MEMOIRS OF A TOUR GUIDE  


(One of the guiding principles of Belgian-born New York City Tour Director Simone is that "you can't be a good tour guide unless you are a good storyteller". In the course of her professional career, Simone has encountered innumerable amusing and thought-provoking anecdotes while effectively controlling crowds of tourists from all over the world. What follows is an episode taken from her upcoming book "Memoirs of a tour guide".)



TWO SPANISH LADIES

By Simone


The sun had not yet risen. I was lying on my bed, glad this was Friday, the last day of this five-day tour. I had guided 46 foreign tourists through Niagara Falls and Washington D.C. Everyone seemed pleased, which in itself made my job and efforts worthwhile. Except for a guest complaining that the mirror in his room was streaked and had fallen off the wall when he tried to clean it and had given him a cut on his forehead, I did not have much trouble this time around. There was always a tourist looking for a free amenity and in this case, although you needed a loupe to see where he had gotten hurt, the Spanish guy got a free dinner in the Niagara hotel we had lodged in.

Suddenly, a knock at the door of my room made my brain change gears, and when I opened the door I saw before me two Spanish ladies belong to my group. Since they had usually looked so elegant with their dangling earrings and extravagant jewelry, their colorful clothes and typical chignons, I could hardly recognize them through their disheveled appearance. They were both petite women and had worn different high heel shoes every day. The whole group had indeed been wondering how they could walk up and down the capital's monuments and memorials without breaking their necks. Looking quite at ease in them, their fancy shoes were the talk of every woman on the bus. Some were blue satin with rhinestones; others were red velvet with pearls, still others, were black linen with sequins. I had personally never seen such shoes.

Now before me, the two ladies were clad in funny looking slippers with little bells at the front ends, crying and gesticulating hysterically and explaining that they had been robbed of all their belongings during the night. Their cash, jewelry, passports and airline tickets were all gone. This had never taken place on any of my previous tours and I was staring at the two women, horrified at the thought that such a robbery could have occurred in a luxury hotel. "How can this have happened with all the locks on your door?", I asked. "We forgot to put the security chain on", they cried."We were too tired to think of it when we returned last night from the concert at the Mall."

They had had a wonderful time. Tony Bennett had performed that night, not far from the Lincoln Memorial, and they had succeeded to squeeze into the audience and see and hear the great American singer up close. It had been a delight and they had felt lucky to be able to attend such a unique performance. It had been an opportunity of a lifetime.

I was appalled listening to the story of their robbery and told them to wait while I got dressed. The three of us then went down to the manager's office, not yet at his desk. It was only 6 A.M. I spoke to the night clerk who was a real jerk, and told him to call the police. Arriving promptly, they took us to the station where the two lovely ladies were interrogated at length and since no one there spoke one word of Maria Isabel's beautiful language, and neither one of my Spanish ladies knew one word of English, it was I who translated word for word what was being said. This took quite a long time and it was now after 10 A.M. I was concerned about the other tourists who expected to depart at 8:30.

Returning to the hotel where I found the manager dunking his doughnut in his "café con leche", I angrily explained what had happened. Since I had to leave immediately, it is he who would have to take the two tourists to the Spanish Consulate to get a copy of their passports and also to Iberia Airlines for a copy of their non-refundable return tickets to Madrid the next day. I had no choice but to leave the two ladies still in tears in his care, and ran, but I had to stop at the cashier to help three Italians who had made some phone call to Rome early that morning. It was not rare for this to happen at the last minute because some tourists hoped the tour would leave before the bill from the long distance phone company had arrived. Now at the cashier window, the three men were complaining at the high price of their calls although I had warned my travelers that calls to Europe from their hotel rooms would be outrageously expensive. Luckily my driver had already loaded the luggage and my tourists were seated impatiently on the bus, waiting for me to lead them to their destination. Explaining in four languages what had occurred, and although I was two hours late, they showed some compassion and didn't gripe too much. They were anxious to arrive in the Big Apple where they expected to take a few more bites of it, before returning to their respective countries of France, Belgium, Italy, Spain and Australia.

All went well and the next day after everyone had left the United States, I called Mr Swanson in Washington to make sure he had kept his promise. He assured me that he had taken the women to the airport himself and had gotten the relevant documents' copies, as I had required. Feeling relieved and thanking him profusely for his help, I couldn't resist voicing my surprise at thieves entering a room so easily in a hotel of such category.

"Where were your security guards? Isn't this a five-star hotel?", I asked. "What are you talking about, Simone? These two women were too embarrassed to tell you that they had picked up two twenty-year old rapper-type guys in front of Lincoln Memorial and had taken them up to their bedroom. The good-for-nothings had apparently left with the loot while they were sleeping, no doubt with a smile on their face!"

I couldn't believe what I was hearing, but after a few seconds of more repartee with the manager, we both burst out laughing.

"Come to think of it Mr. Swanson, it was an expensive smile", I added more seriously, reflecting again on the whole thing while bidding him farewell.

I couldn't help smiling myself as I was hanging up, thinking as they do in France, "Chapeau!" to my Madrilenian beauties. Indeed dear ladies, "My hat goes off to you!" One was 84 and the other 85!





(Copyright 2001 Simone. All rights reserved)

For those of you interested in obtaining further information on Simone's "Memoirs of a tour guide" contact moi254@aol.com