I didn’t say I lived at Dupont Circle, I said my station was Dupont Circle. I had a bit of a hike up toward Adams Morgan - I couldn’t have afforded to live near Dupont. And this was the late 1980s. Today even Adams Morgan I think would be too pricey.
I live in a small tourist town – well, technically two towns, but the second one only exists because that means the people who live there can have the really prestigious address. Anyway.
Lots of people rent bikes up here. Excellent. Now, please remember that even though it’s a small town and we’re all going 25 MPH, that doesn’t mean you can randomly ride out between parked cars in front of me. Idiot.
The same goes if you are on foot. Please look before you cross the street. The locals are actually the worst about this, I think. I fear for the lives of a lot of kids who grow up here and move to somewhere like New York; they will be killed the first day they arrive and wander into traffic just assuming everybody will stop for them.
In winter, OMG, it snows! If you are not used to driving in winter, please just don’t. Don’t. There are free buses. There are pay buses. There are taxis. You can walk. Don’t drive. When I moved here I had only driven in snow a few times. I got studded snow tires and learned quick. You are from California and have neither experience nor proper snow tires and are only here for a few days. Get off my road.
Those are actually the biggest thing. I am not fond of suicidal tourists.
Oh lord, the ways are endless.
Wandering across the road, against the crosswalk sign.
Clogging the highway to “the Kenai” with their slow-moving, giant rental RVs. 150 miles trapped behind 400 old people in motor homes driving 30 mph so as to catch every sparkle off of every wave in the inlet, every possible mt. goat come down to graze by the side of the road (by GOD why do you think there are 1000 foot long TURNOUTS every 20 feet along the goat viewing areas???).
Thinking that locals were put in your path to show you how to get to tourist traps. Honest to God, I was driving out of the parking lot one night and had a truck stop in front of me, in the MIDDLE Of the road, blocking not only traffic behind him, but people leaving the parking lot (after a long day of work) to come up to my vehicle and ask me how to get to the damned zoo.
Taking pictures of buildings in Anchorage. It’s not as if we’re exactly known for our architecture. Alaskans have a saying, “the best thing about Anchorage is that it’s so close to Alaska”. Personally I’m a city girl, but if I went on a “once in a lifetime trip” to a place known for its WILDLIFE? I’d go to where the wildlife IS.
Seqways, on the sidewalk…nuff said.
That has nothing to do with SF…not quite sure why some couples do this.
Are they trying to get a spontaneous game of Red Rover Red Rover going?!
I do know that most of those with the “death grip” usually are couples whose combined weight is about 880 lbs, blocking anyone who wants to go around them, and really, people - you don’t need to hold on that tight, nobody is going to yank either spouse away!
Born in Pamplona, went to college in Barcelona, graduate school in Miami, worked in (among others) a tourist destination in Costa Rica and Edinburgh; currently living in Seville.
The immense majority of tourists are fine people. The ones who:
- get off the bus/escalator and block the spot for everybody else,
- loudly ask “does anybody here speak my language?” in a tone that conveys “how dare you not speak my language!” (and why does only English have that particularly irritating turn of phrase?),
- complain about foreign foods (in a foreign country? really?),
- about people speaking only foreign (ehm… you’re the one speaking foreign, BillyJoe)
- or, in Costa Rica, about too many animals,
- or proceed to inform the locals that their customs are barbaric / their dances are too sluttish / that is not real [insert local music, or worse, a music genre from another part of the country],
- and let’s dedicate a special paragraph to the assholes who go someplace with the exclusive intent to get so drunk they fly,
those do make me stabby to different degrees.
So, basically, the people who behave as if either their momma didn’t teach them no manners or they left their brain in their other body. Anybody else is welcome to visit, ask questions, take pictures of our buildings and share our foreign food!
Haze, I recommend not trying to drive if you ever get to Madrid - actually, that holds for anybody who likes being alive, as heart attacks while behind the wheel tend to be fatal. There is perfectly fine public transportation (when they’re not on strike, that is) and the drivers make Italian ones seem slow, polite and rational. I’ve driven in Italy, I’ve driven in NYC, I’ve driven in Saragossa (those are some damn suicidal cabbies there) but none scared me as much as Madrid.
Former NYCer here.
People who can’t be bothered to learn some basic words and phrases in the local language. You can’t just stop someone and wave a map in his face and say something in YOUR language, and expect a helpful answer.
People who expect everything (especially the cuisine) to be exactly like home. Especially people who travel halfway around the world, then eat at McDonald’s.
People who constantly stop strangers and ask them to take their picture in front of something famous. Do you have to prove that you were there?
People who block sidewalks, forgetting that the people who actually live here may be in a hurry. Oh, and people who walk four abreast.
Taking pictures of “typical residents,” without asking permission.
