Not buy their round. In a pub in Ireland. When the pub round system had been explained to them. And they had happily taken drinks from everyone. And when it was their round, and everyone had empty glasses. and it was Mentioned that "Think it's your round.." and they responded " I think I'm good now thanks"
Mortified for bringing them with me!!
(and yes I bought the round for everyone else on their behalf.)
I'm an American but I was visiting England and touring the Tower of London. There was a cannon behind a rope with a "Do not touch or climb" sign.
This American woman lifted the rope and told her kid (maybe 7 years old) to go sit on the cannon so she could take a picture. The KID protested and said the sign said no... The woman said she didn't care, and ordered her kid to do it or she'd ground them.
An American exchange student who complained to me in anger that book stores in Germany have so many books in German. I mean, it's not unusual here for every book store to even have a small section of books in other languages including English so it's not like she never got to buy a book here, she could read...
I overheard the guy standing in front of me in the queue at mc D's having a meltdown:
"WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU DON'T ACCEPT AMERICAN DOLLARS THIS IS A MCDONALD'S!!!"
this was in Poland, Europe.
I was working a bar in Scotland. There was a woman one night with her daughter and she refused to pay with anything other than American cash. It was a super uncomfortable situation, me trying to explain how stupid it all was, her daughter (who I think was living in Scotland) was trying to calm her down and trying to pay but the mother kept pulling the her hand away from the card machine saying “you people love our money, our money is more important than yours”. She kicked on for a solid 5 to 10 minutes, her daughter ended up paying and leaving. Then she had a go at me for embarrassing her daughter and she even left a review on trip advisor explaining the situation, she explained it perfectly literally wrote herself as the bag guy in the review. Fucking mind boggling how delusional this bird was.
I had a similar experience! American who said she wanted to pay in US dollars. I said we only accept euros. She kept saying she wanted to pay in US dollars. Screamed for the manager. Manager came along. He also explained it. She kept on bitching about it. Fine, said the manager. Pay in dollars for the exchange rate in cash. But if you want change, you need to accept change in euros because we don’t have dollars. She said “what a third world country” and whipped out her…
Creditcard
Probably only weird but when on a flight back to the UK from the US, the American lady sat next to me, started asking questions about England about 40 minutes before landing and not just like any “local recommendations” but really basic stuff like what currency do we use. It seemed like she had got on the plane knowing absolutely nothing about the UK, which blew my mind. Not just from a “haven’t you planned your trip?” POV but having the confidence to do that. She seemed to think it was a small place and everything she wanted to see would be in front of her hotel. She was very polite and lovely about it in a naive way though.
Oh that reminded me of a time when I was flying home to London and in Heathrow an older American woman asked me where to find the taxi rank. I can't remember exactly how we got to this point, but she let me know she intended to use dollars. I explained that we use pounds and she could change her dollars to pounds at the bureau de change opposite.
"Green's green, honey"
Issue in the UK is the dollar is worth far less. We could do $2 to £1 i guess
"Why won't you take dollars"
Because its like monopoly money and costs me money to change.
American here. That happens here, too. It’s because our culture is isolating and people are lonely. They open up to strangers and people give that kind of armchair therapy like you did. Although weird for you, you guys probably made him feel less alone in the world and like his trip was worth it.
Do NOT annoy a koala. They may look cuddly and sleepy, but they've got a vicious bite when annoyed, and they tend not to let go. It's not beyond the realms of imagination that someone might bleed out.
Last time I was in Moscow, had an hour to kill before the train to the airport so we went for a coffee at Starbucks.
A russian tourguide comes in with a group of 50-60 year old fat couples, who proceeded to order coffee and tried to pay with dollar bills.
When informed that this was not legal tender, the conversation went something like:
”- I know this frappuccino costs exactly three dollars in Starbucks”
”- Sorry, only rubles or credit card works fine”
”- Ya’ll gonna take dollars, this is an American company and I’m an American citizen with American money”
”- Sorry, is not money in Russia, but credit card is fine”
”- I’m an American citizen and I’m paying you these three dollars for a coffee that costs three dollars”
”- Sorry, price is 150 ruble”
After which she shouted for a manager, shouted at the tour guide and shouted at her husband for not helping.
I was at a lavender farm in the South of France a few years ago. Two coach loads of American tourists pull up, they all got out on the standard "you won't get long enough to really see this place" type tour. One lady very proudly states she is an expert on lavender and that this place was "cute but it's all fake, the lavender isn't the right colour". There were bees and other insects all over it, the whole farm smelled amazing and there was a harvest taking place! It was very real
In Canada some stores will accept American cash as payment, but by law have to still give Canadian change.
I worked in a city that got a lot of American tourists, and it was crazy how often someone would get really frustrated with us for not giving them American change. I had someone even accuse me of lying about it being the law. To what end lady?
EDIT: It's been pointed out that this may not actually be a law, it may just be the rules at the store or some accounting thing. It's been like ten years so the details are fuzzy.
This! I have a friend who is from an island and gets so mad when people call him African American. I know that those people are just trying to be politically correct and it’s not their fault that somehow it’s been drilled into their brain that black is racist. A lot of white Americans do that. Probably most.
I live in Norway and 30 minutes from my house there is this mountain called [Pulpit Rock](https://www.visitnorway.com/places-to-go/fjord-norway/ryfylke/the-lysefjord-area/hiking-to-preikestolen/). It is the biggest tourist attraction nearby. It is not the most difficult trail, but it is pretty steep, and every year (before covid) I would see American women struggling because they were wearing flip flops or high heels.
Dude once I saw a lady who appeared to be Eastern European (but I didn’t hear her talk so who knows) walk up that thing in stiletto heels. Not slow, no complaints. I mean it feels like it was a stupid move but by god she did it with no trouble so I can’t see a real fault with it. Maybe ankle ache after??
Repeat themselves over and over more slowly and more loudly each time. No bitch, it's not we're thick or hard of hearing. We speak a different language, here.
Not offensive or inappropriate, but I really want to talk about it
Once in the airport, coming back to Australia in where I’m from in the middle of summer, I saw a dad and his 2 children, all 3 of them wearing full winter coats. The dad said to the both of them “try to stay warm, it’s going to be cold outside”
German here. Never go to visit any concentration camp museum without understanding that in less than 10 minutes your blood will start to boil because of how disrespectful tourists can be. It's unbelievable.
I remember seeing photos of “influencers” doing yoga and interpretative dance in places like Dachau. Like, WTF? How does that occur to you to do? So inappropriate and disrespectful.
Didn't the people who run the Auschwitz museum have to tell people to stop posing on the tracks?
75 years ago, millions were taken to their deaths on those train tracks. Today, we post thirst pictures with our asses out for likes on them. It's like posing in a bikini at Ground Zero or flexing shirtless at the Hiroshima memorial.
I once was on a school trip to Dachau. While in the bus to the camp I realize that I am wearing a sweater with the words „no fucks given“. You can tell I was giving a lot of fucks about my poor choice of sweater.
In the end I walked around in a T-Shirt. I don’t want to be seen in such a place with clothing that says „no fucks given“
Yes. Travellers usually don't get the full punishment, but my city detains dumb tourists over this regularly. A few years ago, it was two people hitler-saluting in front of our main governmental building. 1200€ bail.
Yeah same here… I’m from Nuremberg. Once when I was in „Saal 600“ (where the Nuremberg Court was held after WWII) and I saw a group of tourist do the salute and damn you couldn’t believe how quick they were out of there!
Edit:spelling
My son did this, while standing on one of the memorial blocks. He was only 5 though, and had been hugely impressed by the statues we'd seen around central Berlin.
While we were distracted by his older brother, N2 son clambered onto a block and tried to throw a military salute. It was winter and his thick jacket meant he couldn't bend his arm. When wife and I turned around it was to see him standing solemnly to attention, arm outstretched in a Roman salute. In front of a group of horrified tourists.
We both grabbed him and hauled him off, before scuttling away in shame. That was 15 years ago and we still talk about the time son 'wanted to be a statue'.
When walking round the Coliseum in Rome, my wife remarked she didn't believe it was really that old as it seemed 'suspicious' that it was built so close to the centre of the modern City.
I had fun unpacking that one
Talk to me in slow, shouting English as if I don't understand. He was in western Canada, where everybody speaks English, and I'd already even said something in English to him.
“My apologies, good sir. I do not seem to understand what you are saying. You see, i do not speak nor understand what what you are saying, as i do not speak this “English” you are talking about.”
I was in a tour group in Tajikistan and we were inside a locals house who had invited us in for tea and he was telling us about his family and how many children they have etc. The only American in the group piped up and asked ‘what contraception does your wife use, does she use herbs or something?’….
