Stoopie Americans...
i work in a co-op in yorkshire, a few weeks ago a middle aged couple came to my till to be served. i put their things through and told them the total. the male looked at me like i was stupid and said "did you know in america they pack this for me?" and i said "Well i don't get paid enough so get packing it yourself!". His wife laughed! :D
(mufin_man, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 17:09, Reply)

Just for you:
I just got back from a visa trip in Japan today. While there, I intended to figure out and say the dumbest-assed thing a tourist could say there, and I think I succeeded.

We were eating pizza in a weird western-through-a-funhouse-mirror-themed restaurant, and when the cheque arrived at the end, I said, "Now whur's mah fortune cookie?"

Of course nobody around understood English.
(racetraitor has an alibi for, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 16:55, Reply)

....
I went to Gambia on an educational with the Gambian Tourist Board.

We was being shown round a resort that had alot of woodland. The guide said to us that we may come across monkeys.

About 5 seconds later I spotted a movement in the bushes and because I was excited I shouted to the rest of my group, "there's a monkey, theres a monkey" everyone crowded round to look at the monkey who turned out to be a Gambian man cleaning up the forest, he had a pitchfork to his side, his hand on his hip just giving me an evil look.

I seriously didnt see him there I just saw the movement in the tree's. The whole trip was spent with the rest of the group thinking I was a cockney BNP member!
(Fran, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 16:54, Reply)

Another good American one
Standing in a queue with my mother at a checkout we overheard some Americans say:

"Well, of course the Americans invented all the best stuff. TV, cars and Scotch."
(Japes, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 16:46, Reply)

Living in Albuquerque
While I was in Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA last year, a lot of Americans asked where abouts in Australia I was from. But the question that really took the biscuit was:

"What language do you speak in England?"
I told the girl that if you think about it (which she clearly hadn't/couldn't) it made sense that the English would speak English.
"Oh. I thought you guys spoke French."
(Japes, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 16:41, Reply)

Outside the (clearly marked) Foggy Bottom-GWU metro stop
An English couple stopped me to inquire as to the whereabouts of the closest metro station.


I sent them off in the opposite direction and went merrily off to lunch. Having originally come from "Flor-ee-duh" I'm more than accustomed to dealing with annoying touristy types. Outside of the standard fat white midwesterners with too many kids and those damned mouse hats, the Japanese tourists who wear all-black and ask where the beaches are at are the worst.

I like how they always have nice cameras though.
(grumperfish, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 16:37, Reply)

sluff
i spent most of my kiddie life in a town around 15 miles from slough, and everyone there used to call it sluff as a way of putting it down, partly because, as anyone who has been there will know, its more nasty than yo' mumma.

ie:

me : what you up to tonight?
mate : aw i've gotta go to bloody sluff, been roped into watching my sister play
me : rightoh. have fun, mind ya dont get stabbed..

perhaps the tourists picked it up on their way thru windsor?
(5lab, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 16:31, Reply)

american tourists
In Cambridge I was walking down Sidney Street during my lunch hour and two gorgeous young American girls asked me where the nearest internet cafe was. I politely gave them directions to one just along from the Corn Exchange, and they thanked me and went on their way.

Can you believe they didn't ask me to come back to their place for a threesome? The stupidity!
( djtrialprice, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 16:19, Reply)

Smollensky's
in the strand.
American woman: "can you tell me what exactly Banana Cream Pie is"

Waitress: "what one of the three words are you having a problem with"

waitress was sacked
(Carling in a Stella glass Sky high and six thousand miles away, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 16:19, Reply)

Where the hell do they come from?
I was in St Ives market in Cambridgeshire today. It was busy, there were market stalls selling everything from fruit & veg to dodgy Gucci sunglasses. People everywhere, get the picture. Some thick Froggy bird actually came up and asked me "Is zees ze market place?" Where the hell did she think she was? In a park, in the cinema, up a fucking chimney or what? Of course I didn't actually say that to her, I just nodded and called her a cunt.
( Captn Hood-Butter is not dead yet., Mon 11 Jul 2005, 16:14, Reply)

myohmy
If everything was pronounced exactly the way it looked, we'd be short about half a QOTW, now wouldn't we?
(deilbfe6ogcshnbcryjh, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 15:59, Reply)

lochs and guitars
1) Its LOCH ness, not "Lock" ness, its not a lake, its a loch!! And I havn't seen nessie either...

