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A lost tourist who thought Maine was San Francisco

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Re: A lost tourist who thought Maine was San Francisco

#131

Post by ghaff »

parsecs wrote: post #126
ghaff wrote: post #120

I don't think the person actually traveled there. But there's a small tech-oriented conference in Portland, ME and, in one of the earlier years of the conference, someone booked a flight to Portland, OR given that's where obviously a tech conference would be.

Sorry but I don't really understand that last part - is Portland, OR a likely place for tech conferences to take place?

It's not a super-common conference spot but it's where O'Reilly's OSCON mostly happened for many years pre-pandemic (when O'Reilly shut down their events business) for example. And there's a lot of other relatively low-level open source-adjacent activities there. Puppet Labs is located there for example. Certainly a bigger conference location than Portland, ME in general which I don't think even has a convention center and doesn't have more than regional flights into the airport.

Re: A lost tourist who thought Maine was San Francisco

#132

Post by ericsoderstrom »

mkl wrote: post #113
khazhoux wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Clearly, a thing can't be both to your left and right side simultaneously -- that's a physical impossibility. In fact, to underscore this point, the Tony Bennet song "I Left My Heart In San Francisco" was written to remind people that water in SF is to their left.

No one said anything about simultaneous. Stand on a beach, any beach in the world, looking straight out at the water. Turn 90 degrees left; now the water is on the right. Look straight out again, then turn 90 degrees right; now the water is on the left. Tada! You have just done the "impossible".

(hint: it's a joke)

Re: A lost tourist who thought Maine was San Francisco

#133

Post by klipt »

marcandre wrote: post #96
RegnisGnaw wrote: post #4

I lived in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada (eh?) for 23 years and we have similar stories. There is an island that is part of Nova Scotia called Cape Breton with a city named Sydney (so Sydney, Nova Scotia, Canada) with population of ~30K. Every few years we get a tourist that confuses that with Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. They generally realize something is wrong when they switch planes in Halifax from a Jet (B…

I was flying to Costa Rica from Montreal. Airline wanted money for checked luggage, but typically for long distance flights like this it's free. After enquiring, turns out I had bought the wrong flight to San Jose, California, instead of San Jose, Costa Rica. It's SJC vs SJO too, easy to confuse... Glad I figured that out before getting there!

San Jose, California has a nice technology museum, and a short commute to many silicon valley companies, but not much else going for it!

Re: A lost tourist who thought Maine was San Francisco

#134

Post by gumby »

In the late 80s I left a wedding on Hawaii to fly home (change in Oahu). In those days you just walked out and climbed up into the plane. Well I paid no attention to anything, and only realised I’d flown to the wrong island when I couldn’t find my connecting flight. They were very understanding and sent me on my way.

I’d actually forgotten about this but literally earlier this week was talking to the couple’s now adult kid and he mentioned he’d heard this story often as a kid! It was hardly newsworthy but apparently laugh-worthy.

Re: A lost tourist who thought Maine was San Francisco

#135

Post by umeshunni »

dbcurtis wrote: post #43
jeromegv wrote: post #37

There's also the classic of people leaving for San Jose Costa Rica and landing in San Jose California. Happened to a friend of mine, he wasn't too embarrassed by it because he shared the whole story on Facebook

Don’t know if it is still true, but Alaska used to have a daily flight from San Jose to San Jose. I always found that amusing when I saw the monitor waiting for my Portland (Oregon) flight.

They still sell that flight though there's a stop in LAX now.

Re: A lost tourist who thought Maine was San Francisco

#136

Post by smnrchrds »

__s wrote: post #124
heelix wrote: post #66

There was a time where I use to fly internationally very frequently. Very use to having the manager sort out the car/flight/hotel with our travel agent - so for the most part I just grabbed the tickets and go. Manager asked me - can you go to London? It was pretty cold in Minnesota, and London sounded nice. Turned brain off, got on the flight, and landed way too early. London, Canada... ffs, and it was even colder th…

I live in London Ontario, right by the Thames. Got hassled at customs in Netherlands being asked why my Canadian passport was issued from England. People always say they can't hear the accent when I say I'm from London (besides that time at customs they were accusing my lisp of sounding a bit English) There's also a Paris Ontario

> There's also a Paris Ontario

Also Lisbon, Dublin, Vienna, Seville, and Copenhagen. There used to be a Berlin, but it was renamed to Kitchener in 1916.

https://i.redd.it/zhp2c11izm541.jpg

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berlin_to_Kitchener_name_chang...

Re: A lost tourist who thought Maine was San Francisco

#137

Post by Spooky23 »

willcipriano wrote: post #88
Spooky23 wrote: post #9

I used to work in a State Capitol, and would occasionally run into confused tourists in strange places, or very much lost. They were always Chinese or German and I’d run into them two or three times a year. One couple thought they were in Niagara Falls. Another somehow found themselves stuck in a secured employee parking garage. The strangest one was a person on a self guided tour who took a wrong turn and ended up w…

>Another somehow found themselves stuck in a secured employee parking garage. Note to self, if in a secure area of a government facility without permission pretend to be a German tourist.

Oh no, that would be bad.

This was a private garage.

Re: A lost tourist who thought Maine was San Francisco

#139

Post by verelo »

RegnisGnaw wrote: post #118
zwayhowder wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can concur, I live in Sydney, NSW and have made the mistake in concur myself. Fortunately just for listing the city I had a meal in, not for booking a flight.

I wonder if it’s limited to 2 letters.

Because in the US, where the company was founded, the states have 2 letter abbreviations in common language. I wish people could use the ISO: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_3166-2:AU https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_3166-2:US

Re: A lost tourist who thought Maine was San Francisco

#140

Post by quickthrower2 »

The best I can do is Amsterdam 2001, got off the train station in the city, couldn't find the hotel, grabbed a cab and told them the name of the hotel, took us to some suburb 5 miles away or something. Something was lost in translation there. Thought 'oh shit'. Got on a train back to the original point. Realised hotel was just on the other side of the square.
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