Here was the basic plot of the gore movie, Hostel: Obnoxious American tourists get sold to butchers at a higher rate than tourists from other countries because, well, they’re obnoxious American tourists. And that’s just not right, because according to a worldwide survey of hotel staffers from Expedia, it’s the French who are the most obnoxious tourists.
Like we needed a survey; we saw Talladega Nights *.
Reinforcing lots of old stereotypes (except for the B.O. thing), Time reports that even the French think the French are obnoxious, and also cheap, very likely to complain, and expect everybody to know French. Vacationers from France scored just better, prancing in at 19th place among 21 countries ranked according to pleasantness abroad, than India and China, where it’s likely too darn crowded to think about being polite.
France took the silver, just behind Italy, in one positive trait: They’re really well-dressed. So they’ll look great while stiffing the waiter.
America wasn’t awesome in the survey, ranking eleventh and well behind the Japanese, Germans, British, and Canadians. In general, Americans are considered loud, plaintive, and impolite, but also generous and willing to give the local language the old college try before resorting to English.
Expedia’s marketing director for Europe, Timothée de Roux, defended nations on both sides of the pond. de Roux said Americans are jerks sometimes (paraphrasing) because they expect the same excellent service abroad as they get at home. Likewise, the French expect certain levels of quality, just like a la maison.
You’d almost believe that, but when French vacationers spend 85 percent of their vacations in-country and even French hotel staffers don’t like them, it makes de Roux’s explanation a bit suspect. He may be right that 37 days of vacation on average makes the French tourist a bit tighter with the money.
We can accept that and forgive so long as others understand that if Americans actually take their whole two weeks per year (assuming they don’t check in with the office every day, too), we get a little cranky if our hard-earned leisure time doesn’t go as planned. Blowing off steam can get a little loud, too.
No worries though. With the Olympics in dead-last-place China this year, the natives likely won’t notice anything out of the ordinary from either country.
*Please, no flaming. That joke should be sufficiently self-deprecating. If flamed in the comments because of it, I’ll assume your sarcasm/humor receptors are either broken or made by a French company**.
**Honestly, take a joke, will ya?
