some thoughts from the amazing mind of Elizabeth Mattern

The other day, upon leaving the mental stimulation that is class (please note the sarcasm), I opted to sit outside and enjoy the sunshine in a small park between the school and my house. Now in this park, which conmemorates our homeboy Christopher Columbus, there is a monument. So, since there's an oldish-looking monument, tourists see it and immediately flock to it like flies to a florescent bug-zapper light in order to take a picture with it even though they haven't got a clue as to what it is. For all they know it could be a monument conmemorating the great achievements of Adolf Hitler that just hasn't been taken down yet. Luckily for them, it's not. So I watched the string of tourists who came through the park to take a picture with this monument. Here are my observations..

First of all, I'm pretty positive that tourists, young and old alike, TRY to look ugly and/or awkward. Don't they realize that 1) they're going to be immortalized in photographs in this get-up 2) they're not on an African safari and 3) Interestingly enough, looking like an idiot is not a prerequisite for being a tourist. 4) I can't think of a fourth but I'm sure there is at least one more. From what I've seen (and Allison and I were also discussing it while she was here), it would seem that a typical packing checklist would go as follows:
-teva's
-shin-high socks to be worn under teva's for stylish but comfortable foot-wear
-cargo shorts/pants/shants with as many pockets as humanly possible
-cargo vest with as many pockets as humanly possible
-cargo jacket with as many pockets as humanly possible
-fanny-pack
-giant camera bag
-one small camera bag
-awkward hat

American tourists
They awkwardly stand around with their cameras in hand waiting for someone who doesn't look 'dangerous' to pass by so that they can ask them to take a picture. If in a group larger than two, everyone from the group will want a picture with their own digital cameras (as they refuse to make things easy and share... which is half the purpose of a digital camera...), and therefore shove all 9 cameras at the poor hand-picked, picture-taking victim. Then, they won't like how they turned out in the pic on their camera, so the process is repeated. Then, of course, you have the college-aged male jackasses (I have no doubt they were American) who climb up and pretend to hump the monument. Just think... in just a couple years these superstars will be entering the work force, probably handling your money, advising you on stock market decisions, or teaching your children. And finally, Americans never fail to display what Ines calls the "American smile" (keep reading..).

Spanish tourists (or just picture-takers... since this is technically their country and all...)
The existence of the "Spanish smile," which, unlike its American counterpart, is ironically the lack of a smile. They could be laughing just before the picture is taken, but the moment that they know that the button is going to be pushed, the smile disappears and they just look at the camera. Or turn away from the camera. Sometimes there's a hint of a smile that you can vaguely detect at the corners of the mouth... but that's about all you're usually going to get. Take, for example, this picture of Hannah and her roommate Ines, in which Hannah blatantly said "Smile for the camera!" at which point Ines turns away.

Japanese tourists
I swear to God that the entire country of Japan descends upon Spain during tourist season... sometimes I can't help but wonder who's left out there in the east to invent new cameras and robots and whatnot. I noticed it a lot more in Sevilla, but probably just due to its being a smaller city. They frequently travel in packs, which are usually in the range of 30-60 people. However, despite the bazillion hour plane flights and the endless long busrides they endure together, they apparently don't make friends within these packs... proof being that they never take pictures with other people. Within the packs, the Japanese seem to travel in pairs. They do not take any pictures in which they are together, but rather one stands stiffly, hands behind their back, in front of the monument and doesn't smile while the other one takes 5 pictures of that pose. Then, they switch. It must be simply exhilarating to look through Japanese photo albums: "Monument and me. Monument and you. Monument and you again. Monument and me again. Street scene and me. Street scene and you."