British Expats - The rise of the Ugly European

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The rise of the Ugly European

Thanks to the Mad Kowboy Diseased Bush, Americans have to fight off
insults from silly, judgemental Europeans who can't seem to
differentiate between "Americans" and Bush's politics. I guess their
xenophobic media forgot to report on the millions of Americans who were
protesting right alongside them this past President's Day weekend. ****
'em.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2...can-usat_x.htm

Ugly sentiments sting American tourists

By Marco R. della Cava, USA TODAY

As an A-list celebrity, actor Vince Vaughn employs an array of weapons
to cope with hecklers, from a Saharan wit to a waiting limo.

But during a movie shoot recently in England, Vaughn found himself
repeatedly reaching for the same comeback. Three totemic words from the
attic of history: the Marshall Plan.

"I'd say one in three conversations wound up the same way, basically
that 'America is the devil.' So I'd ask folks to think about the
Marshall Plan a bit and get back to me," says Vaughn, 32, referring to
the Allied blueprint for the reconstruction of Europe after World War
II. "In the end, though, I just had to tell people, 'I'm not having this
discussion anymore.' "

But if you're heading overseas, be prepared to have it. Again and again.
If the past 100 years were widely considered the American Century, this
new one is fast shaping up as the Anti-American Century.

Just ask tourist Colleen Frost, 33, who hopped into a cab recently on
her first day in Berlin. An English-speaking driver demanded an
explanation for what he called "America's megalomania."

"He wanted to know what I would think of my country if my brother or
boyfriend was killed in a war," says Frost, a dental hygienist from
Santa Fe. She says the ride was over before she could provide an answer
for the disgruntled cabby.

How times have changed.

A mother lode of goodwill fostered in the decades after the defeat of
Nazi Germany has been reduced to dust in recent years. A growing number
of foreigners see some of the United States' political decisions
(pulling out of the Kyoto Treaty on global emissions) and personal
choices (Americans' penchant for gas-loving SUVs) as at best unilateral
and at worst selfish. The confrontation over Iraq is just more fuel on a
bonfire.

From Spanish plazas to Parisian metros, American tourists are being
quizzed, grilled and even spat on by people who do not approve of the
Bush administration's drive for a war against Saddam Hussein.

As a result, a declining number of Americans (54% today vs. 79% a year
ago) believes that the USA enjoys a favorable image abroad, according to
a recent Gallup poll. And a majority of Americans (64%) cite a fear of
unfriendliness as the top concern of traveling abroad during wartime,
according to a survey in the February issue of Conde Nast Traveler.

Anecdotal evidence from across Europe indicates those fears are not
unfounded.

"I've spent 100 days a year for the past 30 years in Europe, and,
generally, people always managed to differentiate a government's action
from its citizens," says Rick Steves, a Seattle-based tour operator who
specializes in Europe.

"But I have never seen this level of frustration in my lifetime. They
just can't understand our push for war, especially the younger
generation."

Steves says the current climate is in stark contrast to the
"breathtaking" we-are-all-Americans sentiment that gripped Europe on
Sept. 11, 2001. He is not discouraging his clients from traveling abroad
now, and cancellations have been few. That said, his Web site features a
flurry of concerned exchanges about overseas travel. Steves urges
would-be tourists to pack the right attitude.

"Being defensive does no good. You have to keep things in perspective
and listen," he says. "At its best, travel remains a vital force in
promoting understanding."

And is it ever needed. If European criticism of the United States was
previously limited to newspaper headlines and kaffeeklatsch debates, the
tug of war over Iraq has unleashed a torrent of frustrated invective on
the streets.

Much of such vitriol is aimed at the Bush administration. That has never
been more in evidence than during the weekend of Feb. 15, when more than
6 million people in roughly 60 countries hit the streets in some of the
largest anti-war protests since the Vietnam War.

But sometimes this antagonism filters down directly to the American
tourist.

Laurel Scapicchio and her 13-year-old daughter were waiting for a train
in the Paris metro a few weeks ago when their conversation was
interrupted. Two men in their 20s overheard their American accents and
shouted, "Pigs!"

"It brought us back to reality," says Scapicchio, 42, a freight
forwarder from Saugus, Mass., who was on her first trip to the French
capital. "It was a little spooky. But we shrugged it off. It wasn't
personal. It was just because we were Americans."

European tourism officials, who are battling a 19% drop-off in U.S.
travel since a record 13.1 million visited in 2000, discount such
incidents as aberrations.

"I am certain that a number of American visitors will be asked about the
U.S. administration's policy on Iraq. But if indeed there have been some
unpleasant encounters, I strongly believe that they are few and far
between," says Patrick Goyet, vice chairman of the European Travel
Commission in New York. "Furthermore, speaking as a European and for the
vast majority of my fellow Europeans, I consider any such behavior
idiotic and embarrassing."

