Latest news with #AmericanTourist
The Independent
3 days ago
- General
- The Independent
A falling tree in Venice injures a dozen people, including foreign tourists
Foreign tourists were among a dozen people injured when a 50-year-old tree fell next to a bus stop in the Italian lagoon city of Venice on Monday, authorities said. The oak tree fell on a group of people waiting in a shaded area at Piazzale Roma, the last stop for buses and taxis ferrying visitors to and from the lagoon city from the mainland, city officials said. It wasn't immediately clear why the tree fell. The most seriously injured was a 30-year-old Italian woman, who was sitting on a wall near the tree with her two small children when the tree fell, Italian media reported. The woman was in critical condition with abdominal injuries, while her children weren't seriously injured and placed under psychological care, according to hospital officials. Another Italian woman in her 50s also was in critical condition after suffering chest injuries. A video from the scene showed the tree had snapped at the trunk, just above the roots. "The tree was apparently healthy,' Francesca Zaccariotto, the city's top public works official, told the news agency ANSA. She added that the tree was monitored along with others in the city, and there had been no signs indicating a possible collapse. A 60-year-old American was under observation for a head injury, a 70-year-old American suffered facial injuries, and two tourists from Eastern Europe suffered multiple bruises. Four other Italians were slightly injured.
Associated Press
3 days ago
- General
- Associated Press
A falling tree in Venice injures a dozen people, including foreign tourists
MILAN (AP) — Foreign tourists were among a dozen people injured when a 50-year-old tree fell next to a bus stop in the Italian lagoon city of Venice on Monday, authorities said. The oak tree fell on a group of people waiting in a shaded area at Piazzale Roma, the last stop for buses and taxis ferrying visitors to and from the lagoon city from the mainland, city officials said. It wasn't immediately clear why the tree fell. The most seriously injured was a 30-year-old Italian woman, who was sitting on a wall near the tree with her two small children when the tree fell, Italian media reported. The woman was in critical condition with abdominal injuries, while her children weren't seriously injured and placed under psychological care, according to hospital officials. Another Italian woman in her 50s also was in critical condition after suffering chest injuries. A video from the scene showed the tree had snapped at the trunk, just above the roots. 'The tree was apparently healthy,' Francesca Zaccariotto, the city's top public works official, told the news agency ANSA. She added that the tree was monitored along with others in the city, and there had been no signs indicating a possible collapse. A 60-year-old American was under observation for a head injury, a 70-year-old American suffered facial injuries, and two tourists from Eastern Europe suffered multiple bruises. Four other Italians were slightly injured.
Daily Mail
28-05-2025
- Lifestyle
- Daily Mail
American tourist exposes what he hated about Australia
An American tourist has let loose at Aussies and revealed what he disliked most about his time down under. Russell Richardson, a marketing expert known as Russ Flips Whips online, is regarded as one of the most famous car salesmen in the world. He started out making videos for a local dealership in the US, with his marketing skills and engaging content quickly earning him 750,000 followers on social media. Currently holidaying in Australia, Mr Richardson recently posted a video sharing the three things he loved and disliked most about the country. One major gripe? Speed cameras - or as he calls them, 'speed traps'. 'You guys have speed traps on like every road, every corner, every highway, every hundred feet,' he said. 'If I lived out here I would get a speeding ticket every day, it's unreal how many cameras and signs I saw for speed traps. 'All the locals were telling me "yeah it's a problem, they have so many speed traps". I didn't know that for the first week so I might be getting some speeding tickets.' But what shocked him most was how often strangers approached him to criticise the United States - especially its politics. 'The thing I hated most about being in Australia was, believe it or not, there was a group of men that I met in every part of the country, 55 to 70 years old, that would recognise my accent and come up and ask me if I'm American,' he said. 'I'd say "yes" then they would go on this rant about how terrible America is and how terrible Trump is and how terrible our politics are and how our country's just gone to crap and I probably hate where I live. 'I'm sorry, I don't care who you voted for, whether it's Biden or Trump or any other politician who was in office at the time of my stay here in Australia, I'm always going to defend my country. 'I'm on vacation guys, why would these people come up to me and talk about politics, I would never do that. 'I didn't speak to one person here about their politics. I don't know about them and I don't care about them so I was really blown away when this happened to me more than 10 times.' Mr Richardson said America was 'the greatest place to live' and that Aussies should keep their opinions of his country's politics to themselves. 'The more I travel the more I realise how great our country is. It's not to say that Australia is not a great country, but I'm proud of where I live,' he said. The other downside for him was the food, which he said wasn't up to American standards, with the exception of chicken salt. 'There's a reason people are overweight in America, it's because our food is better,' he said. Still, Mr Richardson had plenty of praise for Australia. He said he loved the people, the scenery, and the chance to drive different cars which were not available in the United States - such as the Ford Ranger and Toyota HiLux.
