[EDIT: Fixed space on end of episode]
In retrospect, this article probably should have been named: Armpitty. In this episode, I look at TSA Security, Rick Steves latest blog posting, Morocco, Bus Tours, Haunted Places, Disney California Adventure, New Zealand, Sydney, Oktoberfest Post-Mortum and Google Maps. Still not sure how well this is going, may start tweaking what I’m doing in the next episode. Visit Travel Off The Cuff and leave me some comments on how to improve what I’m doing!
The first episode of Travel Bits by Travel Off The Cuff. We highlight some great travel stories that came out this past week.
In this episode, we make sure everything is set up correctly and layout our vision for the podcast.
If you’ve ever been to or planning on going to France you’re certain to hear the question or comment about how rude the French people are to visitors. I recently got back from a couple of days in France and there were a couple of people who’ve asked me if I encountered any rude French people. This wasn’t my first trip to Paris. But I have to say, the rudest people I saw while there were two old American women!
At this point, you’re probably saying to yourself, “Well, he probably speaks French good enough to get by.” Nope. I hardly speak any French. Oh, I know a couple of words: Merci, parlez-vous anglais, bon jour, and au revoir. That’s about it. I’ve listed those in order of importance. If you don’t know what they say, they are: Thank you, do you speak English, hello, and goodbye.
Travel requires understanding and respect.
The people who have the biggest problems while traveling are those who go to places and bring their own cultures and norms with them. You can’t. What we do and expect in the United States is completely different then what is done in England, Germany, France, or India.
It is important to understand that. When I took a group tour through Europe, our tour guide often repeated, “Just because it is different, doesn’t mean it is wrong.” If you are the type of person who can’t handle it when things change, travel probably isn’t for you. Sorry, don’t even think about going to Italy. You’ll be flooding your senses on a minute by minute basis with a culture that is so different then what you’re used to. So much so that you probably would not enjoy the experience.
Understand and accept that everyday things just work differently in another country. Don’t stomp into a place and demand that people do things the way you expect them to. When I first enter a large store or restaurant, I always take a moment to look around, see how people are acting, and get a feel for how things are flowing.
I don’t travel to stand out. I travel to fit in.
When I was at the airport waiting for my flight back home, we stopped in at a food court area. I’m walking around, looking for a quick snack. At one of the food areas, an older American lady is standing at the glass. “Is anyone working here?” she blares behind the counter, “I just want to get something to eat!”
I get in line to pay and she gets behind me with her friend. In her hand, a package of pita slices. “These are stone cold,” she blathers to her friend. “I wanted to get them warmed up, but I just couldn’t communicate to her.”
“We’re in France!” her friend says with a smile.
I’m willing to bet that the lady behind the counter understood exactly what was asked, but she wasn’t willing to comprehend because of the intolerable actions of the American. I was close to turning around and telling them to just shut up.
The problem is that they didn’t show respect to those who were serving them.
I have found that the French people are very proud of their country, their history and their language. Especially their Language. If you’ve never been to Paris, alone theSeine River, there’s a department whose sole purpose is to protect the French language. Imagine that. English tends to adopt foreign words into its own.
When I had to interact with a Parisian, I always started out with bon jour and ended with merci. I wanted to show that I respected their language first, then ask them if they spoke English (parlez-vous anglais). Most of the time, the people I was speaking to spoke English good enough for me. Sometimes, it took a little work to get my meaning across.
For example, we stopped for lunch at a café. The menu was in French. I knew I was looking at sandwiches and one read: “quatre fromages.” Okay, I knew fromages meant cheese. I quickly worked through every French word I’d ever heard in my life to figure out that quatre meant four. So a four cheese sandwhich. I confirmed with the waiter that it meant what I thought it did (I pointed at the word and held up four fingers) and had a great Panini sandwich.
Do I get upset and demand an English menu? No. In some places, once the waiter (or waitress) learned that we spoke English, they quickly provided an English menu. But you know, there’s some fun in trying to figure out the menu. I’ll give you an example.
