" makes me go insane every time I think about it

[xtruss]

Restrictions Leave US Travelers ‘High and Dry’

— Stacey Lastoe, CNN • Updated 27th June 2020

(CNN) — In downtown Buffalo, New York, crossing the border into Ontario, Canada, used to be as easy as driving one mile across the Peace Bridge over the Niagara River. But that's now a forbidden route.

In the coronavirus era, New York residents and out-of-state road trippers aren't allowed to cross the border for leisure travel.

US citizens have been shut out of their neighboring country to the north and a slew of nations around the world. The latest travel news affecting Americans: The European Union is considering blocking travelers from areas with severe Covid-19 outbreaks after it opens it borders on July 1.

Since the United States has more confirmed coronavirus cases than anywhere else in the world, with numbers increasing in some states each day, US travelers are unlikely to be allowed in any time soon.

"The US's chances are close to zero," an EU diplomat told CNN. "With their infection rates ... not even they can believe in that possibility."

As long as the US-Canada border remains closed, visiting Niagara Falls in Ontario won't be possible for US citizens. (LARS HAGBERG/AFP/AFP/Getty Images)

Although potential travel bubbles are being discussed all over the world -- Fiji is the latest in talks to join one with Australia and New Zealand -- the United States has yet to form or join a bubble.

Where does this new world order leave US citizens with a penchant for travel?

Nostalgic for the pre-Covid days when a US passport promised access to much of the world? Anxious of how they'll be perceived -- and received -- by foreign countries when restrictions are eventually loosened?

The future of travel for Americans, and whether they'll be welcome again as tourists, is not clear; in many ways, it's a moot point for as long as travel to certain regions is prohibited.

Uninvited

As many Americans eschew air travel and instead take to the road, they won't be taking the road into Canada. Indeed, travel restrictions for US passport holders at this time far outnumbers the travel possibilities.

And for many people, that's just how it should be.

A trip through Canada is unlikely to be a summer vacation option for Americans while the Covid-19 outbreak in the US continues to swell. )Courtesy Via Rail Canada)

Colleen Friesen, who lives in a small resort town in British Columbia, hopes the US-Canadian border stays closed.

"The majority of Canadians are strongly against allowing Americans into the country due to the US's rampant infection rate. Although some states seem to be managing the pandemic, when we see news of Oklahoma allowing an indoor rally, we just shake our collective heads," Friesen tells CNN Travel via email.

Stacey McKenna, who is based in Colorado, isn't ready to think about international travel of any kind right now, though she stipulates that it's partially because the places on her radar "are extremely vulnerable economically and geographically," and she wouldn't be willing to risk exposing anyone.

"I think if I reach a place where I feel international (or even air) travel would be appropriate, then I'll start asking myself if I think I'd be welcome."

For New York-based travel writer Juliet Izon, who canceled a summer vacation in Italy months ago when there was still a glimmer of hope that things might resume, seeing where the United States is compared with other countries is disheartening and depressing.

Izon believes she'll take the trip to Italy one day but says, "I wouldn't be surprised if in certain countries if they don't allow Americans in for a while or a really strict quarantine for years to come," adding that the United States' handling of Covid-19 was likely to be "another black mark against us."

The other? The state of US politics.

Friesen, who says she appreciates her country's politicians taking a backseat to the scientific and medical community, is scared of the way the virus in the United States "has become politicized."

France is moving through stages of reopening, but US citizens are not yet on the list of countries who can visit. (BERTRAND GUAY/AFP via Getty Images)

But one EU diplomat ,who spoke to CNN earlier in the week on condition of anonymity, calls the US-EU travel decision a very sensitive issue and insists "it is only ever about health."

"For sure, you can see not being on the list as something political, when one country is allowed in and another is not, but this is a misrepresentation of what we are doing. We are looking to open our borders, this is a positive step."

In spite of this statement and the EU diplomat's insistence that "we want people to come," the much-changed travel landscape has some people concerned.

"Rather than thinking about the near future of travel, I've been pondering how all of this will affect xenophobia more generally," says McKenna.

A Holistic Experience

Dennis Geronimus, New York University art history associate professor and chair, has historically combined business and leisure travel, often to Italy. He is not personally concerned about how he'll be received when he travels internationally again -- and he's someone who'll likely be able to travel on certain foreign soils well before other Americans.

This is in large part because of the nature of his travel. Geronimus is typically hosted by international colleagues and admits that it is "different than going on vacation somewhere not knowing anyone and then just diving into the culture and going to see the sites and seeing other foreigners at the sites as well."

