Durban - If you are thinking of taking a selfie in front of the Eiffel Tower in your newest Zara shirt, think again. The latest travel trend will see you baring your chest for a selfie you won’t be showing your mother.
Inspired by Topless Tour, tourists across the world are being encouraged to move away from the traditional way of taking pictures of themselves while standing in front of beautiful vistas or magnificent buildings, and to instead snap those shots while baring their upper bodies.
These posts include some from South Africa, specifically Cape Town, where tourists are baring all from the top of Table Mountain.
While Qatar may be campaigning for tourists to cover up, Topless Tour has other ideas.
What started as a spur-of-the-moment idea and an ordinary Instagram post has sparked travellers to send in entertaining, topless photos, taken from the back, which are posted on the social media channels of the Topless Tour.
The Daily Mail reports that The Topless Tour was started two years ago by friends Olivia Edginton, 20, Lydia Buckler, 21, and Ingvild Marstein Olsen, also 20, who are students at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance in London.
After taking an impromptu topless dip in a cold lake in Olsen’s home town in Norway, the three friends wanted to capture the moment of freedom – and started a trend.
The Topless Tour currently has about 20 000 followers on Instagram (@the_topless_tour) and more than 10 000 followers on Facebook.
That number is increasing as the trio and a growing community continue to document their travels with bare backs.
Although the topless photos come predominantly from women, many men have submitted their torsos as well.
In an interview with CNN, Edginton said, “We never imagined it would have such global reach and appreciation. It was always just something we hoped would catch on, never really thinking it would happen.”
For the trio, the best part of the experience has been hearing people’s stories from all over the globe, and how the project has helped people “Feel themselves again, be proud of who they are and love their beautiful bodies,” said Edginton.
“One of our followers recently said these lovely words: ‘All that pressure and judging went away. And so did my shirt. I felt free, happy, and me.’ “ - Liam Joyce, Sunday Tribune