Stupid Tourist Customer Questions

[Knightmare]

"Is that a Great Lake?"
No, you (In head: NO you sorry excuse for a human)

Ah yes, tourist season in Michigan. I was born and raised in northern Michigan, where all the south Michigan people come up, and everyone else turns up, especially during the autumn when the leaves change. But I got asked that question a lot. "Is that one of the Great Lakes?"
"Um, no... you can see the shorline across the lake. The Great Lakes are big. Really BIG!"

And where I was from, a small town called Gaylord, I was an hour away from two of the Great Lakes. People would ask me how to get there. I replied "Pick any direction except south and you'll be there in an hour!"

[Jester]

Oh, I forgot one of my favorite conversations.

TOURIST: "Where are you from?"
JESTER: "Take a guess."
TOURIST: "I would guess somewhere north."
JESTER: "This is Key West, the Southernmost City. EVERYTHING'S north!"
TOURIST: "Oh yeah."

[jb17kx]

“How far apart are the mile markers?”

One Kilometer.

No, seriously, we still call 'em mileposts here. But we space them 1km apart. You should say that to somebody some time...

[Mongo Skruddgemire]

Oh yeah, you know, because any area that's even slightly rural doesn't have the modern convenience of paved roads

Lets see. The Eastern Shore is SOOOOO rural that we don't have such modern conveniences such as:

University of Maryland: Eastern Shore
Salisbury State University
Wor-Wic Tech Community College (with a kick-ass nursing program)
Pennsula Regional Medical Center
Atlantic General Hospital
Center At Salisbury (nice mall)
The Salisbury Mall (not so nice but in the process of renovation)
Target
Home Despot and a Lowes
Michaels Craft Store
Walmart and a Sams Club
The Corporate Headquarters for Perdue Farms Incorporated
Dresser Wayne Industries (they build most of the gas pumps you'll see in the middle Eastern shore of the Country
Northrup Grumman

The list goes on and on...yet we're still considered the ass-end of Maryland

Hell our own governor even called us a "collection of shit-house counties"...in spite of the fact that the tourist revenue generated by Ocean City paid for Camden Yards Stadium in Baltimore so fully that taxes didn't have to be raised (or at least not that we noticed). We showed off out displeasure of Gov. Scheaffer by parading in front of the governor's mansion and office in pick-up trucks and flat bed trailers with out-houses on them. We even adopted a bumper sticker "I'm from the shit-house side of Maryland and damn proud of it"

Mongo

[Acolyte]

I had a bunch of idiots from Michigan come over to Windsor on the July 4th weekend to go snowboarding and come into my store asking where the nearest ski resort was. They were dressed up in parkas with the a/c blasting and snowboards on the roof.

I gave them directions to Banff, AB and told them it shouldn't take them long to get there from Windsor, ON. In reality, its about a 2050 mile (3310km) trek.

You evil bastard.
Then again, I would have pointed them to somewhere in BC, so...

However, I can top that. As I was walking past the Ambassador Bridge exit, a car stopped to as me for directions. To the Yukon.
Odd coincidence, since I DO technically live in Whitehorse, at least for half the year.
Anyways, I looked at them like they were crazy, then told them just to go northeast for about ten days (That's how long it took me, anyways). If you hit Alaska, you've gone too far. If you hit the Northwest Terrorities, you turned north too soon. If you hit British Colombia, you're too south.

[dragonflygrrl]

From two years at the Budget rental counter at Kansas City International.

- Where does Charlie Parker play? Heaven, I guess (Charlie Parker was born in KC, and there is a memorial there at the American Jazz Museum. He died in the fifties.).

- I want to eat real authentic Kansas City style barbecue, but I don't want to go to the ghetto. What do you suggest? I suggest you either suck it up or eat crappy barbecue. For the former, check out Arthur Bryant's. For the latter, may I suggest KC Masterpiece on the Plaza.

- Will the exit marked Sports Complex take me to the stadiums? Ya think?

- So there's really a city here, huh? That's why we call it Kansas CITY, you stupid &*%^&! This is usually asked by New Yorkers, who seem to universally believe that Missouri is given completely over to pig farmers. I understand that KC isn't exactly Tokyo, but it is in fact a real honest to gosh city.

- What are those funny things in the skyline? I have no clue. STOP ASKING ABOUT THEM!! For those of you who don't know what I am talking about,http://www.visualjourney.com/Images/...KC-179-Thm.jpg

[protege]

Then there are people who come to Pittsburgh...and are surprised. Why? Well, quite a few people think that the steel mills are still here, belching out huge black clouds and covering up the skyline. Uh, last I heard, most of that went away after WWII. Before then, the skies would be pitch black...even at noon because of the pollution. 60 years on, a few outsiders still believe that...even though *every* sporting event usually shows a few shots of the skyline on TV

[Dips]

Massachusetts has dirt roads. I happen to live on one.

Some of my favorites:

Wow. It's so green here!

[Yeah. That would be due to the trees and the grass. Were you expecting the entire state to be paved over?]

Referring to the one of the branches of the public transit system:

Why do they call it the Green Line?

[Probably to keep it from being confused with the Red, Blue and Orange lines. Other than that, I don't actually care.]

