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Making a Scene
The Occidental Tourist · October 25, 2000

Confession time: The Tourist recently became a participant in an, umm, unfortunate and embarrassingly loud scene. In the lobby of a four-diamond hotel, no less.

At this point, faithful readers may ask: How exactly, Tourist, is this news?

OK already. While the Tourist is an incessant grouch when it comes to traveling, he usually doesn't get involved with public confrontations. Demanding refunds from inept airlines, by all means, is perfectly fine. A complaining call to a hotel manager can result in concrete retribution. Recounting your travel tales of misery and sorrow in the lounge over generous portions of scotch is par for the course.

But public scenes? The Tourist has successfully avoided these.

Until now.

It unfolded at a luxury hotel in Silicon Valley. For the record, the Tourist believes - while he was in the right on principle - he fell short on decorum and should have graciously let the matter die a quiet death. But he invites the readers to make their call for the ultimate ruling, after reading the summary below: Did the Tourist act appropriately? Or should he have kept his mouth shut? Send him your ruling at OTtravel@regiononline.com and you have the Tourist's solemn promise: If you side with the latter sentiment, he'll remain respectful of your decision and won't belittle you in this column. (This time, no readers weighing in will be identified in any follow-up edition of Ticked.)

That said, this is a relatively factual recap of the incident:

The Tourist's day started at 6 a.m. on East Coast time. He got his beloved toddler lad up; changed his diaper and sat with him for morning videos; put in a 10-hour day's work in Washington; then drove to Dulles for a five-hour flight. Then came the mishaps: The laptop broke down on the plane. Nearly a folder's worth of business papers were lost along the way.

Once landed, more atrocities: The Tourist clearly has no desire to get stiffed by luxury hotel mini-bars, but his taxi driver seemed clueless as to where to buy a six-pack of beer in San Jose. "Sir," the English-challenged cabbie insisted, "there are NO beer stores here in the valley."

"So, let me get this straight," the Tourist responded. "In the technology capital of the free world, you cannot purchase beer?"

"No," the cabbie said. "No one drinks beer here."

The Tourist - with one conversation with the hotel doorman - learned otherwise. Apparently, this was the only cabbie in America who hasn't been introduced to the concept of a convenience store.

So imagine his mood as the Tourist approached the front desk to check in. He walked right over to the clearly marked "Preferred Guest" line. Because the Tourist travels frequently, he takes the time to make a simple, toll-free call to half a dozen top hotel companies, and gets on their membership plan. Among other goodies, preferred status provides a way to bypass long, check-in lines.

When the customer ahead of him was finished, the Tourist approached the designated "preferred guest" desk immediately in front of him. Suddenly, a guy waiting in the other line cut across and whisked in front of the Tourist to move in front of the "preferred" line. The Tourist gave him his patented 'What the Hell?' look.

"I was waiting longer than you," the line-cutter explained.

"Yeah," the Tourist replied. "But this is the 'Preferred Guest' line. You were in the other line."

"Oh, so we should all wait longer than you?!" he fumed. "You're not the only preferred guest here!"

The Tourist applied logic, albeit unsuccessfully: "Well, if you're a member, then you should have been in the right line. It's clearly marked. That's the whole point of joining the preferred program ..."

From there, the scene got uglier. The guy got more and more irate, and taunted the Tourist as if he wanted to do some serious knuckle dancing outside. Had the Tourist not ignored him, the surrounding, well-heeled guests would've been ducking behind fern trees to avoid getting mace in their cognacs. Unintimidated, the Tourist held firm and checked himself in, all while he's getting screamed at in the other ear. "I apologize if YOU misunderstand the process," he said to the other guy.

Now, does the Tourist consider himself entirely blameless?

Hardly. In polite society, he would have just shut up and let the other guy have his way. But this time, he didn't. He simply wasn't in the mood. He earned the right to check in with an express service - no different, really, than avoiding rental car counters by signing up for Avis 'preferred' status. Either way, you 'jump ahead' of the line. But you made a proactive, travel-savvy move to make it happen.

But, that aside, the Tourist is happy to bring himself before the judgment of his readers: Feel free to either give the Tourist a ton of grief, or give him your hearty 'thumbs up.' Results will be reported accurately in a future column. Really.

The Occidental Tourist is a magazine writer in Washington, DC. He writes for Maxim, POV, Capital Style and ABCNews.com. His column appears on Tuesdays. E-mail him at tourist@ticked.com.