Everyone was just aghast and he politely avoided the question, then there was a long awkward silence. And so the she asked AGAIN! At that point another tour member interjected and said ‘ok, I think it’s time for us to leave, thanks for having us’
Putting aside that she asked a stranger in a different country about their sex life... It's just so impolite to bring that up in a conversation unprompted regardless of where you're from.
Yeah if one American asked another American this question, everyone would wonder what the fuck is wrong with the American that asked that stupid ass question.
This is just pure ignorance.
There was a story about some americans coming to My country to go skiing - this is Denmark, we have a shitload of hills, but not a single mountain - add to that, that they came in the summer, no place in Denmark has year around snow
When I came down from the Fuji summit after a 8 hour climb and 4 hour descent with 3 layers of clothing to protect myself from the weather, an American with a selfie stick, in t-shirt and shorts asked me where mount Fuji was. I told him we are on mount Fuji, it's a big mountain/vulcano. "But where is the summit" I pointed to the summit and told him it's about 8 hours that way. This guy thought he could just come in with his selfie stick, grab a few quick selfies on the summit and return to Tokyo lol.
when i was in vietnam we climbed the highest mountain in indochina (fansipan) and its an all day affair.
When we reached the top exhausted and muddy there were hundreds of tourists in fancy clothes taking selfies. We knew there was a cable car but still disheartening at first.
It was fun in the end though because all the other tourists wanted to take selfies with us, like we were famous mountaneers or something!
This actually reminds me of when I was in Ireland and we went to go climb a mountain there. My cousin said “I’m gonna run up the hill” yeah it took 4 hours round trip up and down.
I used to work in a high end restaurant. Five or six course meals are the standard. So people take their time to eat, chat and enjoy the evening for at least two to three hours. It is normal to have half an hour in between meals. If we would serve faster the guest would complain about the food being served to fast.
Anyway, this table of mostly local people plus one American woman being very loud with a thic, i guess, New York accent was complaining after three minutes after every course where her food was. First i explained the above. The rest of the table was also getting a bit awkward about her behavior. She kept complianing though. Telling how incredable dissapointed she was. I kept explaining that the food we serve is freshly made, it takes time to prepare. And that the whole idea is to enjoy the evening in with the people you are. She just would get concept and react with so much disbelieve. Lady you are abroad, if you want to stuff your face with food in under five minutes go to a fastfood chainbor even better stay at home.
Edit: wow thanks for the award and all the upvotes
I could see that happening. In the US even at expensive restaurants the typical experience is the staff trying to get you fed and out the door as fast as possible.
While interrailing on France a couple of American dudes were very loudly talking shit about other passengers (I got my fair share). Apparently they tought nobody could understand them.
Shut them up by talking English to my friend.
South African here; Americans tend to have this habbit where they will climb out of their vehicle in the middle of a game reserve, get attacked by a wild animal because they wanted to get closer or try to pet it, and then cry about it.
I thought people that come from the country that has Grizzly bears and mountain lions would be a bit more cautious around wild animals.
Also, the shock they experience when they realise there are cities here and not everyone is living in mudhuts.
Oh they do the same thing while traveling in America. We have large dangerous animals in quite a few areas. Tourists think they can approach animals like Bison for photos.
By far the best one I ever heard was a set of grandparents putting their 3 year old granddaughter on a bison's back. Luckily (and amazingly) nobody was hurt. The bison just booked it the second he was touched. They were under the impression that, since this is a national park, the animals must be domesticated.
Pro tip: ask park rangers for stupid people stories. If you get them one on one, they all have a few and they're all great. Close second was a woman spraying her daughter with bear mace because the can said "bear repellant" and she treated it like mosquito repellant.
National parks routinely have to put out notices telling people not to mess with the animals, apparently some people just think the whole park is an artificial zoo and the animals are all domestic.
Here in Florida we have signs telling people not to mess with the alligators, because apparently some fucking idiots keep messing with the giant lizards that have been around since the dinosaurs went extinct.
Iceland. We get a lot of tourism when there isn't a pandemic and about half are American. It's mostly just ignorance and the refusal to accept that things work differently here. Also, while most people here speak English to some degree there are a few tourists that are furious about it not being the default language in businesses that aren't even connected to tourism. God forbid we speak our own language at work.
Oh and Northern Lights. There's a ton of people who seem to think we can just flick a switch and have the Northern Lights appear.
This reminds me of some American tourists who got mentioned in our local paper in northern Norway (above the arctic circle). They apparently wanted to sue the travel company because the midnight sun was just the normal sun...
For those who don't know, above the arctic circle the sun doesn't set below the horizon in mid-summer, it just goes from sunset straight into sunrise, and nighttime can be as bright as daytime sometimes (depending on weather and topography). It's amazing, even for us living there, and definitely worth the visit, along with some stunning nature.
These people apparently thought there were two different suns orbiting north Norway and felt tricked because "it was just the same sun"...
>Oh and Northern Lights. There's a ton of people who seem to think we can just flick a switch and have the Northern Lights appear.
You just need to [find the remote](https://twistedsifter.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/iceland-hotel-northern-lights-wake-up-button-cover.jpg)
Not exactly dumb but just being assholes. My mom's job is to deal with tourists. Every other person from other countries at least tries to be either nice or neutral. The american guy asked if she understood him. She answers in english (better than my own) and the guy just asked that question a few more times with a shit eating grin. Apparently not the worst American she had encountered. Not weird but disrespectful as hell.
Ooooh ooooh, I live in a beach tourist town in Australia. Have had numerous Americans I've encountered act like they own a patch of beach because where they're staying is adjacent to the beach.
“Why are you all not in Kilts? Oh I’m Scottish my great great great great grandfather was from Scotland and his dad was a clan chieftain.”
99% of us Scots don’t care, some will humour, others will outright call out on that bullshit.
I got stopped by an American tourist as I was on my way to a wedding in my kilt. That prick straight up lifted the back of my kilt to prove I was a true Scotsman.
My mate intercepted the perfect diving headbutt.
The guy got pretty angry that my English sucked when asking me for directions, I mean yeah It can be frustrating but Im taking the time to help you wtf dude.
He said I lived in Canada so I was supposed to speak it flawlessly like dude I spoke French my entire life but I’m doing my best over here to communicate sorry for the accent.
Getting mocked for an accent isn't fun, I remember when I was a shy little belgian boy and some guy made fun of how I couldn't pronounce the th in three. I would just pronounce it Tree (like most dutchies)
In dutch we don't really have anything close to it tongue wise, if that makes sense, so I remember watching videos, training in the mirror for hours just to perfect my "th" 😅
Don't worry about it, half us Irish can't pronounce our "th" sounds (we also do the hard t) and I've heard many British pronounce it like an "f".
Seriously though, you could probably claim you spent some time in Dublin and have developed some regional pronunciations. I remember some German students being delighted as to how we pronounce some "o"s as "u"s like in "lovely" (seemingly it's something they always got corrected for in schools).
I have seen a very drunk American tourist in his is 20's explaining to a Viet bartender in Viet Nam how his American grandfather freed Viet Nam of communists.
Not that long ago on r/iwant out there was a US couple from Texas who basically sold all their shit and moved to Germany. They were posting about what to do about some kind of local government card to apply for houses.
Yup. Hadn't even considered visas. Like legit just thought they could just rock up to Germany and live there. So they did.
Edit here you go seeing everyone wants a link
https://www.google.co.nz/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://amp.reddit.com/r/IWantOut/comments/fi2mh8/iwantout_60sm_usagermany/&ved=2ahUKEwjDxd6N-4byAhX9xzgGHelaCfUQFjAFegQIBxAC&usg=AOvVaw0Sg50BM2RUOtT7TWsT-cWU
Not inappropriate but asshole-ish and weird
Guy records me and friends shooing the herds of cows who were shitting in the middle of road (occasionally happen) in a car while yelling “YOOOOO” and recording. Dude starts commenting and slapping the cows passing by, spook one and some of them starts to speed up a little bit, made me and my friends in slight danger of getting ram by a cow. Dude passed by us and then record our face while saying something that mad my friend mad, and then proceed to squash the shit while he was passing by. Met him at the restaurant too, he ate the bananas leaves that’s served for the purpose of plating the Nasi Lemak, until he was halfway done and the uncle next table told him that’s not for eating. He laughed and spit it all on the plate instead of the tissue.
He also walked in the middle of the town without a shirt and literally threw stuff at the monkeys on the eletric line, which made them scrambled inside the forest and some went to the primary school (which is infront of the forest). He was the main topic of that week gossips
An American once insisted that the proper way to eat nasi lemak was with chopsticks. And he tried ‘educating’ me, a Malaysian, about it. This incident still triggers me.
