Wednesday, 02 September 2009

• What To Do With A Crazy Travelmate?

  

  When I was a teenager staying with relatives far across the country, I was known to wear out my welcome quickly. If I was staying two weeks, they'd wish I were gone by the end of the first. The first few days always went smoothly, but soon I would become crabby, snapping at loved ones kind enough to take me in and provide food, lodging and entertainment. Sometimes it would be behaving selfishly. 

  For instance, when I was 16, I stayed at my Aunt's home in the Bay Area, and we visited Stanford University in Palo Alto, California for an Undergraduate admissions tour. During this tour, I mocked the accents of local girls I heard on the campus. To a New Yorker like me, they seemed to combine the grammatical prowess of Cher from Clueless with the nasal passageways of Fran Dresher (Both of whom are women I love). My Aunt was severely irritated by my reflexive need to imitate these girls, and responded by saying she thought I would never amount to anything when I grew up. I was really offended by this comment at the time, but she turned out to be right.

  A few days later I completed the second half of my typical travel faux pas by not closing the shower door in her bathroom correctly and the water leaked onto the floor. She made me promise to clean it up, but I never did. I watched as she took the water soaked bathroom rug into the backyard to air dry.

  Looking back on the adolescent nightmares I unleashed, (And there were many) I am filled with shame at myself and regret. Whenever I have the opportunity now to stay with a friend or relatives, I always say a prayer to God begging him to help me be on my very best behavior and not annoy my hosts. I always assume that if there's a personality problem that's going to lead to conflict, it will be me that starts it. I was wrong.

   

  During the last two weeks I went to Ireland and Croatia with an acquaintance from a small scholarship program I attended last year. In Ireland we traveled by ourselves and stayed at a hotel, but in Croatia we were hosted by a mutual friend, yet stayed mostly around each other.  This acquaintance was several years older than me, in her late 20s, and I figured she would be more mature and grounded, and I would be the annoying, pesty "kid" once again. Instead, this woman turned out to be some sort of bipolar, psychotic 1997- Meredith Brooks- hit. One moment she would be smiling at me, annoyingly cheerful in tone saying "Isn't it amazing that we're really here?" The next moment she would be screaming at me, making random demands, complaining about the weather, overwhelming me with her unsolicited opinions on every little thing you can imagine.
  

  Don't get me started on the amount of times she dictated to me what I should wear, eat, and what temperature the room should be when we slept (If the room was too cold for her, the air conditioner went off, even if it meant I went sleepless because of the heat.)

  It was also upsetting to watch her dress down every single person in the service/tourism industry we encountered, including the Pakistani Irishman who worked the front desk of our hotel. She would interrupt me speaking to him to ask him something, then while he was answering her she would complain that she couldn't hear through his accent and that he should just talk to me. Which is what he was doing in the first place!

  When she wasn't prepared for an excursion and forgot to pack something, like a sweater for the air conditioned flight, she expected me to immediately forfeit the items I had thought to bring for myself. So I often had to do without. On the last day, after she was stupid enough to lose her wallet and she demanded I find it for her while she brushed her teeth, screaming at the top of her lungs "We are not leaving this hotel room without my wallet, so I suggest you look for it NOW!" This was her response to my bringing her breakfast from the lobby.
  

  Mind you, I am not her lover, or an old friend.We just met literally 6 months prior to leaving for Europe. I lost my patience with her at this point, and waited for her downstairs. She brought down her luggage five minutes before the bus to the airport was to arrive, and told me to watch her luggage while she went to use the bathroom. She then left the luggage there before I could answer her. I could see the bus arriving and sweat began to accumulate across my forehead.  I decided to leave her luggage by the front desk and risk them getting stolen so that I wouldn't miss the bus- and my flight. (The 3 previous times we went to an airport together on this trip she arrived an hour before the flight took off, angering me because we had to rush and barely missing planes taking off.)

  All this time I thought I was the only one who was capable of being a monster travel partner. I see now that perhaps two prayers are necessary before I leave for any destination. For myself and for my companions. I think it will be awhile before I go anywhere far again with people I do not know well.

  What do you do when you encounter a crazy travel partner?

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