This afternoon we took the family to town where we did a bit of second-hand shopping, browsed around a farmer’s market, and took the kids to the park. On our way home we stopped off at our favorite local hamburger joint and had a bite to eat.
About halfway through our meal, a group of Americans came in, speaking English loudly and more or less taking over the entire restaurant. The group was made up of a dad (or a dad figure, at any rate), four teenagers (two boys, two girls), and a two- or three-year-old boy. As soon as they came in, the dad went to the bathroom and the little boy ran to the “balloon tree” and started grabbing at the balloons, nearly pulling the entire thing down on top of himself. One of the older boys tried to get control of the situation, in the process popping at least one balloon and adding to the general tumult. Throughout all of this, the older kids were milling around in the dining room and calling back and forth to each other (again, LOUDLY).
Finally the dad came out of the bathroom and fairly yelled across the room, “Anybody else need to use the bathroom?” One of the boys took him up on the offer, and the rest of them went back outside to their car, the dad stopping first to grab another balloon or three (nice, considering that they had aparently come in only to make use of the facilities).
My seat was facing the parking lot, so as I finished my dinner I had a clear view of the dad digging around in the overstuffed cargo area of the car, while the pre-schooler ran unheeded through the lot forcing at least one car to take evasive action not to run over him. The girls finally managed to rein him in to some degree (between composing text messages on their cell phones), and the last of the bathroom-goers re-joined them after a time.
At last they all piled into the car (just your average family sedan, which means that the little guy was sitting on the lap of one or another teenager in the back seat), and Dad backed out, running over the half-full Coke bottle he’d left sitting beside the car when he got in. He drove over the rivulets of Coke, turning the wrong way and going out through the in door, so to speak, and forcing still more drivers into evasive maneuvers.
The whole thing was exhausting. At one point I couldn’t resist remarking (in English, somewhat loudly) that Americans wonder why they have a bad name in the rest of the world. To be fair, however, I have to say that it’s only a very small percentage of Americans who would go to another country and act the way this family did (and honestly, I’m sure they’re every bit as clueless and disruptive within the confines of America as without; I’m equally sure that your average American would find them just as unpleasant as we did). They’re sure the ones you remember, though.