Two years ago, I was walking around Paris by myself. I stopped in a restaurant to have lunch before making my way to the Eiffel Tower to meet the tour group I was with. I was seated inside and ordered a Pepsi (a word I understood!) while I looked at the menu, completely in French. There were only two phrases on that menu that I understood: tartare and Bolognese. Okay, I knew I didn’t like raw meat and the other is my mom’s favorite Italian sauce, so I was in business for lunch. Sure, I could have experimented and tried tartare, especially since you can’t get it in the U.S. any more, but that’s more of a group thing to do where everyone shares the plate.
Thinking back, I wonder what kind of trip those ladies had. I know their trip was finished because I saw them in line at customs. I’m sure they enjoyed the sights and all, but I’m sure their stories are littered with side snipes about how rude the people are over there.
It’s a shame really. Because if they would have taken a little time to develop an understanding of the culture and had the common decency to show some respect to people they met, their trip would have been unbelievably great.
Merci beaucoup!
As you can probably tell, the site has gone under the scalpel and been updated with a whole new look. If you have any problems, please, contact us at the link in the footer to report any issues. However, if you’ve used the site before, there are some things you need to know.
First, however, I’ll be on vacation until Sept 24, so I won’t be able to reply until then…hopefully, however, there’s nothing majorly wrong with the site. Read more to learn how to log in now.
Unless you were contacted by us in e-mail, your username is the email that you used to sign up to the site orginally. If you would like to have that changed, contact us below (with the contact us link, not in the comments area!) and tell us your current email and what username you would like to use.
To reset your password, click on Log In and then click on Forgot Your Password? Enter your Username and submit. The system will send you a link to reset your password (There seems to be a small glitch at this point, the page is blank when you click on the link, however, it does reset and e-mail your password to you). Once your password is reset, log in with it. You can then click on Profile to update your settings and change your password to something easier to remember.
As you can see, we haven’t completely updated all of the WordPress pages to fit in with our design, I’ll be working on it as soon as I can next week.
As I’m on vacation, I won’t be posting new travel stories, but feel free to post the ones you find! That’s what this site is designed for!
Any comments on the new design, leave a comment for us below. We’d love your feedback!
Thanks…Mark
Like all good things, this trip began in a bar.
It was a warm evening as we stood along the railing of a roof top bar in Orlando. The illuminated bank buildings filled the sky as the loud music filled the air. One of my co-workers was celebrating a birthday and bar hopping had brought us to this relatively empty bar on a Wednesday night.
I said, “It’s too bad you’re in school, I was hoping to go to Munich this year again.”
“I’m not in school. I’m taking the semester off,” she replied.
The Gatwick Express approached Victoria Station in central London. For the past thirty minutes, my eyes have been glued to the window, watching the English countryside glide past. My first thought, as we passed through the numerous towns between London and Gatwick was how old everything looked. Yet, I was fascinated by the almost cliched look of the buildings. I was in England.
Last week, a friend of mine on one of the social network sites posted their status as “wants to travel.” I gave them a simple two word response: So Go. But it got me thinking that there is no logical way to justify travel outside of work related travel. Of course, those who travel for work, their status might well be “don’t want to travel.”
When you’re flying out of central Florida to London, there’s one choice in non-stop service: Gatwick. My flight was departing from Tampa around 5 in the evening, with arrival around 7 a.m. the next day. Which means, unless you want to spend your first day in London in bed sleeping, you’ve got some serious planning to do way before you depart.
Let’s pretend you’re on vacation in London with your family. You’ve spent the last several months planning this trip and saved up for it even longer. The day is all planned out: morning at the British Museum (I’d love to see the Hadrian exhibit), take the tube to Westminster station (the kids love “Minding the Gap”), check out Westminster Abby, walk across the River Thames for a ride on the London Eye before hopping back on the tube for some dinner plans across town. A perfectly planned day, except in the middle of your London Eye ride, it stops and you’re stuck there for over an hour trying to get your kids to urinate into a plastic bag. There goes dinner and the rest of your plans for that day.
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