It was just the opposite with us - we wished the tourists would stay in the designated festival areas, because the entire town wasn’t part of the festival
People would wander into our garden look into our windows like we were an exhibit and knock on the door asking to come inside and have a look.
And then there were the people who’s kids we wouldn’t let come in and pee. How could we be so heartless to our “guests?”
I posted this when it happened back in the fall, but it’s worth repeating.
I popped into a fast food place here in eastern Colorado one day to grab lunch during a particularly busy day. As I went into the store, I noticed a touristy trio – two women and a man – disembark from a rather large Lincoln with Michigan plates on it. Inside, I ended up standing behind one of the women – a skinny harpy with the patience of a 2-year-old. In the line next to us was a handsome young Hispanic fellow who seemed more intent on chatting up the comely McWaitress than getting his lunch.
As I was waiting for my order, Skinny Harpy discovers that there is lemonade coming out of the water tap on the drink machine. She loudly and acidly demands a second cup, but doesn’t tell any employees what has happened. Finally, two new cups later, the manager realizes someone has hooked up the hoses wrong in the back. He races to the back, switches the hoses, but before he can return and drain the lemonade out of the water tap, Skinny Harpy Tourist Lady has made a big scene, tossed her lunch back at the counter people and demanded her money back. Finally, the manager returns, quiets her down and endures a scathing indictment of his store’s customer service. She turns to talk to someone else in her party, I look at the manager and say, “Why do they call it tourist season when we’re not allowed to shoot 'em?” The poor man just looked at me, utterly stricken. At that moment the young Hispanic man leaned in and said, “That’s okay, the hides aren’t worth anything and they taste like shit.” The manager forced himself to not smile too broadly as he hurried toward the back; Skinny Harpy returned to her Lincoln, and I’d like to think the young man and the waitress lived happily ever after.
No, we don’t hate tourists in Colroado. We hate arrogant assholes. Come to Colorado. Enjoy yourself. Don’t fall in love with us because we don’t want you living here.
Nava,I guess the student travel things isnt really tourism in the normal sense of the word, I used it as a reference here because Ive seen negativity towards these students.
To address some of your questions, when I said taking over, it comes down to really simple things, for example using public transport here can be a nightmare in Summer as there are so many extra passengers, who are not always considerate of others. Its also like you said: some people dont like the fact that there are huge groups of teenagers standing around yelling at each other in foreign languages.
Im fully aware that there are cultural differences that make moving to foreign countries all the more difficult and so obviously locals need to make exceptions for them.
About the mass thing - I dont know anyone who dresses up for mass in suits and hats for mass… but then again I dont attend mass so what do I know?! That being said when I was made go by my mother, I wore jeans and t shirts so if people thought bad of you because of that I would just ignore them - people are weird!
Just in case I wasnt clear in my earlier post - I have nothing against foreign students coming to Ireland - Ive been a FES so Im hardly going to complain about others!
Where are you? I grew up in the AC/OC/Wildwood area, and the Philly suburb types were all “Shoobies”.
NY types of Italian stock were “Guidos.”
Hey sometimes a few of us come from the US to Sydney to tie on a few. BTW long time no see! 
Monmouth and Ocean County Beaches. I practically grew up on Sandy Hook.
Guidos is universal and included North Jersey Italians and some of my Cousins. 
I never heard *Shoobies * before and Pennies is just a play on Bennies. I know Wildwood gets overrun with tourists from Wildwood, up my way we jokingly call them Pennies.
Jim
Like there’s a difference.
To us, all you guys north of Toms River are the same.
When my kids were growing up, we lived in a small town just below a National Park. When the kids were 3 and 7, we felt them old enough to enjoy Disneyland. My family wore matching T-shirts purchased at the drugstore in our hometown to Disneyland and I carried a backpack with the camcorder and various kid survival gear. My husband made a comment that I looked like such a tourist and my daughter was jaw-dropped dumbfounded, then furious. She demanded my husband" take it back, mommy’s not a tourist!" It took us a minute to figure out that ‘tourist’ was a dirty word she’d heard her grandfather use —he worked maintenance for the park service and was always going on about something some damn tourist had done.