At this time, American travelers can't go to Italy and cities such as Rome (above), at least not for pure leisure travel. (ALBERTO PIZZOLI/AFP via Getty Images)

There are steps Geronimus could take now to potentially be granted access forbidden to US leisure travelers, though he'd still be subject to the quarantine.

In any event, though he'd like to see the Raphael exhibition in Rome and collaborate with colleagues in Italy, he's not planning a trip to the region anytime soon.

It might be deemed essential, but Geronimus doesn't see it as essential enough. Instead, the professor would prefer to focus on the measures needed to resume on-site classes at NYU this fall.

Likewise, McKenna, whose background is in medical anthropology and public health, is thinking about other, bigger things: "I'll be honest. I haven't even gotten to the question of whether I think I would feel welcome as an American" since international travel is just not appropriate right now.

Says US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, "We've been working with countries all across the world, including our friends in Europe and the EU proper to determine how it is we can best safely reopen international travel. It's important for the United States to get Europeans the capacity to travel back to the United States."

Safety First

It's not about Americans, per se, says New Zealander Elen Turner, though it's hard to ignore the restrictions impacting them along with the number of confirmed Covid deaths and cases.

"I think once the borders reopen properly, New Zealanders will be as welcoming of Americans as they will be with any other travelers," Turner says.

But Friesen, who is troubled by the United States' handling of the pandemic, says, "Given the push back on the pandemic protocols we've seen in the US, we just don't believe that Americans will do the right thing."

As stories of Americans refusing to wear masks -- not even on an airplane in at least one case -- and not practicing social distancing surface, Friesen's skepticism may be justifiable.

While New Zealand may form a travel bubble with Australia, it's unlikely Americans will be allowed in any time soon. (Courtesy Shutterstock)

However, for so many people CNN Travel spoke with, the health and safety of others -- and doing what's right -- is paramount.

Chicago-based photographer and writer Joshua Mellin says: "I think to travel internationally for leisure right now demonstrates a total lack of care, you deserve whatever stares you get."

Mellin adds: "I'm personally of the mind we're all global citizens, but there's still a reality you're not entitled access to a foreign country, you're granted entry."

When it comes to granting foreigners entry, Turner would be comfortable taking cues from the New Zealand government. Right now, returning New Zealand citizens must quarantine for two weeks upon arrival, and no one else is allowed in.

If, down the line, the quarantine was applied to all visitors to New Zealand, what then?

"So if that was to be extended to all arrivals then I think New Zealanders would be fine with that because generally, our government has handled the pandemic well and there's a high degree of trust in them," Turner says.

She adds, however, that she doesn't see this happening, does not envision a New Zealand opening itself up to foreigners until quarantine is no longer necessary.

The idea of a pre-holiday quarantine is the subject of scrutiny anyway.

Last month, when the concept was gaining steam, Alison Hickey, president of Kensington Tours, told CNN Travel "we would not recommend traveling to a destination that has implemented a 14-day self-quarantine requirement."

'We're Reopening'

While enforced quarantines will deter many a traveler, other regions with no quarantines in effect might entice them.

From Mexico and the Caribbean to Turkey, tourist spots around the world are opening back up and encouraging visitors to boot.

US travelers can fly to Mexico, but for many, the risks aren't worth it. Pictured: Parroquia de San Miguell Arcángel in San Miguel de Allende, Guanajuato. (Shutterstock)

Whether hotel promotions or upgrades or relaxed policies on cancellation, the sweet chorus of "we are opening" could potentially jump start what has been a very dark period in the tourism sector.

But just because The Maldives, a luxury destination, is ready to welcome back all visitors with no restrictions (there are also no visa requirements or additional fees), how many US citizens are ready to go?

For many of the US travelers that CNN Travel spoke to for this story, being welcomed or feeling welcome in another country is beside the point.

The danger of exposure and of being exposed looms. And then there's the fear of being stuck somewhere far away.

Elizabeth Lavis, who is originally from upstate New York, found herself scrambling to get out of Vietnam in March amid the outbreak and sudden stringent travel restrictions. That ordeal and what's transpired with the coronavirus since have made Lavis reluctant to go far away from home for the foreseeable future.

California-based writer Melanie Haikan would like to go to Costa Rica at some point and is only eyeing places that are eager for visitors. (Nell Lewis)

California resident Melanie Haiken expresses a desire to help struggling economies as a tourist and is already thinking about her future travels, which include places not so close to home: "As to international travel, I would be ready to travel again in August, but would want to go places that are eager for visitors. I have my eye on Guatemala and Costa Rica, Turkey and Jordan, Scotland, Estonia, and a few other places that seem likely candidates based both on safety and how much their economies depend on tourism."

