To some, however, it is. The country's new identity as a tourist destination sits uneasily with those whose relatives were killed in the Libyan-sponsored 1988 bombing of a Pan Am jet over Lockerbie, Scotland. For many of these people, a vacation in Libya sends the wrong message. Ken Dornstein, who lost his brother, David, in the bombing, summarizes the feelings of many victims' families: "A lot of the Pan Am relatives still want Kaddafi's head on a plate," he says. "They don't want tourists to give their tacit sanction to the regime by making the trip."

Kara Weipz, president of Victims of Pan Am Flight 103, also lost her brother in the bombing. "I have mixed emotions. Do I ever want to personally set foot in Libya? Absolutely not. But half the population is fourteen years old or younger and wasn't even alive when this happened. Should they be held accountable for the sins of eight or ten people?"

Zimbabwe
Five years of riots, economic crisis, and violence have ravaged the country, and for some, traveling there has meant propping up a corrupt regime. Yet many view tourism as a lifeline to this crumbling nation, believing that the money they spend will support the local economy and help preserve national parks and wildlife.

Lindsay Moose, a government employee from northern Virginia, traveled to Zimbabwe on a luxury safari in July because he decided that personal contact with the locals could actually make a difference for the better. "The people I met were very interested in how Zimbabwe was perceived in the United States," Moose says. "They told me that our presence was important because without tourist dollars the safari camps might be closed. There was certainly concern over the political climate, but there was also a strong sense of optimism. I think that we and the other foreign visitors supported that optimism, if only in a small way."

Likewise, Brien and Teri Hensley, a physician and homemaker from California, believe that their trip contributed to preserving the environment they went to Africa to see. "The river we wanted to canoe and the areas we wanted to see happened to be in Zimbabwe," Teri explains. "We did not feel that the money we spent was going to the government so much as supporting the Zimbabwe tourism industry and the people who work in it."

Pierre Faber, whose Classic Africa tour company arranged Moose's and the Hensleys' trips, says that he chooses local operators and plows a portion of his company's profits back into community projects in Africa. When it comes to traveling to Zimbabwe, Faber is a pragmatist. "It is a dilemma," he says. "Clients are paying visa money that goes to the government and to the evil regime. We don't want to support Mugabe in any way, but at the end of the day, the good that we do by helping conserve wildlife and national park infrastructure outweighs the bad." Faber's opinion that tourism will help save the perilously underfunded national parks from neglect is shared by many both inside and outside the travel industry.