Be ready for harsh words

Nonetheless, many Americans abroad have stories to tell. Their warning?
Expect the unexpected. While living in Spain recently, Jane Kelly, 20,
recalls a friend being spat on for being American.

"In any country you're going to get people who do this," says Kelly, who
was studying at the Madrid campus of Boston's Suffolk University.

However, fellow student Kate Perlis, 20, says the atmosphere was
charged. "It seems that the only English a lot of people there know are
the words, 'We hate Bush.' "

Joshua Eckblad, 28, an American high-tech manager living in Madrid, has
had similar experiences. Daily he faces the comments of Spaniards who
"feel free to say anything against America, who think Bush and his
people know nothing about the world."

His sister, Vanina, 27, an architect living in Paris, has fared no
better. She says that the other day a man on the street "told me to go
back to where I came from."

Such run-ins can cause some visitors to contemplate retreat. When Linda
Severson, an American who has lived in Brussels for two years, was
visiting Amsterdam recently with her mother, the pair found themselves
at the Hard Rock Cafe, surrounded by anti-American protesters.

"We were looking down at all the demonstrations and signs that said
'Kill Bush, not Iraqis,' and we just sat there stunned," she says. "We
felt a little homesick."

But other Americans abroad prefer to tack right into the storm.

Louis Nebelsick, 45, is an archaeologist from Louisville who organizes
exhibits for the Dresden museum of archaeology. He says he hasn't seen
this level of anti-Americanism in Germany since the days of Ronald
Reagan, when in 1983 masses protested the installation of medium-range
missiles in Europe.

But despite the rancor, Nebelsick proudly wears an American flag on his
baseball cap. It might as well be a lightning rod in a thunderstorm.

"One guy saw that I was American and said he just had to tell me what he
thought of my country," he says. "His opinion was that America is being
run by a rabid cowboy."

Nebelsick also carries a cigarette lighter emblazoned with an American
flag. Several times of late, folks have turned down his offer of a light
as soon as they caught a glimpse of the Stars and Stripes.

"The era of Americans as heroes is over," he says.

Pleasantries also exchanged

But that isn't to say that positive connections can't be made between
nationalities on a one-to-one basis. Some tourists interviewed spoke of
not only pleasant exchanges but also an appreciation for those Americans
who would travel overseas despite the current climate.

When Tony Vitanza, 42, of Fort Worth unleashed his Texas accent on a
shopkeeper in Belgium, she immediately asked what state he was from.

"I made sure to tell her I didn't vote for Bush," says Vitanza, a flight
attendant who was careful to pluck all the pins off his jacket before
heading outdoors. "But the woman said she was interested in my accent,
not my politics."

Similarly, when Jay Rooney, 57, and Bruce Plank, 35, were in Europe a
few weeks ago while on business for Armstrong Flooring, the only run-ins
they had were with vendors haggling over prices at flea markets.

"We've had no problems at all," says Rooney while touring London's famed
Portobello Road market. "Some of our hosts even seemed apologetic. I
haven't felt criticism. Haven't felt rudeness, haven't felt pressure.
Quite the contrary, I feel some people have gone out of their way to be
nice."

One veteran Europe-watcher thinks the average American is still very
much appreciated by the average European. It's when the policies of a
nation are pinned on an individual that the sniping begins.

"I've found that most Europeans are generally fond of Americans," says
Pieter Ockers, European analyst for iJet Travel Intelligence, an
American company that provides travel risk management advice for
corporate and leisure travelers.

"But the (European) media often stoke the fires," he says. "Their media
portray Americans as culturally inferior, ignorant of world politics,
arrogant in our interaction with the rest of the world and, worst of
all, the bully of the neighborhood."

During Vaughn's stay in England, he found himself criticized on all
those levels. Like a boxer countering each blow, he shot back with the
best responses he could.

Sometimes the complaints left him speechless, like the time he was told
" 'America had no culture' by a kid wearing a Kobe Bryant T-shirt and
listening to rapper DMX."

But one incident really stung.

"Man, it was bad," says the Rat Pack-y star of Swingers. "These girls
saw us and were kind of flirting, and they kept asking us if we were
American. Finally we said, 'Yes,' and they just took off.

"One girl turns and says, 'We were hoping you were Canadian.' Canadian?
Since when was it cooler to be Canadian?"

--
... K ...

TODAY'S BUSHISM: "Columbia carried in its payroll classroom experiments from some of our students in America."Ã¢â‚¬Â¹Bethesda, Md., Feb. 3, 2003

Still obssessed? http://duelingbushes.tripod.com/welcome.html