2) A friend's dad started selling guitars on ebay. They were going for around £30, and an american, who obviously didnt understand the concept of currency exchange, thought that was $30. The american got so confused that my friends dad just said "tell you what, you just give me $20 and we'll cancel the order. Which he did. I suppose this isnt really tourist related, ah well.
(uncle_bob, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 15:49, Reply)

We English are just as dumb!
On my jollies to Cancun, Mexico, my boyf and I were chatting away to a few London Lads about the jabs and crap we had to have before we went away. One of them was complaining and came out with "What do you need typhoid shot for anyways, whats the worst that could happen?"

"erm........ you could die!!!!"

Classic
(bectoria, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 15:43, Reply)

oh, and one more...
More Americans...

"What time does the one 'o clock gun go off?"
( blindmelon, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 15:38, Reply)

ugh
American couple in Edinburgh looking at the castle from Princes Street:

Moron 1: "Wow, Edinburgh castle's really something!"

Moron 2: "Yeah... It's a shame they had to build it so close to the train station though."
( blindmelon, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 15:37, Reply)

More Cruelty than Stupidity, really
If you know Oxford, you may know the Martyrs Memorial.
www.ac-orleans-tours.fr/anglais-liens/siteoutils/images/Oxford/insitu/MaxiMartyrsMemorial0.jpg

Or, if you're feeling goadful, it's the spire of a wonderful underground Cathedral - access is via the steps just to the side of it...which take you into some grotty loos :)
( 0nyx, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 15:37, Reply)

Summer job
I spent one summer working at a local aquatic theme park. Needless to say, people from just about everywhere in the world came by, and I was often asked classic questions such as...
*"What time is the 11 o'clock show?" (I'd make them walk all the way to the front of the park to get a show schedule).
*"Where's Pearl Harbor?" (That's in Hawaii, not Ohio.)
*"Why the hell don't the souvineer fans have batterries?" (I forgot that it was MY fault)
(pk, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 15:36, Reply)

Oh the lies i have to tell..
This isnt a lie! or maybe it is... anyway my mums hubby is lebanese and i have been informed that all of his family in beirut think we live in london because thats the only place that they have heard of in england and we dont want to confuse them...so.. i live in london...actually i live at the other end of the country (vaguely) in a place called hull... nobody cares about hull.. not even me...okay this isnt about tourists, but if they came over, theyd be tourists...kinda..
(Salbo_baggins, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 15:28, Reply)

urgggg.
Ugh, I have quite a few of these stories, though I won't torture you all with them:

-Going southbound on the Northern Line when a (english!) girl yelled 'DOES THIS GO TO STAINES?'. It probably wouldn't have been so bad had this not been the tube, which has maps of the route plastered ALL OVER THE PLACE.

-I used to live in Iceland, and would go with my parents to visit family in America. Some of the questions I used to get there were terrible, such as 'ICELAND?! WHAT STATE IS THAT IN?!' and 'Is it true that Greenland is icy and Iceland is green?!!??!?!'. Whyyyyyy. I also used to get calls from people in the states attempting to get through to their son in the military or whatever, completely not understanding the concept of time zones and being unable to absorb the fact that it can indeed be 3 in the morning when it's only 8 pm in western america. *cries*
(froffee, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 15:27, Reply)

One of our own!
A friend of mine who lives in Kent came up to stay with me in London for the week. While travelling the tube, she would become very quiet after the 'Please Mind The Gap' tannoy spoke (ladies voice version). After a while she piped up 'Is that the Queen???'.

Very loudly.

On a packed train.

I think even the American tourists were laughing.
(Mogg Questioned her own sanity on, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 15:22, Reply)

2 reasons to be careful while ordering food in Spain:

1) Pollo is chicken, polla is 'willy'. This one is so frequently mispronounced that the butchers round here don't even bother taking the piss anymore.
2) Conejo is rabbit, cojones are testicles.
(halfcut, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 15:16, Reply)

Not me, but...
A friend of a friend is a policeman, and was recently accosted by a pair of American tourists whilst walking the beat in London. The conversation went something like this,

"Why does the pelican crossing beep when it's ok to cross?" (tourist)

"It's so that blind people know when the lights are on red" (coppa)

"Thats amazing! In my country blind people aren't allowed to drive!" (tourist)

Genius. Sheer genius.
(Hobbit, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 15:15, Reply)

Lost in Translation
Never ask an American if you can bum a fag off them.