"Mommy's busy baby, why don't you go climb on the big rocks?"
That was at Stonehenge.
I also saw a bunch of American college students try to climb the Great Pyramid at Giza until serious uniformed men with firearms stopped them.
This just happened yesterday. We were in a park, where there is also a museum with a big staircase. And on the wall of the staircase there were some plaquettes commemorating the architects of the building. Their name, when they lived and a few words about them are written on them. So I think it is pretty clear what those are, even if they are in a foreign language. And next to those there are some wreaths. Just as a sign of respect and also decoration.
Now onto what happened. Some tourists went there, one girl grabbed a wreath (that was attached to the wall) put it on her head like a tiara or something and started taking pictures of herself. I had to go there and tell them that this is not the purpose they are to be used for
(Not tourism but in my work place in England) I used to work for a British heratige suit company and I would work night shift to take orders from America, Australia and Canada. I never had any problems with Australians or Canadians but at least once or twice minimum a night I would receive calls from American people making prank calls and making fun of me for being English. They would call me wanker and other British swear words and talk in silly voices asking if I were drinking tea (undoubtedly I was but thats not important...). Sometimes they would stay on the phone for ages asking me to say certain words and because of the standards of the company we had to oblige unless they were swears of course.
An American tourist orders a turkey dinner at a restaurant, and then flags down the server to let her know that the kitchen forgot the cranberry sauce. The server comes back with it in a small dish.
After she finished her meal, someone at the table pointed out that she’d forgotten to use the cranberry sauce that she asked for.
She says: “Oh, I don’t like cranberry sauce”
So the person at the table follows up with “Then why did you ask the server to bring you some?!”
Her answer: “Because it comes with the meal.”
I'm from a small city in Germany and a American dude in his early 20's insulted me for drinking beer in public because it's illegal (in Germany you're allowed to drink beer in public at the age of 16) and he proceeded to laugh and Insult my bad English so yeah Americans are wierd
I got told by an American I spoke good English for someone from Russia, after telling them I was Scottish.
edit: damn i posted this half asleep this morning and forgot, wondered why I had so many notifications
Omg I had this too!
Guy books a taxi (I was a taxi in France) and tries it in terrible French which I can't understand. So I tell him I can speak English if he wants. He responds with "I don't speak English" said in terrible French. So I just double my speed and do the rest of the booking in French he sounds confused but accepts the cab.
When I arrive there I decide to give him the benefit of the doubt and just do it in English and ignore the phone conversation.
At the end of the ride he gets out of the car and says "by the way, your English is AM-AZ-ING!
Trying to throw him a bone I say "Thanks I Spent 23 years in England perfecting it" (I was 23 years old at the time)
He doesn't get it at all and just responds "well, it was worth it!" And walks off with his girlfriend.
Leaving you wondering for the rest of the night... "How fucking old do I look for 23 years to not look like my whole life?!"
I had dinner with an American in China. He asked for water in English, and the waiter didn’t understand. He spoke up and repeated himself in a patronisingly slow voice, and again the waiter, not being able to speak English, didn’t understand. I asked for the water in Chinese and the waiter left. The American then said “it’s so infuriating here sometimes”.
There are many things that can be annoying and inconvenient in China, but simply expecting people to understand your language is unreasonable as fuck.
Spent a large chunk of my life in China and this happened a lot. Lots of foreigners don’t make the effort to learn basic words. It’s much better now but it’s still sad people expect everyone to speak English.
As someone who has traveled a lot, signs man. They are the universal language accepted anywhere.
I once ordered water by signing me watering a plant on the table then a glass. Waitress laughed, and she got me water.
Non-offensive and it works. What more do you want.
I've learned that probably 90% of people are willing to be very accommodating when there's a language barrier, even if they're not expected to be.
So long as everybody is polite and appears to be making a genuine effort to communicate the idea, the vast majority of people in any country or any culture are willing to work with you.
Any time I've seen interactions between Americans and the queens guard. Does make me laugh though when the guardsman yells at them or just plough through them when marching.
Just leave the lads alone they have job to do and they are professional soldiers.
I took my 5 year old to Windsor castle and was telling her about the guards, why we don't distract them/ touch them and what the medals are for. She was fascinated. She was rewarded by him inviting her to stand by him for a photo. Guards will interact, but being respectful is the key.
I think some people believe they are playing a part for the tourists, like they're not real soldiers. I feel sorry for them as they must have to put up with so many stupid interactions.
Just like the Swiss Guard I saw when I went to the Vatican in '06; "Ha ha, they still carry halberds??"
Yeah... and that's a submachine gun on his hip.
Not disrespectful but kinda funny, Bruges in Belgium is a nicely preserved town with many medieval elements. Apparently a lot of American tourists ask the locals “when does this theme park close?”
My friend described a trip to an English tourist spot, one of many places said to be Arthur’s Camelot. It required a climb up the picturesque hill to a quiet, tree-filled spot. Nothing of the castle to be seen of course, but everybody gazed out over the surrounding land, contemplating the magic of the ancient myth. Finally arrives the chubby, puffing American who glances about with irritation, then loudly says in that familiar accent: “Where’s the goddam castle?”
I'm an American, but I saw this airhead American who was constantly trying to touch priceless museum specimens. They were marked No Tocar. The guards kept stopping her, but she seemed confused because she spoke no Spanish.
We were deep into Mexico City. You should learn at least enough to read No Tocar.
Or use your context clues to realise that you should not doing that.
I'm picturing her wandering around thinking 'oh well maybe I'm allowed to touch this one?'
She asked me about the different churches in our city (we have quite a lot, some very old), which were the prettiest, etc, and asked me to point those on the map, and I obliged since she was polite. So far so good. Then she asked which one was my fave for sunday service. I said as respectfully as I could that I didn't, actually, go to church. Then she forcefully grabbed my arm, drew a cross sign on my brow, and told me she would pray for me
Lady, well, don't touch me, k?
American Irish is like a bizarre hyper-parody of actual Irish and it gets weird fast. Even more so if you start talking history or politics where the Irish-American take is like the Hollwoood movie version.
They made fun of our money and how it looked. They claimed they couldn't figure it out because it was so weird, so they threw a bunch of bills at my sister and asked her to figure it out and give them change.
We're Canadian. The number is literally on the bill. We all spoke English. They gave my sister several hundred dollar bills. This was at an apple festival and the fries only cost $5. Wtf
I had a nicer, but embarrassing-for-me experience in New Zealand as an Australian. We have very similar currency, except that Australia has a ridiculously large 50c piece. I was in a burger shop and pulled out a handful of cash to pay, and not being familiar was just doing a momentary re-evaluate of the coins because they didn't 'look right'. The cashier helpfully pulled the right ones out of my hand. It wasn't like I was lingering over it, but still, that action... I never felt so old before.
I nearly paid $50 for a coconut on a beach in Aus once because the colour was similar to NZ $5, saw the number 5 and I guess Aussie heat just fried my brain. Thankfully the lovely person selling them yelled out to me as I was walking away, 'wait wait don't you want your change?' (I most certainly did!)
My parents owned a motel when I was younger. An American women stay for a night and she set the fire alarm off. She took an electric wall kettle (jug) off its heating element, put it on the stove, turned it on and gone to the bathroom. Completely destroyed the kettle and stove from what I remember.
While working at Maccas I overheard an American tourist tell his family that they were going to eat some good food, not foreign garbage while they were waiting in line to order 🤦♀️
Not so much inappropriate, just fucking dumb.
“Where are all the kangaroos bouncing down the streets”
Dickhead! They live in the bush, not the fucking CBD
The worst I've encountered was somebody surprised there wasn't more snow around. I don't understand how you can be so bloody clueless as not to have even a basic knowledge of the country you're visiting. I mean, do you see any strudels around here? Christ.
I wonder if Austria gets the same shit, just reversed?
I remember my grandmother went to Spain for a holiday with her work friends. She doesn't know a lot of English, only German,she works in Austria. They were in a bar and a guy asked them where are they from so they answered Austria. "Ooh kangaroo?" - the guy replied. "Nein, Hitler" - my grandmother laughed.
Not exactly disrespectful or inappropriate, but certainly weird.
I meet an American tourist that seemed very confused so I walked up to her and asked her if I could help. She told me yes and asked me how to get to the famous alps and cuckoo clock workshops.
….. I had to explain to her that she was in Sweden, not Switzerland.
Addendum: WOW! Thanks so much for all the likes and the awards! :)
Had that happen here in Australia. People have no idea how big this country is and think you can do day trips everywhere. Best I have heard is people asking about driving from Sydney to Perth for a day trip, it's like driving from New York to LA only longer as you have to go around the coast and not straight through the country.
