Friday, August 7, 2009

The Funniest Day by Seamus

The day didn’t start out so well. Eamon was sick all day and could not go on the day trip with us to Slovakia. So my parents, Pearse, Colleen, and I went on the hydrofoil, which is a really fast ferry that seats one hundred and twenty-six people. The ride was nice and easy for the start of a very easy going day… or that is what we thought. As soon as we got off the boat, we saw the tour guide. She looked nice and peaceful. She told us to go over to our driver because his car was the audio tour. We got in and listened to a very detailed history of Bratislava. At our first stop it started to go downhill. She called us over and said, “You speak English right? Where are you from, America or Britain?” We should have said Britain because then maybe she would have been nicer to us. She told all the Americans (the 5 of us) to go to the corner and that the Germans would catch up to us. We did as we were told; it took the tour guide twenty minutes to get over to us, and then she says two sentences, “This is the church where there is a crown on a pillow. Also the pillow is two meters by two meters.” She was done. It took her five seconds. We then go to the tour mobile and wait for another ten minutes, while the Germans go to the St. Elizabeth statue. We didn’t even get one sentence from her and she finally says “we will have more time for you in the town. Don’t worry if I don’t get to you.” My dad gave her the Glavin I don’t care wave while she was looking at us. It was funny to see her reaction.
When we get to the town, we turn around to hear the following question from the tour guide: “why do they call this hotel the Carlton?” She stares at Colleen with her cold death stare and Colleen just shrugged. The tour guide told her and the group, in German, the answer. Then my dad says out loud: “Do you think he knows Will Smith or is related to him.” “The Americans” (us) started to crack up. We were right next to the tour guide in front and all the Germans when this happened. My mom actually had to tap her on the shoulder to ask her why it was named the Carlton.
We had to be wearing the brightest colors of all the people on the tour. I had my bright red Phillies hat on. Colleen was wearing a brightly colored flower shirt, and Pearse was wearing his bright yellow Haverford shirt. Every time we stopped, though, she would say “Where are my Americans,” even if we were right next to her. Then she would just say the names of what we were seeing, speak for ten minutes in German and then move on. When we got to each stop, she said “Americans we are waiting” and would start her routine over again. She once caught me looking the wrong way and she personally turned me around and told me to listen even though I didn’t understand anything she said. Colleen thought that this was really funny of course. At one stop at a fountain, we were sick and tired of the guide so we sat down next to the fountain and listened. Colleen and I heard them laughing, so we joined in, but it was unenthusiastically. Ten of the Germans including the Guide turned around and stared at us. As you can see in the picture we started to laugh really hard. After that event happened, we saw an Irish pub. Everyone thought that I was kidding about going to it but I just sat down. The rest of my family followed me like I was the leader. We had lunch there and ditched the rest of the tour. I had chicken wings and we called my Aunt Catherine. After, we had the rest of the day to ourselves.
Auf Wiedersehen or in English Good-bye

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