It's weird how 200 years ago they'd know there'd be skyscrapers and left enough room between the older buildings for you all to build them.

[blink]

In Concord:

Where's the rude bridge?

[At the time I had no idea the Old North Bridge had been referred to that way in a poem, so I just shrugged.]

Is this the rock from the rebellion?

[He was pointing to a war memorial on Concord common. That just made me go "huh?"]

Speaking of rocks:

Is that all?

[While pointing to Plymouth Rock, which is about the size of my desk to the great disappointment of many tourists. I think they were expecting Gibraltar or something.]

In Salem:

This isn't a village.

[No, it's a rather cool little city. Sorry that the population for the last 300 years or so decided to live their lives instead becoming a living history exhibit to enhance your picture-taking experience. I'm sure they'll cry all night about your disappointment.]

And lastly, when I am performing in public:

Is that a real fife?

[Um. Yes. Hence the music coming out of it.]

Do you really know how to play that?

[Nope. The music you think you've just heard was actually beamed from my mind to yours. You're just perceiving it as sound.]

Who taught you to play?

[This really wasn't dumb. I just told them my friend, Karen, got me started.]

No. I mean wouldn't the first guy who knew how to play that song be dead by now? How could YOU have learned it?

[I take it back. That was dumb.]

[Casino Jockey]

at least things in america are pretty universal - try being in australia.

one of my jobs was working on a paddle steamer down the murry river, which forms most of the border between victoria and new south wales.

heres a few funnies i got:

do kangaroos hop down the main main streets of your cities? no, cos than they would get hit by cars and killed, and than we couldn't serve them to tourists for dinner.

Theres one going down that street there we are in rual victoria. we are 2 hours from melbourne.

can i hug an emu? Sure, Just watch out for the dirty big claws they have

do you know the cocodile hunter? steve? hell yeah he's best friends with all australians. he says he likes having 19 million best friends.

and than theres a classic a co-worker got:

can i walk from sydney to perth? sure, it's only about 4000 Km. better bring plenty of water though.

[Greenday]

Ah, New Jersey. Hated so much, yet one of the hugest tourist states. If you are going to make fun of my state, STAY THE HELL OUT! No beach for you!

I will with the worst tourist you can meet: The Benny. Those damn New Yorkers that come down here during the summer and act like it is their shore. It never has and never will be.

No, we don't talk with the same accent as you see in a lot of tv shows aka. The Sopranos. Those people are from either New York or very far, North Jersey.

No, I don't know Bruce Springsteen. Yes, I know exactly where his house is. No, I'm not telling tourists that.

I don't know Bon Jovi either...

No, we aren't all farmland. No, we aren't all cities.

I DON'T KNOW KEVIN SMITH. STOP ASKING ME IF I KNOW EVERY FAMOUS PERSON FROM NEW JERSEY!

[Sofar]

When at Pike Place Market, I was once actually asked "Does this place have a McDonalds?" You're standing in the middle of what is essentially a wetter version of a Turkish bazaar. There are three men behind you juggling halibut. Don't expect to find the McDonald's next to the Baby Gap. The mall's that way. Jesus, five hundred miles to eat the same stuff you left in Rabid Rapids, Colorado. We do have real restaurants here.

We've been getting dry summers in Seattle recently, but at the moment it's been raining nonstop for a week, and due to a budget crisis our drainage system is in poor repair at the moment, so the gutters have been filling up and the streets have been flooding.

[Acolyte]

can i walk from sydney to perth? sure, it's only about 4000 Km. better bring plenty of water though.

Heh, I've heard that a few times up here, generally from a large immigration city (Toronto, Windsor, Montreal, ect) to another large city waaayyyy the hell across the country (Generally Vancouver).

Also, here's another gem from working at McDonalds. For some reason unknown to me, we get huge amounts of people from the deep south up in the Yukon. Why the hell they drive across the damn continent befuddles me, but still. They're all amazed that *gasp* we have homes! However, the dumbest question I got asked was:
'Hey, how d'y'all drive out of here?'
'On the road.'
'Whut road?'
'...the roads that lead out of the city? As in, say, the Alaska Highway, that's been here only slighly less time then the people.'
'I though you didn't have roads out of the city, and y'all just flew or sledded or somethin'.'
*Cries*

[Cosmic Cat]

Wow. It's so green here!

Ah yes. I get that one from people who expect the entire state to be one big desert, just like the movies.

[Bacopa]

I know your pain. I'm from New Orleans.

"Oh. I thought you'd have more of an accent."
Yeah. Like those guys in the movies? Yeah, those movies are full of crap.

"What's it like to live in the swamp?"
I don't know, let's call someone from 1865 and ask them. We've got paved roads, shingled roofs and -- and I know this will come as a shock -- dentists.

"Where do the Cajuns live?"
Lafyette. Drive west. If you reach Texas you've gone too far.

Actually, Cajun country extends at least a couple of counties into Texas.

Then there are the visitors to Houston who expect it dry because it's Texas.

-Bacopa

[Argabarga]

Asked by passing tourist in a car while I was working as campus security back in the day....

"How do you stand the smell?"

My response, "What smell?"

He shook his head and drove off, to this day, I have no idea what he was smelling.....