Rules for Being a Tourist in Another Country

1. Bring an expensive, unwieldy, large camera. If you don't have an expensive camera, bring something equally expensive that can double as a camera. After all, what better way to say you're a tourist than to take a picture of a great landmark with something that looks like a dinner tray?

2. When buying anything, first buy something that no native in their right mind would buy, i.e. a mug with the queen's/president's/prime minister's/national animal's/great athlete's/television character's face on it. You want to stand out, after all.

3. As a corollary to purchasing, always argue with the cashier either in a choppy version of the native language or in a louder version of your own language. This still applies to American English vs. English English.

4. When walking anywhere, take steps no larger than that of the average toddler, and pay no attention to anyone walking in front of, behind, or to the sides of you. Remember, a tourist's job is to soak in the culture, and what better way to do that than to bump into natives and absorb them via osmosis?

5. If you are to take a picture of a great landmark, have a subject (friend, family member, stray orphan) stand at the one end of the walkway while you stand at the other end. This way, the natives will be forced to stop and wait while you take your picture, and you will get one completely unimpeded!

6. Walk everywhere with your rolling luggage. You know why.

7. Always compare everything to your native country. What's the point of going to another country if you can't openly boast about how much it stinks in comparison to your own?

8. After trying some local cuisine from a chain restaurant that also exists in your country, decide that you don't feel like eating anything aside from hotel food. The local food "makes your stomach ache."

9. Pay way too much for everything. Not because you necessarily want to, but because you can.

10. Don't actually indulge yourself in the finer points of the culture. It's all boring music, plays, and history anyway. The big buildings are what matters, and of course the ability to brag to your friends after the trip counts the most.  "Oh yeah, we had a great time in London! We saw EVERYTHING."

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