“My friend Jim Richardson, a National Geographic photojournalist, likes to make the distinction between being a "traveler" and a "sightseer." According to Jim, a traveler seeks engagements with the local people and culture, while the sightseer just clicks off sights in the guidebook, a "been there, done that" mentality. A sightseeing photographer stands apart from the culture and "steals" pictures from a distance, while a travel photographer becomes involved with his or her surroundings and the people, and the resulting pictures become more intimate.”

“The distinction often seems precarious. Both traveler and tourist are, by definition, separate from their environment. We like to think that the role we aspire to, the traveler, has that distance on the scene that implies vision and understanding, while the tourist suffers the alienation of the passive viewer, the "sightseer." At its worst, tourism is felt to represent a moral or spiritual failing. And in our hear we fear that we, too, are tourists.”

“...what I'm getting at is like the distinction between tourist and a traveler. The tourist experience is superficial and glancing. The traveler develops a deeper connection with her surroundings. She is more invested in them -- the traveler stays longer, makes her own plans, chooses her own destination, and usually travels alone: solo travel and solo participation, although the most difficult emotionally, seem the most likely to produce a good story.”

“The picture is not made by the photographer, the picture is more good or less good in function of the relationship that you have with the people you photograph.”

“Modern traveling is not traveling at all; it is merely being sent to a place, and very little different from becoming a parcel.”

“Whenever possible, Salgado lives for a while with the people he photographs. “I tell a little bit of my life to them, and they tell a little of theirs to me. The picture itself is just the tip of the iceberg.”