The Accidental Tourist (Prose)

Unit 6 – Prose

The Accidental Tourist

Bill Bryson

Warm Up

Often on formal occasions, we admire friends and strangers who appear elegant, who are pleasant to converse with and who conduct themselves gracefully. At times, we also see people who are awkward, nervous and doubtful about their next move.

Recall a few examples of awkward actions that can cause discomfort or disturbance to others—like spilling a cup of hot drink on someone nearby. Now, read this amusing story about the frustrations of a globetrotter and find out how he faces chaos in his everyday life.

The Accidental Tourist

Of all the things I am not very good at, living in the real world is perhaps the most outstanding. I am constantly filled with wonder at the number of things that other people do without any evident difficulty that are pretty much beyond me. I cannot tell you the number of times that I have gone looking for the lavatory in a cinema, for instance, and ended up standing in an alley on the wrong side of a self-locking door. My particular specialty now is returning to hotel desks two or three times a day and asking what my room number is. I am, in short, easily confused.

I was thinking about this the last time we went en famille on a big trip. It was at Easter, and we were flying to England for a week. When we arrived at Logan Airport in Boston and were checking in, I suddenly remembered that I had recently joined British Airways’ frequent-flyer programme. I also remembered that I had put the card in the carry-on bag that was hanging around my neck. And here’s where the trouble started.

The zip on the bag was jammed. So I pulled on it and yanked at it, with grunts and frowns and increasing consternation. I kept this up for some minutes but it wouldn’t budge, so I pulled harder and harder, with more grunts. Well, you can guess what happened. Abruptly the zip gave way. The side of the bag flew open and everything within—newspaper cuttings and other loose papers, a 14-ounce tin of pipe tobacco, magazines, passport, English money, film—was extravagantly ejected over an area about the size of a tennis court.

I watched dumbstruck as a hundred carefully sorted documents came raining down in a fluttery cascade, coins bounced to a variety of noisy oblivions and the now-lidless tin of tobacco rolled crazily across the concourse disgorging its contents as it went.

“My tobacco!” I cried in horror, thinking what I would have to pay for that much tobacco in England now that another Budget had come and gone, and then changed the cry to
“My finger! My finger!” as I discovered that I had gashed my finger on the zip and was shedding blood in a lavish manner. (I am not very good around flowing blood generally, but when it’s my own—well, I think hysterics are fully justified.)

Confused and unable to help, my hair went into panic mode.

It was at this point that my wife looked at me with an expression of wonder—not anger or exasperation, but just simple wonder—and said,

“I can’t believe you do this for a living.”

But I’m afraid it’s so. I always have catastrophes when I travel. Once on an aeroplane, I leaned over to tie a shoelace just at the moment someone in the seat ahead of me threw his seat back into full recline, and found myself pinned helplessly in the crash position. It was only by clawing the leg of the man sitting next to me that I managed to get myself freed.

This, however, was not my worst experience on a plane flight. My worst experience was when I was writing important thoughts in a notebook (‘buy socks’, ‘clutch drinks carefully’, etc.), sucking thoughtfully on the end of my pen as you do, and fell into conversation with an attractive young lady in the next seat. I amused her for perhaps twenty minutes with a scattering of urbane bons mots, then retired to the lavatory where I discovered that the pen had leaked and that my mouth, chin, tongue, teeth and gums were now a striking, scrub-resistant navy blue, and would remain so for several days.

So you will understand, I trust, when I tell you how much I ache to be suave. I would love, just once in my life, to rise from a dinner table without looking as if I have just experienced an extremely localised seismic event, get in a car and close the door without leaving 14 inches of coat outside, wear light-coloured trousers without discovering at the end of the day that I have at various times sat on chewing gum, ice cream, cough syrup and motor oil. But it is not to be.

Now on planes when the food is delivered, my wife says:

“Take the lids off the food for Daddy”
or
“Put your hoods up, children. Daddy’s about to cut his meat.”

Of course, this is only when I am flying with my family. When I am on my own, I don’t eat, drink or lean over to tie my shoelaces, and never put a pen anywhere near my mouth. I just sit very, very quietly, sometimes on my hands to keep them from flying out unexpectedly and causing liquid mischief. It’s not much fun, but it does at least cut down on the laundry bills.

I never did get my frequent-flyer miles, by the way. I never do. I couldn’t find the card in time. This has become a real frustration for me. Everyone I know—everyone—is forever flying off to Bali first class with their air miles. I never get to collect anything. I must fly 100,000 miles a year, yet I have accumulated only about 212 air miles divided between twenty-three airlines.

This is because either I forget to ask for the air miles when I check in, or I remember to ask for them but the airline then manages not to record them, or the check-in clerk informs me that I am not entitled to them. In January, on a flight to Australia—a flight for which I was going to get about a zillion air miles—the clerk shook her head when I presented my card and told me I was not entitled to any.

“Why?”
“The ticket is in the name of B. Bryson and the card is in the name of W. Bryson.”

I explained to her the close and venerable relationship between Bill and William, but she wouldn’t have it.

So I didn’t get my air miles, and I won’t be flying to Bali first class just yet. Perhaps just as well, really. I could never go that long without eating.

