The first time I heard about this ranking was in Bulgaria, from friends who were struggling with a group of my tourists writing a complaint about the hotel pool. All the tourists had become ill after swimming. One of the guests explained to the Russian-speaking hotel manager: “I’ve got the runs and I’m vomiting.” Once the woman understood what he meant, she thought for a moment and asked just one question: “Why did they drink water from the pool?” The tourists were unable to explain.
That was when I learned that we could compete for the title of Idiot of the Season. That season, an agency other than mine won. But my colleague really was lucky. Her client killed several beetles that looked like cockroaches with a stiletto heel, arranged them on the face of his sleeping child and took several photographs in order to extort compensation from the agency. Drinking water from the pool became a secondary matter.
Last season, we also had a war over the shadow cast by a beach umbrella. It was played out spectacularly between an Englishman and a German from the so-called Eastern Bloc. And there were bloody wars among German pensioners over free sun loungers by the pool. We had no chance. If, at that time, my tourists had been the family who decided that their hotel room had a lowered ceiling, I would probably have won the competition. But luck was not on my side then.
I wrote down these stories, which happened during the fourteen years of my work. I also wrote down stories that had happened to other tour guides. Tourists who were able to look at themselves and their adventures in foreign countries with a sense of distance told them to me. During the summer months, I am offering the readers of the IstotneInformacje.pl portal a little entertainment. On Thursday, the first of the summer columns: The Radio Maryja Pilgrimage.
Grażyna Hanaf