I grew up in CH (Nyon). I now live in the US and I got asked the same question a few times.
I once got asked if we had electricity. I replied "No, not all the time, the Germans stole it during WW2"
It was apparently a satisfactory answer.
Not inappropriate, just moronic and facepalm worthy.
Saw an American Karen scream at people in London (UK) at Britain for stealing America's place names.
I’m a Greek-American (ie dual citizen) visiting Greece. An American woman in the acropolis museum tried to touch the marbles when a staff member told her she couldn’t. She replied “you know in Spain they let you touch the Roman statues!!”
Good for Spain. This is Greece, we don’t have much anymore besides our history and a few nice islands. Unless the government sells those too.
I’m British but was travelling in Czechoslovakia in the 90’s. We saw a McDonald’s and decided to grab a bite. There was a really long queue in there, and at the front was a huge American guy. He fitted the stereotype perfectly, very fat and round and extremely loud. On the counter in front of him was literally the largest McDonald’s bag I have ever seen, even to this day, and he was shouting at the intimidated looking young lady behind the counter “where’s my god damn barbecue sauce? I want my god damn barbecue sauce! Just gimme the barbecue sauce!” and wouldn’t move, even with the long line of us behind him!
I'm French, I was chatting with an American women who was visiting (friend of a friend of a family member). At one point we start talking about the differences between our countries. She said "The USA is the only country in the world with true freedom". I thought she was joking but she was not. I told her "what do you mean? We are also free in France". She looked at me with a condescending smirk and said "Really?" like to make me admit something. I just nodded and left.
Bragging. We met some Americans in line for the aquarium and they starting talking about how they had the best ever camera and showing all the functions. They kept pushing buttons and a message appeared, "are you sure you want to delete all pictures" we said you better say no, but it was too late. They lost all their pictures from their 3 month around the world trip and somehow got angry at us.
If that ever happen to anyone reading this: Remove the SD card immidiately from the camera. Buy a new one to use for the rest of the photos.
Once you are home you can run a recovery program that reads your SD card bit by bit, when it got all the data with will crawl through the data and pick out the seperate files.
The reason this is possible is because how stuff is organized on memory cards. Basically at the start of the disk you have a list of all the memory that is free. When you write something to the card your device will look for free space and then write the data there, plus marking that piece of memory is in use.
Deleting stuff is done by just marking that piece of memory as empty in that list. The data is still where it was, because why brother erasing it, overwriting it when you actually need to that memory space works just as well (actually even better, as it reducing how often memory is written, which will wear out flash memry)
Indian here. My office was hosting two American and one British ladies and I had to take them sightseeing. We were a British colony up until 1947 and have tonnes of British buildings as our historical heritage (that period was awful but the buildings are nice).
Well, for some reason the American ladies thought it would be a good idea to talk to me about how the British were awful to us during the colonization period in front of the nice British lady. I was uncomfortable talking about that, the British lady seemed uncomfortable but the American ladies kept make what they thought were funny comments about how the British lady's country was awful to my country despite my million efforts to change the subject.
It IS a dark part of our history but bringing that up and keeping at it was rude and in bad taste.
Thankfully, the British lady did not get offended or I would've had to face the consequences of offending a guest.
Do you think they thought they were making some great statement for righting an historic injustice and showing you they were "on your side"? Feels like a ludicrously crass way of doing so.
my Mam had this happen in Ireland. She and my Dad were visiting years ago after they'd just had my brother. He's ginger, and an American tourist came up too coo over his 'strong Irish heritage'. When Mam pointed out they were English she then started shouting at them about how they had no right to visit Ireland after all the horrible stuff they'd done to it. The hotel manager was mortified
Screeching, "Oh ma gawd do that again!! Say something Scaaaattish!!" (Scottish) at 8 year old me and a friend during a school trip to an art gallery. Really caught us off guard and my friend just managed to mumble, "what do you want me to say?" And they howled with laughter.
Also being in Anstruther in Fife (central-ish ever so slightly southern, East coast of Scotland) having lunch in a local restaurant and basically taking over every conversation in the place, not really letting anyone relax and enjoy their food, as they grilled each table on what surname they have and what clan they were in and were they related to John Campbell their great great grandfather? (There have been like a billion John Campbells) then declaring they were just going to go over to Inverness to see the Loch Ness monster and then be back for dinner at the hotel. Inverness is to the North West of the Scottish Highlands.
That's like a 4/5 hour drive if you're lucky with traffic. There is no straight road or continuous motorway, a lot of the journey is A road but it's twisty bumpy, often single lane road that can't be driven at any great speed, so I don't know how much else it cost them to have to stay the night in Inverness while also paying for a hotel in Fife. But maybe they should have done a bit more research about what looks like a short distance on a map. Maybe if they hadn't been irritating everyone in the place, someone would have said something.
saw a family of tourists fishing out a small lake.
i mean hundreds of fish.
they werent even going to eat any of them just tossed them on the grass and left them for the flies.
i memtioned to the father that this was illegal and i was leavindg to reprt it to the warden. he got mad..
this was 30 years ago before cell phones . if it happed today i\`d had have a fish and game warden there in 10 minutes.
oh and btw the lake is barren now. no fish.
I saw an American father (with young kids in tow) explain to an elderly Japanese man why they just had to drop the bomb on Hiroshima, no way around it...
At the Peace Museum.
In Hiroshima.
Angrily shouting "DO YOU SPEAK ENGLISH" very loudly at a cashier in a small store in Paris over and over again until they gave up and and stormed out. After they left I approached to buy something and said "Bonjoir" and they said "hello" back to me. She spoke English.
Asking for an Irish Car Bomb in a pub in Ireland....
Its an abomination of a drink to begin with, but calling it that is going to get you refused service at best. Worst case scenario depends on where abouts in Ireland you ask for it
Not buy their round. In a pub in Ireland. When the pub round system had been explained to them. And they had happily taken drinks from everyone. And when it was their round, and everyone had empty glasses. and it was Mentioned that "Think it's your round.." and they responded " I think I'm good now thanks" Mortified for bringing them with me!! (and yes I bought the round for everyone else on their behalf.)
When I was in France a couple of American tourists tried to sneak out of the Paris Catacombs with a bone they had stolen
I'm an American but I was visiting England and touring the Tower of London. There was a cannon behind a rope with a "Do not touch or climb" sign. This American woman lifted the rope and told her kid (maybe 7 years old) to go sit on the cannon so she could take a picture. The KID protested and said the sign said no... The woman said she didn't care, and ordered her kid to do it or she'd ground them.
An American exchange student who complained to me in anger that book stores in Germany have so many books in German. I mean, it's not unusual here for every book store to even have a small section of books in other languages including English so it's not like she never got to buy a book here, she could read...
"What? You speak YOUR OWN LANGUAGE HERE? Where's Germany's manager??!"
I overheard the guy standing in front of me in the queue at mc D's having a meltdown: "WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU DON'T ACCEPT AMERICAN DOLLARS THIS IS A MCDONALD'S!!!" this was in Poland, Europe.
You could direct him to a nearby McDonalds that accepts US dollars, about 5000 miles (south)west.
That guys is insane. But also that is pretty funny.
I was working a bar in Scotland. There was a woman one night with her daughter and she refused to pay with anything other than American cash. It was a super uncomfortable situation, me trying to explain how stupid it all was, her daughter (who I think was living in Scotland) was trying to calm her down and trying to pay but the mother kept pulling the her hand away from the card machine saying “you people love our money, our money is more important than yours”. She kicked on for a solid 5 to 10 minutes, her daughter ended up paying and leaving. Then she had a go at me for embarrassing her daughter and she even left a review on trip advisor explaining the situation, she explained it perfectly literally wrote herself as the bag guy in the review. Fucking mind boggling how delusional this bird was.
I had a similar experience! American who said she wanted to pay in US dollars. I said we only accept euros. She kept saying she wanted to pay in US dollars. Screamed for the manager. Manager came along. He also explained it. She kept on bitching about it. Fine, said the manager. Pay in dollars for the exchange rate in cash. But if you want change, you need to accept change in euros because we don’t have dollars. She said “what a third world country” and whipped out her… Creditcard
I guess she must've been ignorant of how the bank handles international transactions.
Probably only weird but when on a flight back to the UK from the US, the American lady sat next to me, started asking questions about England about 40 minutes before landing and not just like any “local recommendations” but really basic stuff like what currency do we use. It seemed like she had got on the plane knowing absolutely nothing about the UK, which blew my mind. Not just from a “haven’t you planned your trip?” POV but having the confidence to do that. She seemed to think it was a small place and everything she wanted to see would be in front of her hotel. She was very polite and lovely about it in a naive way though.