Turkey, it would seem, is a likely candidate. On June 19, Turkish Airlines relaunched two North American routes to Istanbul with two others (Miami and Los Angeles) following on June 22 and 24 respectively. By late July, three additional US hubs will be operating flights to Turkey.

Any EU travel ban could change things, but as of June 23, when CNN spoke to Connecticut-based Caryn B. Davis about her upcoming trip to the Azores in Portugal, the travel journalist said she is still planning on going, hopefully in the next six weeks.

Pompeo expressed the importance of the economy in travel between the US and the EU, saying "It's important for the United States to get Europeans the capacity to travel back to the United States. It's important, very important for the Europeans to fully reconnect with the American economy as well."

But until safety concerns can be adequately addressed, Mellin doesn't think anyone, US citizen or not, should be going anywhere.

"There's a responsibility of showing respect for other people and places as a traveler that starts at home and is inherently broken by visiting another country during a global pandemic."

But in fact, international travel may resume sooner rather than later in some currently off-limits places. "I'm confident in the coming weeks we'll figure that out as between not only the United States and the EU, but the United States and other parts of the world, too," Pompeo said.

As to what it'll be like?

"I think if anything, when we do travel, it's certainly my hope that we bring that sense of, I guess, empathy to wherever we're going ... ," Geronimus says.

— CNN's James Frater, Michael Conte and Luke McGee contributed reporting to this story.

[the-maxrecords-blog]

where the wild things went

Vice: Hello Max. This is your first film in five years. What on earth have you been doing with your time?

Max: Just living, you know? Living, going to school, getting done with school.

Vice: Did you ever worry, "Hang on, what if I've forgotten how to act"?

Max: I didn't really think about it until the first day or two shooting then I was like, "What the fuck am I doing here?". For the first couple of days the learning curve was pretty steep again.

Vice: How does one even go about preparing to play a sociopath? Presumably it wasn't method acting.

Max: I kind of feel like there is no such thing as acting that isn't method to some degree because if you're not actually experiencing it, then you're a fucking liar. I was talking with Billy [O'Brien - director] about it and - I forget the word that he keeps using - but it's an intuitive process. You just kind of feel it out, you know? I was pretty miserable while we were shooting, just because you're in a super dark brain space all day. Especially living in a place like Minnesota where we were shooting, six days a week. You don't get the opportunity to turn it off, you know? And that's great as far as the actual creative process goes but it sucks as far as trying to be a person.

Vice: Have you ever done a psychopath test?

Max: I don't think so.

Vice: Would you like to do one?

Max: Yeah, let's do it! Is it legit or is it some Facebook nonsense?

Vice: Oh, Facebook nonsense probably.

Max: So you're not licensed?

Vice: We're not unlicensed.

Max: I'm pretty sure it's an either-or thing.

Vice: So there are eight statements. You either agree or disagree. First one: "You rarely catch me making any plans. I'm far too spontaneous".

Max: Yeah, absolutely.

Vice: "If I got a better offer, I wouldn't mind cancelling longstanding plans".

Max: Yeah, that's probably true.

Vice: "It would be fun to drive fast cars, ride rollercoasters or go skydiving".

Max: I've been skydiving. Fast cars are fun. I don't get the appeal of rollercoasters. I guess I haven't really done a true roller coaster. It feels artificial.

Vice: Shall we disagree?

Max: No, let's agree.

Vice: Alright. "I think it's okay to step over other people to achieve my ambitions".

Max: I don't know. I don't think you necessarily need to it. I can't think of many situations that I've been in where that's necessary, where there isn't some other course of action you could take. Let's disagree.

Vice: Do you have an ambition?

Max: In the broader context of my life, I just want to gain skills. Recently I was doing an outdoor programme back in the States through this thing called NOLS [National Outdoor Leadership School], so I was off doing that for a couple of months. Getting better at being outdoors and learning how the natural world works. And I love playing music so getting better at that. Just learning to be a better, more competent person. Trying to not be a dick.

Vice: It's a good motto. Okay: "I'm very persuasive and getting people to get what I want is a real talent of mine".

Max: Agree! I think I'm pretty good at that. I've been manipulating my parents for years.

Vice: The perks of being a child star... What was that whole experience like?

