What Tourism Forgets to Measure

This Easter I spent a few days in Athens and decided to see the city through a visitor's eyes. I wanted to explore what Athens offers tourists up close — its archaeological sites, how the city presents itself to people coming from abroad, and the wider picture shaped by mass tourism.

One of the places I visited was Filopappou Hill. I wanted to see again the work of the great architect Dimitris Pikionis.

For many people, the Filopappou project is the most important work in modern Greek architecture, and Pikionis the most important Greek architect.

What I see as its greatest strength is this: the line between what humans built and what nature made is almost impossible to find. Pikionis' interventions don't feel out of place. They are in conversation with the landscape, as if they had always been there.

They don't ask you to look at them. Instead, they quietly support the walker, creating an experience so that visitors can simply enjoy being there — under the sky, in the strong light, inside the landscape, with the Acropolis facing them.

Pikionis didn't build a stage. He turned stone and earth into feeling and experience.

The scene at the terrace overlooking the Acropolis — the high point of the whole walk — let me down. Crowds, noise, photos and selfies in the spirit of "seen it, moving on." A mood completely opposite to what Pikionis had in mind, and one that takes a lot away from what the place can offer.

Walking down the path towards Loumbardiaris church, though, I saw something that made me stop. A young woman, clearly a tourist, sitting alone on a rock with her headphones on, her bag beside her, looking at the Acropolis.

That image made me think immediately: this is exactly the person Pikionis made this work for. His "audience". And I was glad that, in the middle of all the crowds and noise, someone was actually living his vision.

But it also made me think about something else. We talk about tourism almost entirely in terms of money — how much visitors spend in restaurants, hotels and shops. And in terms of numbers — how many tourists came. By that logic, and by the logic of social media that puts the photo above the experience, this woman is not the "ideal" tourist.

And yet she is exactly the kind of visitor who, having had a real moment there, is likely to love the city, carry it with her after she leaves, and perhaps come back — or bring others. And even if none of that happens, Athens will have given something.

That, over time, has an impact that no standard tourism measurement can capture.

The experience of standing in front of the Acropolis in a space built with care and feeling for exactly that purpose cannot be measured in money and numbers. And it doesn't belong only to tourists — the space is open, free, for everyone, also for locals.

The question is whether we truly want to see this as something of value for Athens — and if so, what we are ready to do about it.

That was the thought I carried with me as I left.