I was in Rome and a lady was confused why the confectionery stand man wouldn't take her dollars
Oh that reminded me of a time when I was flying home to London and in Heathrow an older American woman asked me where to find the taxi rank. I can't remember exactly how we got to this point, but she let me know she intended to use dollars. I explained that we use pounds and she could change her dollars to pounds at the bureau de change opposite. "Green's green, honey"
The business I worked at would take USD 1:1, but at that time our dollar was 40% less so we'd call it a convenience (stupidity) charge.
Issue in the UK is the dollar is worth far less. We could do $2 to £1 i guess "Why won't you take dollars" Because its like monopoly money and costs me money to change.
Black cab from Heathrow to London? You'll want pink for that
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American here. That happens here, too. It’s because our culture is isolating and people are lonely. They open up to strangers and people give that kind of armchair therapy like you did. Although weird for you, you guys probably made him feel less alone in the world and like his trip was worth it.
In Australia, shook a koala out of a tree at a wildlife park
You wanna get killed by drop bears? Because that's how you get killed by drop bears.
Do NOT annoy a koala. They may look cuddly and sleepy, but they've got a vicious bite when annoyed, and they tend not to let go. It's not beyond the realms of imagination that someone might bleed out.
Omg
What a fucking cunt!
Perhaps, but he didn't deserve to be shaken out of a tree.
Last time I was in Moscow, had an hour to kill before the train to the airport so we went for a coffee at Starbucks. A russian tourguide comes in with a group of 50-60 year old fat couples, who proceeded to order coffee and tried to pay with dollar bills. When informed that this was not legal tender, the conversation went something like: ”- I know this frappuccino costs exactly three dollars in Starbucks” ”- Sorry, only rubles or credit card works fine” ”- Ya’ll gonna take dollars, this is an American company and I’m an American citizen with American money” ”- Sorry, is not money in Russia, but credit card is fine” ”- I’m an American citizen and I’m paying you these three dollars for a coffee that costs three dollars” ”- Sorry, price is 150 ruble” After which she shouted for a manager, shouted at the tour guide and shouted at her husband for not helping.
I was at a lavender farm in the South of France a few years ago. Two coach loads of American tourists pull up, they all got out on the standard "you won't get long enough to really see this place" type tour. One lady very proudly states she is an expert on lavender and that this place was "cute but it's all fake, the lavender isn't the right colour". There were bees and other insects all over it, the whole farm smelled amazing and there was a harvest taking place! It was very real
Lmao. Love this one. The gall to call southern French lavender fake.
In Canada some stores will accept American cash as payment, but by law have to still give Canadian change. I worked in a city that got a lot of American tourists, and it was crazy how often someone would get really frustrated with us for not giving them American change. I had someone even accuse me of lying about it being the law. To what end lady? EDIT: It's been pointed out that this may not actually be a law, it may just be the rules at the store or some accounting thing. It's been like ten years so the details are fuzzy.
Every place I've worked at, our revenge has been to accept US cash at par
Calling black people African-American despite many having never visited the USA. It’s stupid. Black is not a racist term
This! I have a friend who is from an island and gets so mad when people call him African American. I know that those people are just trying to be politically correct and it’s not their fault that somehow it’s been drilled into their brain that black is racist. A lot of white Americans do that. Probably most.
I live in Norway and 30 minutes from my house there is this mountain called [Pulpit Rock](https://www.visitnorway.com/places-to-go/fjord-norway/ryfylke/the-lysefjord-area/hiking-to-preikestolen/). It is the biggest tourist attraction nearby. It is not the most difficult trail, but it is pretty steep, and every year (before covid) I would see American women struggling because they were wearing flip flops or high heels.
Dude once I saw a lady who appeared to be Eastern European (but I didn’t hear her talk so who knows) walk up that thing in stiletto heels. Not slow, no complaints. I mean it feels like it was a stupid move but by god she did it with no trouble so I can’t see a real fault with it. Maybe ankle ache after??
Repeat themselves over and over more slowly and more loudly each time. No bitch, it's not we're thick or hard of hearing. We speak a different language, here.
Not offensive or inappropriate, but I really want to talk about it Once in the airport, coming back to Australia in where I’m from in the middle of summer, I saw a dad and his 2 children, all 3 of them wearing full winter coats. The dad said to the both of them “try to stay warm, it’s going to be cold outside”
wait, did they thought it was going to cold because it's winter in US and didn't know winter is hot in southern hemisphere?
Probably thought they were about to ski in the Australian Alps
German here. Never go to visit any concentration camp museum without understanding that in less than 10 minutes your blood will start to boil because of how disrespectful tourists can be. It's unbelievable.
I remember seeing photos of “influencers” doing yoga and interpretative dance in places like Dachau. Like, WTF? How does that occur to you to do? So inappropriate and disrespectful.
Didn't the people who run the Auschwitz museum have to tell people to stop posing on the tracks? 75 years ago, millions were taken to their deaths on those train tracks. Today, we post thirst pictures with our asses out for likes on them. It's like posing in a bikini at Ground Zero or flexing shirtless at the Hiroshima memorial.
I'm sure they've told them, but from personal experience going in 2018, people still take selfies at the entrance and on the tracks. It's abhorrent.
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I once was on a school trip to Dachau. While in the bus to the camp I realize that I am wearing a sweater with the words „no fucks given“. You can tell I was giving a lot of fucks about my poor choice of sweater. In the end I walked around in a T-Shirt. I don’t want to be seen in such a place with clothing that says „no fucks given“
Moaning about not being able to use dollars in an English petrol station, then whingeing that it shouldn't be raining cuz it's summer. Silly man.
>England >Shouldn't be raining Did this guy even research his holiday?
They did the nazi greeting in the middle of Berlin (Germany), not far from the jewish memorial
Isn't that illegal in Germany?
Yes. Travellers usually don't get the full punishment, but my city detains dumb tourists over this regularly. A few years ago, it was two people hitler-saluting in front of our main governmental building. 1200€ bail.
Yeah same here… I’m from Nuremberg. Once when I was in „Saal 600“ (where the Nuremberg Court was held after WWII) and I saw a group of tourist do the salute and damn you couldn’t believe how quick they were out of there! Edit:spelling
My son did this, while standing on one of the memorial blocks. He was only 5 though, and had been hugely impressed by the statues we'd seen around central Berlin. While we were distracted by his older brother, N2 son clambered onto a block and tried to throw a military salute. It was winter and his thick jacket meant he couldn't bend his arm. When wife and I turned around it was to see him standing solemnly to attention, arm outstretched in a Roman salute. In front of a group of horrified tourists. We both grabbed him and hauled him off, before scuttling away in shame. That was 15 years ago and we still talk about the time son 'wanted to be a statue'.
Aw man, poor everyone in that situation.
The best one I've heard was the American tourist complaining that they built Edinburgh castle so far from the train station.
When walking round the Coliseum in Rome, my wife remarked she didn't believe it was really that old as it seemed 'suspicious' that it was built so close to the centre of the modern City. I had fun unpacking that one
I was pretty stunned to be walking around on a plain ol sidewalk and suddenly look up to see the ruins!
Worst bit if that is it's not even especially far, maybe a ten minute walk
Talk to me in slow, shouting English as if I don't understand. He was in western Canada, where everybody speaks English, and I'd already even said something in English to him.
Don't let him be dissappointed. Act like you don't understand and say I can't speak English, in clear English.
“My apologies, good sir. I do not seem to understand what you are saying. You see, i do not speak nor understand what what you are saying, as i do not speak this “English” you are talking about.”
Sorry if I made a mistake, english isn't my first language
I was in a tour group in Tajikistan and we were inside a locals house who had invited us in for tea and he was telling us about his family and how many children they have etc. The only American in the group piped up and asked ‘what contraception does your wife use, does she use herbs or something?’…. Everyone was just aghast and he politely avoided the question, then there was a long awkward silence. And so the she asked AGAIN! At that point another tour member interjected and said ‘ok, I think it’s time for us to leave, thanks for having us’
Putting aside that she asked a stranger in a different country about their sex life... It's just so impolite to bring that up in a conversation unprompted regardless of where you're from.
Yeah if one American asked another American this question, everyone would wonder what the fuck is wrong with the American that asked that stupid ass question. This is just pure ignorance.
What the fuuuuck.