Max: Really awful! Especially for children, the film world is just terrible. You can't grow up in that world and still have a connection to reality. At least if you're, like, really in it. Especially the poor folks out there who have stage parents. It's just so sheltered. The creative aspect of acting is one of the more amazing things that I've gotten to experience but everything outside of that is pretty bizarre.

Vice: Was it enough to make you think you might not want to do it anymore?

Max: I think, probably, yeah. Especially once Where the Wild Things Are came out. And that was my first real acting role too. Being thrown in the deep end as a young, pretty vulnerable person. And then you have an experience like that and there's all this stigma around it, back in the "real world". I went to the same school since I was in second grade, through most of high school, and I knew all these kids and they were my friends before and after but there was, coming back, this weird stigma, these weird assumptions that if you're in a film, you're an asshole and you don't exist in a grounded real world way.

Vice: What are your memories of working on that film?

Max: It was really important to Spike that the set was conducive to a child. So we had a million kids on set. All the crew was kind of invited to bring their families. And as a way to kind of understand the vibe that Spike wanted to cultivate, there was always music on set. The Smiths, Cemetery Gates and Big Mouth Strikes Again, all those songs. I have really wonderful nine-year-old memories of romping around on set and that music playing.

Vice: How does one move past an experience like that and into the world of adult acting?

Max: I think you just grow up and learn to be a person. I think one of the biggest learning curves for me, as a result of those experiences and then applying that to the real world, was that it took me a long time to learn to take a compliment. From twelve through to however old, you just kind of shut down. There's this assumption of an agenda. But you grow up and you learn to be a person and you temper the experiences of working in the film world with what people are actually like and you balance that.

Vice: Is there one thing you know now that you wish you knew then?

Max: No, I don't think so. I am the person I am as a result of a lot of those experiences and I love the people that I met and especially those people that I have experiences with. It is what it is. Can't change the past!

Vice: Okay: "My ability to make quick decisions means that I would suit a dangerous job".

Max: [Takes long time to decide answer] I dunno... The idea of being a smokejumper appeals to me.

Vice: What's a smokejumper?

Max: It's a term for the folks in the US that are forest firefighters and jump out of airplanes. That appeals to me.

Vice: What do you think you'd be doing if you weren't acting?

Max: Working in outdoor education probably. Working with kids or being in the outdoors. Or both.

Vice: Do you have a desire to keep acting?

Max: Yeah. I mean, I like doing it and I think creatively it's really cool and the people you get the opportunities to work with are often really wonderful people. It allows me to do other things in my own life. My parents have kind of helped me gain this perspective of it, but I think it's best for me to view it as a hobby. I like acting but I don't think it's healthy to do films back to back.

Vice: What was it about this script?

Max: I love Billy and I love Nick Ryan, the producer. I love Robbie Ryan, our cinematographer and I think, aesthetically, just the, Midwest middle America vibe, that's really cool. And the humour of the script. It's genuine and it has real emotion embedded in it but it's funny! That Fargo humour really appeals to me.

Vice: Do you have a favourite movie?

Max: It changes periodically, of course. Birdman has been one of my favourite films ever. It came out a couple of years ago and I've watched it half a dozen times. The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover. I rewatched that pretty recently and remembered how good it was. People keep talking to me about Donnie Darko in relation to this film and I like that one quite a bit.

Vice:"When others are crumbling under pressure, I'm usually the one with a cool head". Agree or disagree?

Max: Yes. I think so.

Vice: When was was the last time you lost your cool?

Max: I've been working on that skill and I think I'm getting pretty good at it. It's been awhile since I've been genuinely, deeply upset about something. One of my favourite things in the world is this scar right here [shows us a fairly impressive scar on his knuckle]. I got it punching walls. It was like the perfect teenage angst motivation. The first time, I was really upset in my house because I had read something about the use of American drone warfare and just how upsetting it was and how a bunch of civilians had just been murdered somewhere in the world. And then the second time was me being upsetting at my parents.

Vice: Alright, last one: "I'm rarely to blame for things going wrong, it's usually the fault of the people around me".

Max: I mean, yeah. But I'll disagree.

Vice: Okay, let's see your results… You're 61% psychopath! "Though your conscience is in the right place, you have a pragmatic streak and generally aren't afraid to do your own dirty work".

Max: I'll take that.

Vice: There's more! "You're no shrinking violet but you're no daredevil either. You generally have a little trouble seeing things from other people's perspectives, but at the same time you're no pushover. Everything in moderation, including moderation, might sum up your approach to life".

Max: I like that. I'll take it!

Credits: Vice.com

Source: https://i-d.vice.com/en_gb/topic/max-records