Tourist guide report(导游实习报告)

TOURIST GUIDE REPORT PROBLEMS IN TOURISM AND MY SUGGESTIONS
BY
XXX
CLASS: 13010302
NUMBER: 13
FOREIGN LANGUAGE INSTITUTE
XX UNIVERSITY
MAY XX, 20XX
Problems in Tourism and My Suggestions
In order to extend our job opportunities, our institute gave us two weeks’ time to have a practice about tourist guide from May 15 to May 26. During these two weeks, although I felt a little tired, it is still valuable because I learnt much about tourism, which I couldn’t get from class.
The practice included two parts, and each part last one week. At the beginning of the first week, the famous tourist guide and teacher Miss Xi Yueting gave us lectures on tourism and how to be a tourist guide. I knew little about them. Originally, I thought that it was admiring to be a tourist guide, because she or he could travel all over the world for free. Miss Xi explained the profound in simple terms. After hearing her vivid explanation, I learn that tourist guide is a tired and complicated career, which has great responsibility. Then, we watched some related videotapes. At the end of that week, we spent two days visiting some places of great interest. On the first day, we went to the Museum of Stone Tablets, the City Wall, the Shaanxi History Museum and the Big Wild Goose Pagoda; on the other day, we visited the Museum of Emperor Qin Shihuang’s Terra-cotta Warriors & Horses and the Huaqing Pool. In the following week, we were given free time to prepare the simulated tourist guide and our practical reports. So I went to libraries and read large amount of books on tourism, then finished my report. Although I was born in Shaanxi Province, I knew little about history and culture of it. After the practice, I felt proud of Shaanxi Province and the industrious and ingenious ancient people; mean well, I still found some problems.
Tourism development, like any kind of development, has an impact in the environment. The impact can be both positive and negative. On one hand, in less-developed areas, tourism development can improve the environment for both tourists and local people through improvement in
sanitation, sewage, and housing; on the other hand, tourism development is more likely to be considered in negative terms in developed area such as pollution and congestion. Along the outer crest of the City Wall, there are crenellations or battlements. Under each crenel there is a square hole, from which arrows were shot and watch was kept. What made me surprised and angry were the characters wrote or curved by tourists, and generally they wrote, “Somebody has been here.” On the City Wall, there are some gun carriages. Also, I found the same kind of words on the barrels. If everyone who visited the City Wall all left his or her names, I’m afraid that it would become the Name Wall. Then, who would like to visit here?
Tourism affects the environment in a number of ways. It may have direct environmental impacts on the quality of water and air, and on noise levels. Sewage disposal in to water will add to pollution problems the use of powered boats will on inland waterways and sheltered seals. When I visited Huaqing Pool, I found the pollution was very serious. First, in the bottom of some pools, there were many coins and paper money, especially in the Chinese Flower Crabapple Pool. Our tourist guide explained that this action was to make a vow to a god. If this action was not forbidden, the pools would be filled with money, and the springs were definitely polluted. Second, on the surface of Nine-dragon Pool, there are many beautiful water lily, but at the same time, the water is full of rubbish. In the pool, there are several golden-fish, and in order to attract them, people throw food to them. Then, the food is too much for them to eat, and then it rots. Finally, I found paper and empty bottles here and there. Increased application of the internal combustion engine for tourist transport, and oil burning to provide the power for a hotel’s air conditioning and refrigeration systems, add to the diminution of air quality, and noise levels may be dramatically increased in urban areas through discos and night clubs, and by increased road, rail and air traffic.
The natural environment is a major attraction for tourists. Visitors tend to be attracted to areas that are scenic, that offer a pleasant climate, and have distinctive landscapes. In order to cater to tourists, a certain amount of development is necessary. Roads must be built to make the area accessible, lodgings to house tourists and restaurants to feed them must be available. Then there comes a point when more people use the area than can be supported by it. The more the area is used, the greater will be the impact. On the way to the Museum of Emperor Qin Shihuang’s Terra-cotta Warriors & Horses ，the traffic is convenient and the streets are straight and wide, while on the square, there are thousands of buses and taxies, so you can imagine the quality of air there. The result is that some costs start to be involved in the development of tourism, and in most cases, tourism is in conflict with the environment.
The tangible elements of the service create the first impressions. The décor, the design of the premises, the uniforms of the staff, the style of the signs, and notices are all the first-time customer has to judge what service he is likely to get. The use of the brand logo on signs, print, equipment and uniforms reinforces the message of the advertising and establishes the professionalism of the organization. If the service experience is good they can also send the customer away with a positive impression of the organization, which may make him recommend it to others or return himself. On the contrary, if the service is unsatisfactory, the branding may imprint a negative image in his memory, and then he may avoid the organization in the future. Take my practice for example, the staff and service in the Shaanxi History Museum and the Museum of Emperor Qin Shihuang’s Terra-cotta Warriors & Horses are rather good; while in the Huaqing Pool, the staff there have no centralized or formal uniform; what’s worse, when we went to the gate, a member of staff shouted to us loudly, “Take photos for free!” Hearing this good message,
we were tempted to follow her. But when we got our photos, she demanded us to pay one Yuan for each. Although it was not expensive, we still feel angry for she shouldn’t have cheated us. In the entrance of the Museum of Emperor Qin Shihuang’s Terra-cotta Warriors & Horses, there gathers hundreds of farmer and businessmen selling goods. When the tourists go by, they hold the goods in front of their faces without manners. I’m sure that this kind of behavior will leave foreigners bad impression.
According to these problems, I have some suggestions.
The key to successful integration of tourism in the environment lies in planning and management of any proposed development. The most effective ways of resolving potential conflicts between tourism and the environment is by applying good management practice. Such as the provision of one way systems, speed limits, limits to access to the remoter areas. And a circulation pattern may be necessary to direct and control the flow of visitors through a site. This may involve the erection of sighs, fences and barriers, additional landscaping and panting schemes.
The most effective techniques of visitor management are usually unobtrusive by persuasion. As I mentioned in Huaqing Pool, the guide can persuade the tourists not to hurl money and other things. Also, the manager can set a notice. Visitor management involves two considerations—preventing and restricting access to environmentally fragile areas and directing visitors to those areas that can accommodate them. A variation of this approach is to have a variable system of pricing in relation to the season and prevailing visitor numbers.
Tourism is also a kind of goods, so it needs means of publicity as well. Advertising in tourism essentially follows the principle of: attract attention; create interest; foster desire and inspire action. Attention was
attracted by advertisements, which were les notable for their promise than for their bizarre, attention-getting qualities. Major strategic brand awareness campaigns at periods of peak booking are examples of this. A brochure can be used to call to action to the consumer, and the operator dispatches a brochure direct to the consumer. What’s more, as medium, the effects of television and radio are obvious.
Since the natural urge to travel is increasingly easy to satisfy, and as holidays can meet so many needs, tourism will not become less important in the future. Not only are the numbers of people traveling forecast to grow over the next twenty years, the numbers of people employed in the tourism industry and the number of countries or regions joining those for whom the industry is already important are also expected to increase. Greater awareness of tourism’s negative impacts has done nothing to stop absolute growth, nor to discourage new entrants to the market. By 2007, worldwide employment in tourism is expected to grow by 46 percent. By 2020 the World Tourism Organization estimates that 1.6 billion tourists will be visiting foreign countries annually. Moreover, China, it is predicted, will be the world’s top destination. Therefore, we should be confident.
Reference:
Tourist Guide in Shaanxi Province, 2005,Shaanxi Tourism Press
Travel and Tourism, 2004, Xi’an Jiaotong University Press
Tourism English, 2002, Advanced Education Press。