shedridt

A tourist agent on a Windstar cruise commented on some of our unusual travel destinations. When we told her that we went to these places to see total eclipses of the sun, she was astonished - & asked - "Where else do they hold them?"

corli33

I've got some that are funny. Let' see. I live in Texas and all time we get others, especially Europeans who have no concept of distance or geography. One Brit couple wanted to know if they could drive on over to California for the afternoon and go to Disney World and be back in time for dinner. Me thinking " Yeah, you can drive across the USA and be back for dinner" but I politely replied "No, it would be too far." An Irish woman wanted to know if New York was near Dallas. I asked two Austalians how they enjoyed Florida, they said we never went to Florida, just Miami. We also get, I don't know how many, that come over here and are shocked that the women don't look like Dolly Parton with big hair and rhinestones, the men aren't wearing cowboy hats and boots with a 6 shooter on their hips, we don't live on ranches and ride horses everywhere and it's not like the TV show "Dallas." Yes, JR Ewing and such are FICTIONAL.

kerouac

<i>In Avignon at an outdoor restaurant, with perfect southern twang: "Do you have pitchers of beer? You know, pitchers?" (with hand gestures).</i>

Actually there are a number of places in Avignon that do!

stfc

Your women DON'T look like Dolly? Well, I'm never going to Texas then.

On a Gray Line bus tour of Toronto, the American family in front of us asked when the Canadian War of Independence was. They seemed a bit surprised when they were shown the Queen's face on a $20 bill. And were told she was still the Queen of Australia too.

justretired

Dolly Parton is one of my favorite philosophers. She once said, "I'm not offended by dumb blonde jokes because I know that I'm not dumb. I also know I'm not blonde."

Most women can't afford to look like Dolly, who once remarked, "You'd be surprised how much it costs to look this cheap!"

Texans themselves can be mistaken about distances. I live in Massachusetts, and we once had a group visiting from Houston. They had a free day between meetings, so they rented a car to do some touring. Someone suggested visiting the Old North Bridge, where there's a national park at the site of the first battle of the Revolutionary War. You know,

<i>By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their flag to April's breeze unfurled,
Here once the embattled farmers stood,
And fired the shot heard round the world.</i>

Anyway, one of the women from Houston took a quick look at the map, and said, "Yeah, we ought to have time to do that in a day." She handed the map to someone else, who began giving instructions to the driver. After about fifteen minutes (they started in Waltham), the navigator said, "OK, we've arrived."

The original map reader yelled, "What! Let me see that map! Where's the scale on this thing?" The map showed all of Massachusetts, about 120 miles (190 Km) wide (that's the long dimension). When she realized how small it all was (on a Texas scale), her mental wheels started turning. "Oh my God," she said, "we can go to Cape Cod. We can go to Cape Ann." And then, as the size of it all sunk in, she said, "We can go to <i>other states!</i>"

And they did. They drove to Cape Cod, and they drove to Cape Ann (completely the opposite direction). They drove into New Hampshire, and through it, and had a lobster lunch in Maine. I guess when you're from Texas, it all doesn't amount to much distance.

- Larry

pdx

kerouac- don't rain on my schmear campaign. It's my little nasty judgmental comment and I'm sticking to it.

GreenDragon

Having grown up in Miami, I can understand the Texans' attitude, Larry. It takes a good 5 hours or so just to get out of the state (unless you're on a boat to Cuba!), so being able to do something like that (much less another country, like in Europe) is bizarre, exotic, and downright exciting

I now live in Gainesville, which is only 1.5 hours from Georgia, and it still seems strange to go to another state for a day trip, but I've done it.

Timlin

We were in Fort Snelling, MN during an unbearable heat wave. We only had a couple days so we began the tour in spite of the heat and felt so sorry for the young people working in authentic costume of the period (1800's? or earlier?).

As we progressed through the buildings we came upon a man who was sitting and his wife was trying to get him to move on. As we walked past him I heard him say to his wife; "I can't go on. My skin is leaking."