They won't think you're just after a cigarette.

oops.
(emma_fisi, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 15:07, Reply)

minkymonkey
The line "Do you have any more Henges?" was uttered as an example of tourist ignorance, but this is actually a valid question. In Larkhill, just 3 miles away from Stonehenge, there is a small English Heritage site where "Woodhenge" used to be.
( djtrialprice, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 14:59, Reply)

My sister ...
who isn't at all American, but instead lives in Manchester.

Went to stay with her and hubby at their new house and they took us to the newish Imperial War Museum building at Salford Quays. (http://www.manchester2002-uk.com/museums/museums2a.html)

As you now know, the rather interesting building is made up of 3 'shards' representing conflict on land, sea and air.

What it certainly doesn't represent is 70's funkmeisters Earth, Wind & Fire, which is what my sister would have you believe. Laugh, I nearly fell off the nearby Lowry Bridge (which incidentally, was designed by the same architect.

Informing AND entertaining, all in one post.
(Throbbe, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 14:44, Reply)

It's long, I know...
I was born and live in Lisbon, a small, pretty simple city where you can find tourists all times of the year, but since Spain is right next to Portugal, we don’t really get that many Americans - the ‘usuals’ are mostly British or Dutch, ‘cause they know they’ll get just as much sun over here as in “Aye-bee-tha!” (slaps forehead)
The Americans we DO get seem to be completely baffled and behave like they just landed on Pluto.
This story isn’t really funny, but it’s just a testimony of how annoying it can be when people don’t even make an effort to remember they’re the ones visiting a foreign country...
I was waiting for the bus on one of our very busy squares at about 7h30 pm, which means there are LOADS of people still trying to get home (many of them students and businessmen/women; how is this relevant? …Read on).
A very loud, very pale-skinned and quite large American family are trying to catch some sort of transportation to a landmark by the river.
Well, if you’re in a country where the language is as unknown to you as the reason why people carry chiuauas as purses is to me, you try and find someone who will at least LOOK like they speak a foreign language (there’s plenty to chose from since it’s the financial district).
No, not this family. Because like so many other tourists (disregard nationality, because this seems to be a common problem for any tourist here), they decide to ask the simplest looking old lady or the man most likely to win the ‘I’m-so-dumb-I-forgot-to-close-my-mouth-and-now-I’m-standing-on-a-pool-of-my-own-drool’ award of the year.
So after a few failed attempts at raising their voice and slowing down speech for better communication, I step up and say in my pretty reasonable English “Excuse me, maybe I can help…”
The father raises his arms in the air like I’m bringing him redemption and screams out ‘FINALLY!!!’, showing himself extremely vexed at the old lady he was talking to earlier, like every Portuguese person has the duty to know how to speak in his mother tongue. Promptly, the about 50 people waiting at the surrounding bus stops turn their eyes to ME, as I try to excuse his rudeness with apologetic looks of helplessness.
I simply explain that they have to catch a trolley, number so-and-so, and now, since he has no idea what a trolley is, looks at me like I’m not speaking English anymore, almost angrily so! Fortunately a trolley goes by, I point it out to him and simply say “One of those…”.
He still looks repeatedly at his guide and at me, doubting, but as he sees everyone else get on it, he follows, shouting out to his family -standing two feet away- “Come on! We have to catch this one over here!!!”
Not a thanks, not a nod. Too bad I didn’t give them the wrong directions.
(Mikash, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 14:16, Reply)

FrogServo
I can pronounce all of those words as I have the ability to 'read'. I think the Merican doth protest too much..........
(myohmy, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 14:07, Reply)

Edinburgh
Correct, Edinburgh is not in England. And it doesn't contain the letter o either. "Here's your boarding card from Detroit to London, and your onward one to Edinboro, sir". WTF?

But I do have fun correcting the offenders politely, because they get all apologetic if you do it nicely!
( K2k6 has a proper job these days, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 14:06, Reply)

Sorry but Yanks again
Asking me is Winchester Catherdral was open on a Sunday.......

Spose at least they didnt blow it up to check for oil.
(Taco Tickler, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 14:05, Reply)

FreudianSlap's trash cans
I suspect the Americans may have been amused by the British bins because they look like US post boxes. Many Brits have attempted to throw away rubbish into post boxes when in the US for the first time, me included. I suppose that makes me a stoopid tourist too!
( K2k6 has a proper job these days, Mon 11 Jul 2005, 14:03, Reply)