Telegraph
23-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
Has Paris finally become friendly? I posed as a clueless tourist to find out
The aloof Parisian stereotype has been around for decades, with Paris often voted the most unfriendly city in the world. But lately, something strange has been happening. Parisians haven't started sparkling in the sunlight, but they have, dare I say it, become rather personable. Friends and colleagues agreed. Were they basking in an Olympics afterglow that made it impossible to be mean? (Even though, ironically, there didn't seem to be a Parisian left in the city during the Games.) I decided to put the friendly Parisian theory to the test. I felt like a spy. My partner is Parisian, we speak French at home, and I live in Lyon, but for the purpose of this experiment I decided to channel my inner Emily Cooper from Emily in Paris. I boarded the train pretending that my linguistic skills were limited to 'merci beaucoup' (pronounced like 'merci beau cul', or 'thanks, nice arse'). Innocent and slightly bemused tourist mode activated, I made my way to Le Marais. The variables were in favour of a positive result. Paris basked in 25C bright sunshine, the kind of weather where toes poke out of Juliette balconies and even the grumpiest Parisian is at least 50 per cent sunnier in disposition. Since I was here to observe Parisians in their natural habitats, I skipped sightseeing in favour of a café. Disappointingly, the woman who served me was American. It's ironic that we have so many preconceptions around Parisians when many people living there aren't Parisian at all. But perhaps it's like the Berlin effect. Take a nerdy kid from rural Shropshire and drop them in Berlin and within a few months they'll have a shaved head, a tonne of tattoos and a love of techno. Do the same in Paris and they become aloof and solely dressed in monochrome. Two other variables were in my favour. I was alone, and from experience seem to always give off a 'please-talk-to-me-no matter-how-weird-you-are' vibe (a nightmare on buses). Sure enough, it wasn't long before a Frenchman struck up an unsolicited conversation with me. 'I was at law school with Marine Le Pen,' he said. 'She was brunette then, so as you English say, you can be sure the carpet doesn't match the drapes.' Eccentric, yes, but I couldn't fault the man for his friendliness. I crossed Place des Vosges, a mass of bare skin and pigeons in the sunshine, to look for a bistro for lunch. Rocking up at a bistro at 1.30pm, the end of lunch service, is already taboo, doing so with a big grin and an emphatic 'bon JOUR!' even more so. 'Do you have a menu in English?' I asked, but it was already there, a scannable QR code with (almost) entirely accurate translations of the dishes. I eavesdropped on the conversations around me, wondering if anyone would comment on this annoying, too loud British woman. Nothing. The waiter replied to me in very passable English, and was all smiles. I was 15 the first time I came to Paris, on a school trip. One of the girls in my year was half French, and I remember her raining a torrent of choice French swear words on two middle-aged women on the metro – words I didn't understand then but would now – and our flustered teacher trying to repair the damage. Sharing their coach with a gaggle of loud and overexcited schoolchildren had brought out all their Parisianness, and they'd said some pretty rude stuff. In hindsight, who could blame them? No-one relishes sharing their coach with a eurotrip. My food arrived almost alarmingly fast. I dropped my book on the floor – accidentally I might add, this wasn't a Michelin fork test, and the person at the table next to me scooped it up straight away. Remember when the New York Times wrote that Paris had really bad coffee? It was such a slight that the city yo-yoed the other way, and now you can't move for bean-to-cup roasters with a library of plant milk. Perhaps this new-found friendliness is less Olympic hangover and more a matter of pride. Outside Hôtel de Sully, I asked a woman to take a photo of me (for this article of course). She had headphones in, but Anna in Pariswas obnoxious. She also didn't speak any English, so I acted out my request like a game of charades, getting her to take horizontal and vertical shots. She wasn't only obliging, she smiled. On the metro, I saw someone help a woman with a pushchair unsolicited. As I boarded the train back to Lyon, I even overheard someone helping a fellow passenger with their luggage say 'avec un sourire, on arrive à tout faire' ('we can do anything with a smile'). Was I on the lookout for positivity? Definitely, but perhaps by damning Parisians with a cold reputation we've been predisposing them to live up to it. Who knows whether all these friendly Parisians were radiating post-Olympic bonheur or whether it was simply a sunny day in the City of Light, but this Briton was greeted with nothing but warmth. I'll have to reconduct the experiment in the rain to be sure.
