Dear American tourists...

Dear American tourists,

I am happy to see you traveling in Europe.  It's wonderful that you have passports and guidebooks and comfortable walking shoes. But whenever I run into you, I am torn. Part of me is drawn to your smiling faces, your slight confusion, your loud voices, your friendliness. I want to help you. I want to talk about where we are from and give you a hug. Meanwhile, part of me wants to crawl under a bench and pretend I never saw you.  I want to wrap myself in a scarf and wear black and not make eye contact.

To better understand what I mean, please watch this video clip from a show called Harry and Paul. It stars someone like you and is only a couple of minutes long. It starts on 1:25.

(now I am pausing to let you watch it...)

This is the bus ride that you took in London, but it could have been Paris or Rome or Munich. It is the bus ride you took after snapping some photos of your hotel breakfast, a corner bakery, and your hand holding up the Eiffel Tower. I know you took these pictures because you posted them immediately on Facebook.

You make eye contact and smile at strangers and introduce yourselves. You strike up conversations on public transit and wear your ball caps proudly. You are impressed that there is a cafe you can walk to, which is not owned by Starbucks (snap a photo). You are amused by the smallness of cars and the tightness of parking spots (look, here's me next to a SmartCar). You are confused by the streets that curl and twist and change names. You are puzzled by money that comes in so many colors. You proudly tell your waitress that your ancestors came from this country. Then you take a picture with her.

Clark Griswold: There it is, kids, my motherland.
Rusty Griswold: Dad, Grandma's from Chicago.
Clark Griswold: Shut up, Russ.

This was me once too. I foolishly smiled at people and expected them to smile back. But now I have lived in Germany long enough that I don't really see the graffitti anymore, I take fresh bread for granted, and I have all but forgotten how to drive. Summer travel season is upon us and you will flood European capitals with your wide-eyed Americanness. I hear your accents and I want to show you around. I also want to duck behind the nearest SmartCar and hide.