Where You From? is part of the ANA, Take Me ‘Round the World Trip Report.
Nepal should be on the list for Worst Places to Hail a Cab. After asking where I’m going and giving me every excuse as to why the price should be triple, after negotiating why it should be one-third, and after speaking to the Xth taxi driver, the trip begins. The next topic of discussion is where I am from. The worst answer to give if you don’t want to engage in small talk is to say USA. If you say America, best case you hear everywhere in the US where the driver has been. Worst case, you have to hear about all the bad things America has done. To quiet the chatter, for years I simply reply with, “Mexico.” The response I receive is, “Oh Mexico!” That’s it, nothing more, nothing less. To be clear, I don’t pretend to speak Spanish when I enter the cab in order to avoid the interaction. I don’t change my accent to hide my American voice. I just say Mexico. That gets me to my destination in peace. Having moved to Puerto Rico, I thought I could stop lying, but then I was peppered about questions regarding Hurricane Maria and Justin Bieber.
I don’t like telling people I’m from the US, as then they assume I have a lot more money than most people in the world (which is true).
I’ve tried Mexico, but lack of Spanish means people figure it out and get mad.
Now, if I get the sense people in other countries are closed minded, or lazy, I will tell them I’m from Canada.
It’s the most boring country in the world, that does little on the world stage.
It’s not known for anything but ‘people are nice’ and there are some mountains on the west coast.
So, the topics are easy to discuss, and I can throw in an ‘eh’ if I want to look genuine.
No one cares about Canada, no one has heard anything exceptional about Canada, but also limited controversy (I guess people do mention the lack of free speech in Canada, but, I can dance around that).
I think it’s one of the most boring countries, and the easiest and least offensive to say you are from there when you are speaking to close-minded and judgmental people abroad.
But then you have to say you’re from Canada. I won’t give my Canadien cousins the satisfaction.
Trust me, it *pains* me to give Canada any props in the world. I promise.
I’ve never heard a single person saying anything cool about Canada other than ‘they are so nice up there’ or ‘Banff is cool’
Canada is the pinky toe of the world. It’s there, but, it doesn’t do anything.
If it helps me to not get ripped off by people who prey on more wealthy/well known countries. That’s perfect.
Canada is finally contributing something to world as far as I am concerned.
Lol
So you’re the dick that pulls that crap.
Own where you’re from. If you don’t like what your country does, maybe you should do something to change it. Perhaps your country seems exceptional to you , but mostly in the negative sense to the rest of us.
Clearly you don’t know how to read. I love where I’m from. I just don’t want to talk about it every time I get into a taxi. “The rest of us” lol. Yes, there’s only two people in this world: Greeks and everyone who wishes they were Greek.
Wow….nice trolls ‘Howard’ and ‘TPOL’…..speaking about being intolerant, close minded and the living cliche of every USA ignorant citizen both of you…
I wish your country would have contributed on the world stage half of what Canada did for the last decades….
But ‘eh’ please continue to travel and advertise yourselves as Canadian…..that will prevent you guys to mention your ‘great’ country lol
I don’t say I’m from Canada. Get it right.
I laughed at the title because whenever we travel we say we are from Romania. Doesn’t allow all the bad things about USA to be told to us,but more importantly we are never scammed on the price like almost every time when we said USA .
Lol that’s a good one.
I sometimes say Greece because that is where my parents were born and I speak the language. So it is not really a lie because I am from there even though I was born and live in the US.
I say Iraq when Im in the middle East. Same reason
Finland. Nobody speaks finnish or knows anything about Finland.