She’s was quite correct—I have never run over a squirrel, spray-painted a rock or stolen a sign from the park.
I commute back and forth to Toronto during the week, and the only problem I have with tourists are the ones that just stop dead where ever they may be to start taking pictures of the CN Tower. Yes, it’s very tall. No seriously, it’s gigantic. But for the love of Pete, do NOT stop in the middle of a crosswalk to take pictures of it! The cab drivers will run you down!
Other than that, c’mon over!
Down in my little corner of the UK, we call them emmets. It’s derogatory; it means Ants.
I live in South Florida, but not so far south that I get the Miami/Ft. Lauderdale tourists. I more or less live in a “buffer zone” where the only “tourists” are Snowbirds. The neighborhood I live in now is at least half populated with them, and four to five months out of the year, some ancient harpy is giving me dirty looks because I dare to exist in her vacation neighborhood and not be more than half her age. What Bambi and LouisB mention is pretty true for my neck of the woods, except the majority of people come from NY state and upwards, with an exceedingly large handful of French Canadians. (What’s really funny is going shopping and hearing them talk in French about all the stupid, fat Americans when the speaker can easily dwarf the Americans around them.) Going up to Delray Beach can be a bit of a nightmare at times, because in certain areas, you will be completely surrounded by angry, inconsiderate elderly folks who’ll give you a death glare if you so much as exist. (Uh, yeah, I’m the one who’s from here, so knock it off. :rolleyes: )
The restaurant traffic increases tenfold, but the area that I live in has a LOT of residents who are more interested in eating out than cooking a meal at home. Restaurants are always reasonably busy if they’re decent. However, our peak times are at “early bird time” and between 8-9pm. There are, however, some restaurants that are never free of a gaggle of very loud elderly snowbirds; The Flaming Pit in Pompano Beach is one example.
I haven’t been, so I can’t add anything to this firsthand. But what I’ve usually heard is that New Yorkers don’t hate tourists as such, what they hate is when a group of tourists stands on a sidewalk holding up everybody around them while they gawk at the skyscrapters or fiddle with their tourist guides, transit maps, or whatever. I gather that walking in Manhattan is like driving elsewhere–you need to either keep up with the traffic or pull over.
But the East Bay isn’t San Francisco. San Francisco is only the 49 square miles of the city proper, which consists of the most desireable locations in the area, if not all of California. I think one reason San Francisco has retained the cachet it has is that it has not annexed all of its ugly outlying areas, in contrast to what has happened down here in L.A. For instance, I’d like to be able to say Panorama City and Canoga Park aren’t part of L.A., and then I have to remember that they are.
Then I suppose I’m entitled to a little kudos; I love walking all over the City (well, north of Market, anyway, as I haven’t really been south).
But I have to go to Fisherman’s Wharf: you can’t expect me not to go to Alioto’s–that was the best seafood I’ve had.
Well , I live in Hollywood and we get a lot of tourists, but they are mostly in the Hollywood and Highland area where Grouman’s Chinese Theater is and the Hollywood Walk of Fame and such. That is kind of central Hollywod annd I live in East Hollywood, although I do go to these areas. I don’t think too much one way or the other about the tourists
Craps, maybe?
Yeah. And also, people in your town kept talking to me about a “Lemon Stir” but they always said it really fast. What is a Lemon Stir? I want one. They sound yummy! 
We get some tourists that are perfectly fine, and others who are too keen on wearing mad tartan things and trying to prove that they are descended from Charles Edward Stewart or some such nonsense.
I completely meant French Canadians when I referred to tourists from a specific area north of the USA. If any tourist group deserves to be shot during the tourist season, it is the French Canadians or at least those with whom I have run afoul. A more arrogant, self centered, self righteous, condescending pack of jerks probably doesn’t exist. I cherish the time I advised several of them that if they insisted on speaking and being spoken to in French rather than English they should book their next vacation in France or, better yet, stay at home.
I have to ask you about this…is “emmet” a dialect word for “ant”, and if so, which dialect? IIRC the Anglo Saxon word was something like amete, cognate of German Ameise.