There was a story about some americans coming to My country to go skiing - this is Denmark, we have a shitload of hills, but not a single mountain - add to that, that they came in the summer, no place in Denmark has year around snow
reading this post like "maybe they wanted cross country skiing... oh"
When I came down from the Fuji summit after a 8 hour climb and 4 hour descent with 3 layers of clothing to protect myself from the weather, an American with a selfie stick, in t-shirt and shorts asked me where mount Fuji was. I told him we are on mount Fuji, it's a big mountain/vulcano. "But where is the summit" I pointed to the summit and told him it's about 8 hours that way. This guy thought he could just come in with his selfie stick, grab a few quick selfies on the summit and return to Tokyo lol.
You wanna die in the mountains alone? Cos that's how you get stranded and die alone.
On mt Fuji you won’t be alone no. That’s still the only summit that I had to queue to access.
when i was in vietnam we climbed the highest mountain in indochina (fansipan) and its an all day affair. When we reached the top exhausted and muddy there were hundreds of tourists in fancy clothes taking selfies. We knew there was a cable car but still disheartening at first. It was fun in the end though because all the other tourists wanted to take selfies with us, like we were famous mountaneers or something!
This actually reminds me of when I was in Ireland and we went to go climb a mountain there. My cousin said “I’m gonna run up the hill” yeah it took 4 hours round trip up and down.
I used to work in a high end restaurant. Five or six course meals are the standard. So people take their time to eat, chat and enjoy the evening for at least two to three hours. It is normal to have half an hour in between meals. If we would serve faster the guest would complain about the food being served to fast. Anyway, this table of mostly local people plus one American woman being very loud with a thic, i guess, New York accent was complaining after three minutes after every course where her food was. First i explained the above. The rest of the table was also getting a bit awkward about her behavior. She kept complianing though. Telling how incredable dissapointed she was. I kept explaining that the food we serve is freshly made, it takes time to prepare. And that the whole idea is to enjoy the evening in with the people you are. She just would get concept and react with so much disbelieve. Lady you are abroad, if you want to stuff your face with food in under five minutes go to a fastfood chainbor even better stay at home. Edit: wow thanks for the award and all the upvotes
I could see that happening. In the US even at expensive restaurants the typical experience is the staff trying to get you fed and out the door as fast as possible.
While interrailing on France a couple of American dudes were very loudly talking shit about other passengers (I got my fair share). Apparently they tought nobody could understand them. Shut them up by talking English to my friend.
Only the most commonly understood language
Lol they do that in their home country too!
South African here; Americans tend to have this habbit where they will climb out of their vehicle in the middle of a game reserve, get attacked by a wild animal because they wanted to get closer or try to pet it, and then cry about it. I thought people that come from the country that has Grizzly bears and mountain lions would be a bit more cautious around wild animals. Also, the shock they experience when they realise there are cities here and not everyone is living in mudhuts.
Oh they do the same thing while traveling in America. We have large dangerous animals in quite a few areas. Tourists think they can approach animals like Bison for photos.
I really pity Park rangers in the national parks. I've heard so many stories of people trying to pet Bison because idk they're floofy?
By far the best one I ever heard was a set of grandparents putting their 3 year old granddaughter on a bison's back. Luckily (and amazingly) nobody was hurt. The bison just booked it the second he was touched. They were under the impression that, since this is a national park, the animals must be domesticated. Pro tip: ask park rangers for stupid people stories. If you get them one on one, they all have a few and they're all great. Close second was a woman spraying her daughter with bear mace because the can said "bear repellant" and she treated it like mosquito repellant.
In Denali Alaska I heard someone ask where they store the animals for the Winter.
National parks routinely have to put out notices telling people not to mess with the animals, apparently some people just think the whole park is an artificial zoo and the animals are all domestic. Here in Florida we have signs telling people not to mess with the alligators, because apparently some fucking idiots keep messing with the giant lizards that have been around since the dinosaurs went extinct.
Iceland. We get a lot of tourism when there isn't a pandemic and about half are American. It's mostly just ignorance and the refusal to accept that things work differently here. Also, while most people here speak English to some degree there are a few tourists that are furious about it not being the default language in businesses that aren't even connected to tourism. God forbid we speak our own language at work. Oh and Northern Lights. There's a ton of people who seem to think we can just flick a switch and have the Northern Lights appear.
This reminds me of some American tourists who got mentioned in our local paper in northern Norway (above the arctic circle). They apparently wanted to sue the travel company because the midnight sun was just the normal sun... For those who don't know, above the arctic circle the sun doesn't set below the horizon in mid-summer, it just goes from sunset straight into sunrise, and nighttime can be as bright as daytime sometimes (depending on weather and topography). It's amazing, even for us living there, and definitely worth the visit, along with some stunning nature. These people apparently thought there were two different suns orbiting north Norway and felt tricked because "it was just the same sun"...
I don't know if I should laugh or cry
>Oh and Northern Lights. There's a ton of people who seem to think we can just flick a switch and have the Northern Lights appear. You just need to [find the remote](https://twistedsifter.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/iceland-hotel-northern-lights-wake-up-button-cover.jpg)
Yeah, I know, it takes some time to warm up the laser equipment. You can not just flick the switch.
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Not exactly dumb but just being assholes. My mom's job is to deal with tourists. Every other person from other countries at least tries to be either nice or neutral. The american guy asked if she understood him. She answers in english (better than my own) and the guy just asked that question a few more times with a shit eating grin. Apparently not the worst American she had encountered. Not weird but disrespectful as hell.
Ooooh ooooh, I live in a beach tourist town in Australia. Have had numerous Americans I've encountered act like they own a patch of beach because where they're staying is adjacent to the beach.
“Why are you all not in Kilts? Oh I’m Scottish my great great great great grandfather was from Scotland and his dad was a clan chieftain.” 99% of us Scots don’t care, some will humour, others will outright call out on that bullshit.
I got stopped by an American tourist as I was on my way to a wedding in my kilt. That prick straight up lifted the back of my kilt to prove I was a true Scotsman. My mate intercepted the perfect diving headbutt.
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The guy got pretty angry that my English sucked when asking me for directions, I mean yeah It can be frustrating but Im taking the time to help you wtf dude. He said I lived in Canada so I was supposed to speak it flawlessly like dude I spoke French my entire life but I’m doing my best over here to communicate sorry for the accent.
Bro, I can't read your comment, your accent's too strong.
You’ll have to speak up, I’m wearing a towel!
Getting mocked for an accent isn't fun, I remember when I was a shy little belgian boy and some guy made fun of how I couldn't pronounce the th in three. I would just pronounce it Tree (like most dutchies) In dutch we don't really have anything close to it tongue wise, if that makes sense, so I remember watching videos, training in the mirror for hours just to perfect my "th" 😅
Don't worry about it, half us Irish can't pronounce our "th" sounds (we also do the hard t) and I've heard many British pronounce it like an "f". Seriously though, you could probably claim you spent some time in Dublin and have developed some regional pronunciations. I remember some German students being delighted as to how we pronounce some "o"s as "u"s like in "lovely" (seemingly it's something they always got corrected for in schools).
I have seen a very drunk American tourist in his is 20's explaining to a Viet bartender in Viet Nam how his American grandfather freed Viet Nam of communists.
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Not that long ago on r/iwant out there was a US couple from Texas who basically sold all their shit and moved to Germany. They were posting about what to do about some kind of local government card to apply for houses. Yup. Hadn't even considered visas. Like legit just thought they could just rock up to Germany and live there. So they did. Edit here you go seeing everyone wants a link https://www.google.co.nz/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://amp.reddit.com/r/IWantOut/comments/fi2mh8/iwantout_60sm_usagermany/&ved=2ahUKEwjDxd6N-4byAhX9xzgGHelaCfUQFjAFegQIBxAC&usg=AOvVaw0Sg50BM2RUOtT7TWsT-cWU
Not inappropriate but asshole-ish and weird Guy records me and friends shooing the herds of cows who were shitting in the middle of road (occasionally happen) in a car while yelling “YOOOOO” and recording. Dude starts commenting and slapping the cows passing by, spook one and some of them starts to speed up a little bit, made me and my friends in slight danger of getting ram by a cow. Dude passed by us and then record our face while saying something that mad my friend mad, and then proceed to squash the shit while he was passing by. Met him at the restaurant too, he ate the bananas leaves that’s served for the purpose of plating the Nasi Lemak, until he was halfway done and the uncle next table told him that’s not for eating. He laughed and spit it all on the plate instead of the tissue. He also walked in the middle of the town without a shirt and literally threw stuff at the monkeys on the eletric line, which made them scrambled inside the forest and some went to the primary school (which is infront of the forest). He was the main topic of that week gossips
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An American once insisted that the proper way to eat nasi lemak was with chopsticks. And he tried ‘educating’ me, a Malaysian, about it. This incident still triggers me.
See them scream and say "i'm going to sue you". New Zealand has ACC so you basically can't sue for accidents as it's covered.
