Stupid Loud Americans

One thing we had to be slightly sensitive to is the global tension and others’ perception of America/Americans. We were told to not draw extra attention to ourselves and we wouldn’t likely have any problems. Well, with a group of 60 college-age, camera carrying tourists, this is rather hard to do. Plus, as we came to realize, Americans are loud. Really loud. Despite numerous group shushings, we remained quite loud through the week. This was especially noticeable at restaurants…everyone tries to talk louder than the next person and then laughs loudly when someone says something funny.

We realized that we were loud and tried, kind of, or not at all... to be sensitive to it. We were complimented by our hotel in London on being their first group that didn’t draw a single complaint from other guests. There were times however that we weren’t such as our boat ride on Lake Windemerre when half of those who first established themselves on the front half of the boat moved to the back once chorale took it over.

We were quite loud, but I usually didn’t feel like apologizing for it. Yeah, you’ve gotta be sensitive a bit, but that’s who we are. We fortunately didn’t run into any problems as a result of ‘drawing attention to ourselves’ (I don’t think), but the politics issue was somewhat interesting…that’s another post.