It was so perfect for how you felt I still laugh when I think of him.

tejana

I second the comment about distances when you are from Texas. I had a friend in Houston who wanted to visit another friend in LA - they looked at a map to plan the trip, and realized that the halfway point was El Paso - still in Texas.

ps - I often think about what the singer Joe Ely says about the West Texas landscape: "If you stand with your feet flat on the ground and look out, you can see 50 miles in every direction. If you stand on a tuna can you can see 100 miles."

joannyc

True story... 2 of my colleagues were working in England and decided to go to York for the weekend. They visited York Minster (cathedral).

Colleague 1: Wow, this must be from like the 5th Century BC!
Colleague 2: Well, I think they waited until Christ was born to begin building it.

Dayenu

OK, I'm down to June 8, 2005, will have to continue tomorrow. Got some glances at work, why is it I laugh and then cry

patandhank

I was on an American Airlines flight that hit bad weather and had to be diverted where we sat on the runway for hours. The plane was originally headed for Dallas. People were tired, tempers were short. Finally the guy beside me says with a lot of exasperation, "If they can't land in Dallas, why don't they go on to Ft. Worth?!" I looked at him and said, "It's the same airport - Dallas/Ft. Worth." Poor guy just turned all red and said "Oh."

lowcountrycarol

Our Portuguese friend who worked as a maitre'd on Royal Caribbean cruise lines once told us that one of the passangers came up to him on the first day of a cruise and asked " time is the midnight buffret?"

txgirlinbda

Mom and I were driving back in to the States after attending a wedding in Ontario, Canada. I was coaching mom on the border stop, so she didn't get flustered and say something that would upset the Canadian border patrol.

Me (pretending to be Canadian B.P.): "What was your business in Canada?"
Mom: "We've been to a friend's wedding."
Me (still pretending): "Do you have anything to declare?"
Mom: "It waas a wonderful wedding!"

KathleenCL

I will preface this by saying that both times I've been in France I've had excellent experiences with the people there. So, not bashing the French here...while in Paris with several other high school friends in the last 80's, one of the girls was pretty much physically attacked by dome drunk guy. She was really mad and upset. She said, "You know, they call people in Israel - Israelites, they should call people in Paris - Parasites. Cracked me up when I was 17.

When in Dublin a couple of years ago I was at the National Art Gallery. I was talking to a lovely older man, probably in his ealry 70s) who was a guard at the museum. I was asking him about the Vermeer painting they had there. He told me a Vermeer had been stolen several years ago. I asked him if it happened at the National Galley. He responded, in a great Irish brogue, "No, love, your're protected by natural born killers here!" Gotta love those Irishmen.

justretired

Talking about names for citizens of various places: these are varied and often irregular both in French and English. A French man was telling me about some of the French words on one occasion. While someone from Paris is Parisien, someone from Marseille is Marseillais, and someone from Pau is Palois.

So I started talking about English endings. Someone from New York is a New Yorker, but someone from Boston is a Bostonian, for instance. I then asked him if he knew what you called someone from Chicago.

<i>Ah, oui</i>, he said, <i>un gangster!</i> (pronounced "GONG-stair").

I guess he'd seen too many American movies about prohibition.

- Larry

GreenDragon

Great story about the Irishman, Kathleen! I can just hear the accent...

CAPH52

I can't believe I forgot to put this in my TR.

When my son and I were on the London Eye, he saw a woman point to a cell phone tower and ask an older woman with her whether it was the Eiffel Tower. The older woman responded, "You can see Paris from here?"!

lightheart

We were watching the final show of the evening at the Bellagio fountains in Las Vegas. Following a spectacular finish, and the last note of music, there was a momentary silence as a young man said to his friends, "Alright, let's go make bad decisions!"

Then entire crowd burst out laughing. Only in Vegas!

lightheart

This story is from my parents but too good not to pass along:

My parents were on a tour of the Columbia Icefields in Alberta, Canada when a fellow tourist started to fill her bag with snow from the glacier. My parents asked what she was doing, remarking that the snow would melt in her bag. Rolling her eyes, she replied "Are you kidding me? This snow hasn't melted for thousands of years!"