Annie

This question has been posed in the positive, so since traveling entails running into so many different people from different places and it entails us dropping bags, pushing carts, waiting and everything else that goes with it. I was wondering if you would share what the WORST and most surprising (to you) thing has a stranger done to you while you were traveling?

Gary

Ummm...slash all four of the tires on my car when I was in Philadelphia? Does that qualify since I never met this fine specimen of a human being?
Philly is such an armpit of a town.

Caitlin

Well, this wasn't done to me, and it didn't happen on a trip, but about the lowest was an experience my boyfriend's sister had while in college. She fell while riding her bike (in the street of course), and twisted her ankle. A concerned looking man came up and asked, "Are you hurt? Do you need help to get up?" when she answered yes, he picked up her bike and rode off on it.

xxx

I had someone steal my family's assigned seats on an airplane once. We boarded to find a family (including junior in a carseat) firmly planted in our row of seats. They claimed to have boarding passes for the seats but somehow couldn't produce any. They just refused to move, and the flight attendant didn't have time to check things with the gate agent, blah, blah, blah. So my family was scattered around the plane and the interlopers stayed put.

Later, at the hub, it turned out that the squatters were continuing on the same flight, and so were we. The flight attendants checked the seating and discovered that the squatters indeed had no right to the seats and they were forced to move. How humiliating for them!

I have never seen that behavior before or since. How bold!

dan woodlief

These are all just a little off of what you asked, but: Returned from Europe to learn that someone had burglarized our new home (luckily only taking a coin collection) - it didn't take long to get a burlar alarm after that. I had won part of the trip, which I extended, through a radio station. The travel agency sponsoring the trips went bankrupt, and I only got half of the money I should have gotten. The radio station, the largest around here, refused to make good on it (what losers - haven't listened to them in the four years since) - for any of you in the Triangle area of NC, it was good ole G-105. A traveling companion had her bag stolen on the subway in Budapest on a separate trip. Fortunately, someone had turned her passport and a few other items in at the police station, but the police gave her a hard time.

Jaime

I've always met really wonderful people while traveling and had really good experiences. Of course, there was that time in Scotland where a really good-looking man my age asked to sit next to me on the bus, proposed marriage by the 2nd stop, and took down his pants at the 3rd.

wombat

Jaime -- you win, pants (oops HANDS) down!

Tony Hughes

Jaime

That's a sorta Scots traditional thing - quite common, especially on the west coast although most of us stop after stage 2.

victoria

Maybe not in a WORST category but certainly the most SURPRISING was recently on the Bernina Express in the beautiful Swiss Alps. In the midst of her asking how we were enjoying Switzerland this aged Catholic missionary included a "BTW, are you CAtholic" and when I admitted I was a "former" Catholic she seemed to get VERY upset and she and her companion immediately took out prayer books and went into intense prayers OUT LOUD praying for my soul to return to the Catholic Church so that I could be saved!! The more I ignored them, the louder that prayed! My hubby being a former Baptist was not worthy of "any" prayers it seemed.

It ended up with a real "to do" between me and the missionary and I missed a lot of the beautiful scenery! Most say you should not mix religion with politics but I now add another:

"Don't mix religion with over zealous missionaries on vacations!"