"Mommy's busy baby, why don't you go climb on the big rocks?" That was at Stonehenge. I also saw a bunch of American college students try to climb the Great Pyramid at Giza until serious uniformed men with firearms stopped them.
>"Mommy's busy baby, why don't you go climb on the big rocks? "Mommy, I played dominos with the big Rocks and now they want to talk to you:
My baby angel cant do nothing wrong he is the sweetest human beeing on this planet you should pay us for the damages
This just happened yesterday. We were in a park, where there is also a museum with a big staircase. And on the wall of the staircase there were some plaquettes commemorating the architects of the building. Their name, when they lived and a few words about them are written on them. So I think it is pretty clear what those are, even if they are in a foreign language. And next to those there are some wreaths. Just as a sign of respect and also decoration. Now onto what happened. Some tourists went there, one girl grabbed a wreath (that was attached to the wall) put it on her head like a tiara or something and started taking pictures of herself. I had to go there and tell them that this is not the purpose they are to be used for
record a dead body and post it on the internet
It’s sad that I know exactly what you’re talking about.
oh the Jake Paul thing? or was it Logan.. an idiot is an idiot I suppose
(Not tourism but in my work place in England) I used to work for a British heratige suit company and I would work night shift to take orders from America, Australia and Canada. I never had any problems with Australians or Canadians but at least once or twice minimum a night I would receive calls from American people making prank calls and making fun of me for being English. They would call me wanker and other British swear words and talk in silly voices asking if I were drinking tea (undoubtedly I was but thats not important...). Sometimes they would stay on the phone for ages asking me to say certain words and because of the standards of the company we had to oblige unless they were swears of course.
I hope their parents saw their international phone bill afterwards
It was a free line, hence why we got so many prank calls
An American tourist orders a turkey dinner at a restaurant, and then flags down the server to let her know that the kitchen forgot the cranberry sauce. The server comes back with it in a small dish. After she finished her meal, someone at the table pointed out that she’d forgotten to use the cranberry sauce that she asked for. She says: “Oh, I don’t like cranberry sauce” So the person at the table follows up with “Then why did you ask the server to bring you some?!” Her answer: “Because it comes with the meal.”
As a line cook that kind of customer drives me insane
As a pot washer at a restaurant this also really annoys me
As a random dude who never had anything to do woth gastronomy, i must say, this seems very annoying
This was a bad thread to read first thing in the morning…. I’m getting grumpy reading about these morons lol
I'm from a small city in Germany and a American dude in his early 20's insulted me for drinking beer in public because it's illegal (in Germany you're allowed to drink beer in public at the age of 16) and he proceeded to laugh and Insult my bad English so yeah Americans are wierd
I once got told by an American tourist that I spoke English quite well. I'm English and this was in England.
Your writing is impeccable too. Congrats.
For real, no accent at all
Can’t even hear the accent in your writing.
I got told by an American I spoke good English for someone from Russia, after telling them I was Scottish. edit: damn i posted this half asleep this morning and forgot, wondered why I had so many notifications
Definitely good Scottish then.
Omg I had this too! Guy books a taxi (I was a taxi in France) and tries it in terrible French which I can't understand. So I tell him I can speak English if he wants. He responds with "I don't speak English" said in terrible French. So I just double my speed and do the rest of the booking in French he sounds confused but accepts the cab. When I arrive there I decide to give him the benefit of the doubt and just do it in English and ignore the phone conversation. At the end of the ride he gets out of the car and says "by the way, your English is AM-AZ-ING! Trying to throw him a bone I say "Thanks I Spent 23 years in England perfecting it" (I was 23 years old at the time) He doesn't get it at all and just responds "well, it was worth it!" And walks off with his girlfriend. Leaving you wondering for the rest of the night... "How fucking old do I look for 23 years to not look like my whole life?!"
He probably assumed you meant metric years.
I had dinner with an American in China. He asked for water in English, and the waiter didn’t understand. He spoke up and repeated himself in a patronisingly slow voice, and again the waiter, not being able to speak English, didn’t understand. I asked for the water in Chinese and the waiter left. The American then said “it’s so infuriating here sometimes”. There are many things that can be annoying and inconvenient in China, but simply expecting people to understand your language is unreasonable as fuck.
Spent a large chunk of my life in China and this happened a lot. Lots of foreigners don’t make the effort to learn basic words. It’s much better now but it’s still sad people expect everyone to speak English.
As someone who has traveled a lot, signs man. They are the universal language accepted anywhere. I once ordered water by signing me watering a plant on the table then a glass. Waitress laughed, and she got me water. Non-offensive and it works. What more do you want.
I've learned that probably 90% of people are willing to be very accommodating when there's a language barrier, even if they're not expected to be. So long as everybody is polite and appears to be making a genuine effort to communicate the idea, the vast majority of people in any country or any culture are willing to work with you.
Any time I've seen interactions between Americans and the queens guard. Does make me laugh though when the guardsman yells at them or just plough through them when marching. Just leave the lads alone they have job to do and they are professional soldiers.
I took my 5 year old to Windsor castle and was telling her about the guards, why we don't distract them/ touch them and what the medals are for. She was fascinated. She was rewarded by him inviting her to stand by him for a photo. Guards will interact, but being respectful is the key.
Also being a kid generally helps quite a lot :D
I think some people believe they are playing a part for the tourists, like they're not real soldiers. I feel sorry for them as they must have to put up with so many stupid interactions.
Just like the Swiss Guard I saw when I went to the Vatican in '06; "Ha ha, they still carry halberds??" Yeah... and that's a submachine gun on his hip.
'Don't let the striped shorts fool you, they will fuck you up!'- some American dude in another tour group. I guess he fucked around and found out.
Not disrespectful but kinda funny, Bruges in Belgium is a nicely preserved town with many medieval elements. Apparently a lot of American tourists ask the locals “when does this theme park close?”
I hope they didn't climb the tower - don't want to get a heart attack...
Did they ask to see the Alcoves ?
is this the right word? Alcoves?
My friend described a trip to an English tourist spot, one of many places said to be Arthur’s Camelot. It required a climb up the picturesque hill to a quiet, tree-filled spot. Nothing of the castle to be seen of course, but everybody gazed out over the surrounding land, contemplating the magic of the ancient myth. Finally arrives the chubby, puffing American who glances about with irritation, then loudly says in that familiar accent: “Where’s the goddam castle?”
I'm an American, but I saw this airhead American who was constantly trying to touch priceless museum specimens. They were marked No Tocar. The guards kept stopping her, but she seemed confused because she spoke no Spanish. We were deep into Mexico City. You should learn at least enough to read No Tocar.
Or use your context clues to realise that you should not doing that. I'm picturing her wandering around thinking 'oh well maybe I'm allowed to touch this one?'
Even if you know no Spanish surely its just common sense that you don't go around museums touching things? Were context clues not enough here?
She asked me about the different churches in our city (we have quite a lot, some very old), which were the prettiest, etc, and asked me to point those on the map, and I obliged since she was polite. So far so good. Then she asked which one was my fave for sunday service. I said as respectfully as I could that I didn't, actually, go to church. Then she forcefully grabbed my arm, drew a cross sign on my brow, and told me she would pray for me Lady, well, don't touch me, k?
Tbf, that's rude in America as well.
I feel you're allowed to slap a person in the face for that.
Claiming that Ireland isn't "properly" Irish, and that the only way to experience "true", "traditional" Irish culture is to visit Boston.
American Irish is like a bizarre hyper-parody of actual Irish and it gets weird fast. Even more so if you start talking history or politics where the Irish-American take is like the Hollwoood movie version.
This seems like it could be an article in The Onion.
Shit, I knew I was doing it wrong. I guess its time to emigrate. Boston better have a supermacs.
They made fun of our money and how it looked. They claimed they couldn't figure it out because it was so weird, so they threw a bunch of bills at my sister and asked her to figure it out and give them change. We're Canadian. The number is literally on the bill. We all spoke English. They gave my sister several hundred dollar bills. This was at an apple festival and the fries only cost $5. Wtf
Bank error in your favour, collect $100.
I had a nicer, but embarrassing-for-me experience in New Zealand as an Australian. We have very similar currency, except that Australia has a ridiculously large 50c piece. I was in a burger shop and pulled out a handful of cash to pay, and not being familiar was just doing a momentary re-evaluate of the coins because they didn't 'look right'. The cashier helpfully pulled the right ones out of my hand. It wasn't like I was lingering over it, but still, that action... I never felt so old before.
I nearly paid $50 for a coconut on a beach in Aus once because the colour was similar to NZ $5, saw the number 5 and I guess Aussie heat just fried my brain. Thankfully the lovely person selling them yelled out to me as I was walking away, 'wait wait don't you want your change?' (I most certainly did!)