Glossary

Word / Phrase	Meaning
alley	a narrow passage-way between or behind buildings
en famille	(French) as a family
yanked	pulled with a jerk
consternation	worry
extravagantly	excessively
cascade	waterfall
concourse	the open central area in a large public building (here ‘airport’)
disgorging	discharging
gashed	cut deeply
hysterics	a fit of uncontrollable laughing or crying
exasperation	irritation
catastrophe	a terrible disaster
bons mots	(French) witty remarks
suave	polite and sophisticated
venerable	valued
Bill	William (the letter W is changed to B and William is called Bill)

Comprehension

A. Answer in one or two sentences each

1. Give a few instances of Bryson’s confused acts.
2. What were the contents of Bryson’s bag?
3. Describe the fluttery cascade of things tumbling from the bag.
4. Why did the author’s concern over tobacco shift to his finger?
5. What happened to Bryson when he leaned to tie his shoelace?
6. How did Bryson free himself from the crash position?
7. What was Bryson’s worst accident on a plane?
8. What did Bryson wish to avoid in his life?
9. How would staying away from liquid mischief benefit Bryson?
10. Why did the clerk say that Bryson was not entitled to flyer miles?

B. Answer in about three to four sentences each

1. Why doesn’t Bryson seem to be able to do easily what others seem to? Give a few reasons.
2. What was the reaction of Bryson’s wife to his antics?
3. Briefly describe the ‘accidents’ encountered on the flight by Bryson.

C. Answer in a paragraph of 100–150 words

1. ‘To this day, I don’t know how I did it’ – What does ‘it’ refer to?
2. ‘… But, when it’s my own – well, I think hysterics are fully justified’ – How?
3. Bring out the pun in the title ‘The Accidental Tourist’ (one who happens to travel by accident or one who meets with accidents often on his or her trips!).
4. Can a clumsy person train himself/herself to overcome shortcomings? How could this be done?
5. As a fellow passenger of Bill Bryson on the flight, make a diary entry describing his clumsy behaviour during the trip and the inconveniences caused to others as a result of his nervousness.

Vocabulary

A. Foreign Words and Phrases

You have come across the French phrases ‘en famille’ and ‘bons mots’.
Look at the following phrases and their meanings:

Phrase	Pronunciation	Meaning
viva voce	/ˌvaɪvə ˈvəʊtʃi/	a spoken examination
sine die	/ˌsiːneɪ ˈdiːeɪ/	without a date being fixed
résumé	/ˈrezjuːmeɪ/	a brief summary
rapport	/ræˈpɔː(r)/	close relationship with good understanding
bona fide	/ˌbəʊnə ˈfaɪdi/	genuine

B. Refer to a dictionary and find out the meanings of the following foreign words/phrases. Use them in sentences of your own:

1. bon voyage
2. in toto
3. liaison
4. ex gratia
5. en masse
6. en route
7. ad hoc
8. faux pas
9. par excellence
10. in camera
11. status quo
12. magnum opus
13. vox populi
14. incognito
15. déjà vu
16. à la carte
17. via media
18. per capita
19. tête-à-tête
20. carte blanche

C. Indian Loanwords in English

Word	Origin	Meaning
veranda	Hindi	a roofed platform along the outside of a house
bungalow	Hindi	a house in Bengal style
chutney	Hindi	a ground or mashed relish
cheetah	Sanskrit	uniquely marked
coir	Malayalam	rope
bamboo	Kannada	wood
bandicoot	Telugu	kind of rat
catamaran	Tamil	multi-hulled watercraft
guru	Sanskrit	master
anna	Tamil	elder brother
masala	Urdu	mixture of ground spices
dabba	Punjabi	a roadside food stall or restaurant

Idioms

right up one’s alley – exactly what one is interested in or good at
drive one up the wall – make someone very irritated
hit the road – begin a journey
take (one) for a ride – deceive someone
in panic mode – in a state of sudden fear

Replace the italicised words in the given sentences with the appropriate idioms.

Listening Activity

i) ________ was one of the places visited by Mahesh.
a) Sri Lanka b) Goa c) Kasi d) Cochin

ii) The Art Museum at Trivandrum is called ______.
a) Swarnalayam b) Gitalayam c) Chitralayam d) Saranalayam

iii) Varkala is the oldest port of ____.
a) Quilon b) Andhra c) Puducherry d) the Andamans

iv) Mahesh had been to the ____ Lake Wild Life Sanctuary.
a) Chidambaram b) Pulicat c) Kovalam d) Periyar

v) Cochin is called the ____ of the East.
a) Granary b) Cuba c) Venice d) Pearl

Speaking Activity

a) Build a dialogue of 8–10 exchanges between your friend and yourself on the situation:
You were to board a train to Delhi. By mistake you got into the wrong train and fought for your seat there. On realising your mistake, you left the train shamefaced, after creating a commotion. Role-play this in class.

b) Speak to the class for a minute on how one should conduct oneself on formal occasions (table-manners, appearance, manner of speaking, etc.).

Reading – Caesar, the Hero of Mumbai 26/11

Answer the questions that follow the passage.

Grammar – Transformation of Sentences

Simple, Compound, Complex – definitions and examples provided.

Exercises

a. Do as directed (10 items)
b. Split the given long sentence into smaller sentences

Writing

Narrative Writing

Structure: Beginning – Middle – End
Sample proverb expansion: “A bad workman always blames his tools.”

Develop the given hints into a paragraph about two kings.

Curriculum Vitae (CV)

Guidelines + Sample CV of Vijayaraj Joseph

Filling-in Forms

Step-by-step instructions + sample challan + practice forms

End of Unit 6 – The Accidental Tourist