Constantly complaining about how expensive everything is. What did you expect?
Try it in Tbilisi or Tehran sometime… make sure your life insurance is paid up.
Londoner here, and you guys all have it easy, I tell ya. Because along with all the normal tourists you get in DC, NY of wherever, we are also within a cheap two flight fromboat loads of Spanish, Italian, German and French teenagers, who arrive in packs of 40, in matching backpacks, and display zero social skills or spatial awareness, who stand enmass at the entrance of tube stations so you have to physically force your way through the crowd like you’re at a rock concert, who all sit on your doorstep to eat their icecreams/smoke their fags (I used to live in Greenwich, my doorstep was on a tourist thoroughfare) and who clog up a tube carriage so fast and thoroughly that you actually can’t fight your way to the door in time to get off. True.
SanVito, those are found in Barcelona, Pamplona, Seville, DC, NYC, Praha, Orlando, Athens and Milano as well, going off the top of my head for places where I’ve seen them.
A lot of the ones in those European locations are British, though :halo:
Oh, I forgot that one! I’m not a gambler, and never have been. When I lived in Las Vegas, I did know the names and locations of some of the larger casinos, but I had absolutely no idea which ones had the hottest slots, I didn’t know or care who was headlining at the various lounges, and I certainly didn’t know which casinos offered which obscure gambling games. However, I was certainly expected to know all this by some of the tourists, who were amazed that anyone could live in Vegas and not go out gambling and seeing the shows every night. Ummmm, hello, I was a young mother at the time, and I had other priorities in my life, like feeding and clothing my child, and trying to save up for her college fund.
When I lived in south Louisiana, tourists wanted to see an alligator, dammit, and they weren’t going to leave until they did, often expecting the locals to whip one up for them on demand. I’m living in Florida now, so I expect the same thing happens here. In the wild, alligators are usually indistinguishable from a floating log, so I’m not sure what they expected to see.
I guess I could have just pointed out a log and said, “See? There he is! Don’t get too close, now!”
They buy out the groceries in town and I have to drive 30 miles away to get groceries June through August.
The extremely filthy hitchhiking beggars come in with the tourists too. The last ones that asked for assistance wanted two airplane tickets to California. You’re in the wrong town for that buckaroos. They came back asking for train tickets a few days later. That didn’t happen either.
They stand on the left on escalators in DC. The left is for people walking up the escalator. It’s a small thing, but surprisingly annoying.
This is my #1 thing. I occasionally make nasty comments to the people that do it so they’ll move. We know you are agog at being in a subway and want to admire the view of the cement ceilings, but some of us actually live here and would like to NOT wait 12 minutes for the next Red Line to Glenmont because you clogged up the works. Do you really not see the line of 15 angry commuters bottled up behind you?
Also, it’s like half the tourists around here (even the English-speaking ones) can’t read. A sign on the farecard machine says NO BILLS, why are you asking me why it won’t take your $5? The turnstiles at Navy Yard (where the Nationals stadium is) have 2 SmarTrip express lanes with large colorful signs and still we have morons with paper farecards jamming everything up.
Tourist don’t actually bother me. I work a couple of blocks from the Mall and I see them all the time. I sometimes get miffed when they’re crowding places or the buses are in the way. I like to complain about them and act like I want to mow them down with my car, but really, I don’t care. The money is welcome, I’m sure.
My lovely bride and I have a summer home in the mountains of East Tennessee near the tourist town of Gatlinburg.
Many of the locals ask, “If they call it ‘tourist season’, then why it isn’t legal to shoot them.”
Some of them are serious.
I’m surprised. I came in to say that we’re so spread out in L.A. that the tourists, though they are many, are much less of a nuisance than in the geographically smaller and more crowded cities like SF or NY. OTOH if you lived or worked in an an older area like downtown or Hollywood–especially Hollywood–I can see how it might have been an issue for you.
I used to work on Hollywood Blvd. I was about a block from Kodak Theatre. Grrr.
From when I lived in Cambridge:
Yes, I know that the narrow street between the Senate House and Caius College is very pretty. However, its also 8:45 in the morning and I’m late for a lecture. Standing 15 wide and 15 deep to take your pictures is just plain rude.
Tour guides who’d stand under College windows (which were mainly residential), and jabber on in loud voices, giving out incorrect histories. People, its exam season and you’re in a University [town]. You deserve the supersoaker to the head.
Um, yes, I know I’m sat on a wall by the river in rather old looking College and reading, but my exams have just finished and I’m taking a well deserved break. Its not a photo-op for you, damnit.
Oh and lastly, the Japanese (for they were invariably Japanese) tourists who’d not just watch our graduation procession, and take photos (that’s allowed I guess, we did look all quaint and stuff), but would try to join in the procession and get their photo taken by their friends.