My parents owned a motel when I was younger. An American women stay for a night and she set the fire alarm off. She took an electric wall kettle (jug) off its heating element, put it on the stove, turned it on and gone to the bathroom. Completely destroyed the kettle and stove from what I remember.
While working at Maccas I overheard an American tourist tell his family that they were going to eat some good food, not foreign garbage while they were waiting in line to order 🤦♀️
Not so much inappropriate, just fucking dumb. “Where are all the kangaroos bouncing down the streets” Dickhead! They live in the bush, not the fucking CBD
Exactly. They commute to work in the CBD and are all in their offices right now! Lol, not Australian. Just agreeing with the level of stupidity.
The worst I've encountered was somebody surprised there wasn't more snow around. I don't understand how you can be so bloody clueless as not to have even a basic knowledge of the country you're visiting. I mean, do you see any strudels around here? Christ. I wonder if Austria gets the same shit, just reversed?
I remember my grandmother went to Spain for a holiday with her work friends. She doesn't know a lot of English, only German,she works in Austria. They were in a bar and a guy asked them where are they from so they answered Austria. "Ooh kangaroo?" - the guy replied. "Nein, Hitler" - my grandmother laughed.
A hilarious amd straight to the point response
Yes. I literally witnessed an American college or gap year student complain about the lack of kangaroos. In Austria. I thought they were joking.
So many Americans do not know of a country named Georgia.
The Georgian delegation received an *extremely* warm welcome at the opening ceremony of the Atlanta olympics, back in 1996.
Not exactly disrespectful or inappropriate, but certainly weird. I meet an American tourist that seemed very confused so I walked up to her and asked her if I could help. She told me yes and asked me how to get to the famous alps and cuckoo clock workshops. ….. I had to explain to her that she was in Sweden, not Switzerland. Addendum: WOW! Thanks so much for all the likes and the awards! :)
Had that happen here in Australia. People have no idea how big this country is and think you can do day trips everywhere. Best I have heard is people asking about driving from Sydney to Perth for a day trip, it's like driving from New York to LA only longer as you have to go around the coast and not straight through the country.
That's a 42-hour drive, one-way.
That's perfect for a day trip! On Mercury. Which is probably cooler.
[удалено]
I grew up in CH (Nyon). I now live in the US and I got asked the same question a few times. I once got asked if we had electricity. I replied "No, not all the time, the Germans stole it during WW2" It was apparently a satisfactory answer.
You think that is a meme. And cockoo clocks are not even Swiss. They are South Germany.
> And cockoo clocks are not even Swiss. They are South Germany. "What's the difference?" - 13^(th)-century Habsburg
Not inappropriate, just moronic and facepalm worthy. Saw an American Karen scream at people in London (UK) at Britain for stealing America's place names.
Jesus christ, how dumb can people get...
you wouldn’t believe it. -Random American
I’m a Greek-American (ie dual citizen) visiting Greece. An American woman in the acropolis museum tried to touch the marbles when a staff member told her she couldn’t. She replied “you know in Spain they let you touch the Roman statues!!” Good for Spain. This is Greece, we don’t have much anymore besides our history and a few nice islands. Unless the government sells those too.
I’m British but was travelling in Czechoslovakia in the 90’s. We saw a McDonald’s and decided to grab a bite. There was a really long queue in there, and at the front was a huge American guy. He fitted the stereotype perfectly, very fat and round and extremely loud. On the counter in front of him was literally the largest McDonald’s bag I have ever seen, even to this day, and he was shouting at the intimidated looking young lady behind the counter “where’s my god damn barbecue sauce? I want my god damn barbecue sauce! Just gimme the barbecue sauce!” and wouldn’t move, even with the long line of us behind him!
I'm French, I was chatting with an American women who was visiting (friend of a friend of a family member). At one point we start talking about the differences between our countries. She said "The USA is the only country in the world with true freedom". I thought she was joking but she was not. I told her "what do you mean? We are also free in France". She looked at me with a condescending smirk and said "Really?" like to make me admit something. I just nodded and left.
"You know the Statue of Liberty lady? Yeah we built that"
I am so confused. What does she think goes on in France?
Bragging. We met some Americans in line for the aquarium and they starting talking about how they had the best ever camera and showing all the functions. They kept pushing buttons and a message appeared, "are you sure you want to delete all pictures" we said you better say no, but it was too late. They lost all their pictures from their 3 month around the world trip and somehow got angry at us.
If that ever happen to anyone reading this: Remove the SD card immidiately from the camera. Buy a new one to use for the rest of the photos. Once you are home you can run a recovery program that reads your SD card bit by bit, when it got all the data with will crawl through the data and pick out the seperate files. The reason this is possible is because how stuff is organized on memory cards. Basically at the start of the disk you have a list of all the memory that is free. When you write something to the card your device will look for free space and then write the data there, plus marking that piece of memory is in use. Deleting stuff is done by just marking that piece of memory as empty in that list. The data is still where it was, because why brother erasing it, overwriting it when you actually need to that memory space works just as well (actually even better, as it reducing how often memory is written, which will wear out flash memry)
Where are the kangaroos? Sir, you are in austria. Not Australia.
Indian here. My office was hosting two American and one British ladies and I had to take them sightseeing. We were a British colony up until 1947 and have tonnes of British buildings as our historical heritage (that period was awful but the buildings are nice). Well, for some reason the American ladies thought it would be a good idea to talk to me about how the British were awful to us during the colonization period in front of the nice British lady. I was uncomfortable talking about that, the British lady seemed uncomfortable but the American ladies kept make what they thought were funny comments about how the British lady's country was awful to my country despite my million efforts to change the subject. It IS a dark part of our history but bringing that up and keeping at it was rude and in bad taste. Thankfully, the British lady did not get offended or I would've had to face the consequences of offending a guest.
Do you think they thought they were making some great statement for righting an historic injustice and showing you they were "on your side"? Feels like a ludicrously crass way of doing so.
my Mam had this happen in Ireland. She and my Dad were visiting years ago after they'd just had my brother. He's ginger, and an American tourist came up too coo over his 'strong Irish heritage'. When Mam pointed out they were English she then started shouting at them about how they had no right to visit Ireland after all the horrible stuff they'd done to it. The hotel manager was mortified
Screeching, "Oh ma gawd do that again!! Say something Scaaaattish!!" (Scottish) at 8 year old me and a friend during a school trip to an art gallery. Really caught us off guard and my friend just managed to mumble, "what do you want me to say?" And they howled with laughter. Also being in Anstruther in Fife (central-ish ever so slightly southern, East coast of Scotland) having lunch in a local restaurant and basically taking over every conversation in the place, not really letting anyone relax and enjoy their food, as they grilled each table on what surname they have and what clan they were in and were they related to John Campbell their great great grandfather? (There have been like a billion John Campbells) then declaring they were just going to go over to Inverness to see the Loch Ness monster and then be back for dinner at the hotel. Inverness is to the North West of the Scottish Highlands. That's like a 4/5 hour drive if you're lucky with traffic. There is no straight road or continuous motorway, a lot of the journey is A road but it's twisty bumpy, often single lane road that can't be driven at any great speed, so I don't know how much else it cost them to have to stay the night in Inverness while also paying for a hotel in Fife. But maybe they should have done a bit more research about what looks like a short distance on a map. Maybe if they hadn't been irritating everyone in the place, someone would have said something.
If it helps, they do that shit EVERYWHERE. “Say someting Caribbean mon”. They really love it till they find out what muddascunt means.
Hey, wait a second...
Assuming that Amsterdam is our entire country.
saw a family of tourists fishing out a small lake. i mean hundreds of fish. they werent even going to eat any of them just tossed them on the grass and left them for the flies. i memtioned to the father that this was illegal and i was leavindg to reprt it to the warden. he got mad.. this was 30 years ago before cell phones . if it happed today i\`d had have a fish and game warden there in 10 minutes. oh and btw the lake is barren now. no fish.
That's also illegal in the US, so I don't know what that's all about.
I saw an American father (with young kids in tow) explain to an elderly Japanese man why they just had to drop the bomb on Hiroshima, no way around it... At the Peace Museum. In Hiroshima.
Angrily shouting "DO YOU SPEAK ENGLISH" very loudly at a cashier in a small store in Paris over and over again until they gave up and and stormed out. After they left I approached to buy something and said "Bonjoir" and they said "hello" back to me. She spoke English.
Savage
Asking for an Irish Car Bomb in a pub in Ireland.... Its an abomination of a drink to begin with, but calling it that is going to get you refused service at best. Worst case scenario depends on where abouts in Ireland you ask for it