My Ten Funniest Travel Stories

Every time I speak to someone coming back from a far off place, it's not long before we begin swapping stories about the hysterical situations we managed to get ourselves into. Now I'm sure there is some psycho-analysis behind my travel style lending itself to somewhat hysterical happenings, but friends, that's another story for another time. Let's concentrate. I want to hear stories from our readers about absurd, hysterical, or comical things they've seen/heard or done while abroad. And no request here at Pangaea goes without a quid pro quo, so to get started, here's my top ten list of weirdest or funniest things I've seen myself while abroad:

1. I once traveled around Norway in a yellow van full of 17 people. We're not talking about a bus here either folks; picture a standard size van, with enough body parts hanging out of the window to draw any stare within a square mile. This is not the end of the story though. My Dad was one of the unfortunate souls who was half in the van, half out. At a stoplight outside of Bislett Stadium in Oslo, a lunatic woman came from nowhere yelling God knows what in Norwegian. Upon reaching the van she grabbed hold of my Dad and spent what was likely the longest light of my Dad's life trying to pull him out the window. Ole, our only resident Norwegian, explained afterward that the woman was quite fond of my Dad's eyes. To this day, I've never seen a funnier look than my Dad's frantic face as he fought to stay inside that van.
2. Last time I was in Thailand with my buddy Coy, we arrived at a hotel and were told the rate for our room was $4 more than we had expected because the room, "included Bigfoot free of charge." Enough said, we'll take it.
3. I stayed in a hostel with a buddy of mine once and we were given a third roommate we later named "The Brazilian Stomper." He spent the entire night jumping from his top bunk onto the floor making the whole room rattle. After a minute or so passed, he'd climb back up into his bed and repeat the jump. This went on for hours.
4. I worked in Tokyo for several months, and loved to find the most bizarrely translated signs. One of my favorites was my trash can. Somehow "trash can" was mistranslated to read: "It's here. Let's Supreme Can!"
5. Along those same lines, while at a restaurant in Prague I saw a menu item (that wound up being a local river fish) that was translated to English as: "His wife in the garlic." Do you even need to ask if I ordered it or not?
6. While in Egypt we met a shop owner, who upon finding out my friends name was Dave, started yelling "Beckham!" Beckham!" He proceeded to close his store for us, sit us down on the floor, serve us tea and cigarettes (none of us smoke), and show us Roman artifacts unearthed on his Grandfather's farm. Classic.
7. There is a hostel in Interlaken, Switzerland that is named Funny Farm. I won't get into all of the reasons here, but suffice to say the name barely cracks the surface of how crazy this place really is. By way of example, the showers are located in the corner of a dance club on premises. Walking through strobe lights and dj's to get to the showers is bizarre. Having your fingernails and soap glowing under the black lights while showering is ever weirder.
8. In a random neighborhood in Tokyo on a morning run, I once made a run for it and hid in a tube slide thinking I saw a lion. Why wouldn't there be a lion in Tokyo? I was prepared to take kids out, push people aside.... It's every man for themselves when a lion is on the prowl in Roppongi. Made sense at the time.... Long story short, it was a freakishly large red dog shaved to look like a lion (mane, tail, you name it).
9. So out of sync from jet-lag, my friend and I went to bed at 4pm in Paris once. We woke in the morning, showered, and went for breakfast. After eating eggs, we noticed it seemed to be getting dark. My buddy asked a woman in front of a hostel, "Is it day or night?" Confused, she said, "night". We had slept two hours and thought a day had passed. Awesome.
10. Last time I flew to SE Asia, I brought Ambien for my buddy and I to sleep through the flight. We figured we'd take our Ambien with a beer to "cheers" the trip. Let's just say Ambien and a beer is not a good idea. We later found about a half hour of video footage on his camera with us rambling on about lasagna and bread (not served on the flight by the way) that neither of us remember in the least.