Oh, Tourists. Yes, That Includes You.

Oh, tourists. Was walking around the Old Town today, and I came across a couple of large groups of British tourists. I'm rather happy that, due to the huge proliferation of British tourists in Europe during the last decade (thanks, RyanAir!), most people here and elsewhere have forgotten that Americans used to hold a monopoly on the "loud, obnoxious drunkards" crown. Makes going around Europe a bit easier for me. Of course, we're still the Imperialist Pigs With No Culture, but being from NYC somewhat cancels that out - except in Toronto, naturally. Envy and jealousy makes 'em meaner.

I saw the first group while at the Subway on ul. Bracka. They were talking really loudly about how difficult it was to be tourists in Krakow, and Scottish tourists in particular - here are some gems:

"The girls never paid attention to us!" Gee, I wonder why?

"That fuckin' Polish guy, he didn't know the difference between Scottish and British" You know, I could actually see that as a compliment. Though I imagine Manchester would punch me for saying that.

"And that French guy, he just dropped off the hash [we paid for] and didn't want to smoke with us, how fuckin' rude of him! Only because we're from Scotland" I had (and still have) no response to that, except to laugh hysterically. Thankfully, they didn't notice the tears running from my eyes while I tried to hold it in.

All the while two guys in their group are taking pictures constantly, especially of the ice machine, which had the trademark 'Scotsman'. Seriously, they took 5 pictures of it.

This was quite amusing to listen to, but seeing these packs of British men reminded me of conversations I had with Malgosia K. and others on the subject of tourist behavior. Specifically, why travel and eat and the same damn place you could eat at while at home?! It used to be McDonalds (and it still is), now it's Subway. I never understood that - if you're going to take the time and money to travel somewhere, why not eat the local food? Or at least try eating something that you can't get as often at home? Or just try something different? It's not like you're living there - if you live in a place, I completely understand eating at places which remind you of home. But after just a weekend away? No sense whatsoever, talk about a waste.

The other group I came across was at ul. Gołębia 3; as opposed to the first group, which was probably Scottish teenagers, this group was almost exclusively English professionals, and they were complaining that Poland didn't have more beers like their favorite bitters from back home. Another major point of contention for me - why go to another country if you're going to expect the same stuff that you got at home?! As Henio was saying yesterday, it's like going abroad and complaining that the toilet paper doesn't have as many different colors as your home version. That man explains these things far better than I ever will.