How on Earth did they put up with it?

[dianeduane]

This collection of questions sent to the organizers of the Sydney Olympics makes me seriously doubt that old canard of my teachers' that "there's no such thing as a stupid question." Yes there is! (or at least that's what I think before having my tea...)

Q: I have a question about a famous animal in Australia, but I forget its name. It's a kind of bear and lives in trees. (USA)

A: It's called a Drop Bear. They are so called because they drop out of gum trees and eat the brains of anyone walking underneath them. You can scare them off by spraying yourself with human urine before you go out walking.

Q: Which direction is North in Australia? (USA)

A: Face south and then turn 90 degrees. Contact us when you get here and we'll send the rest of the directions.

Q: It is imperative that I find the names and addresses of places to contact for a stuffed porpoise. (Italy)

A: I'm not even going to ask...

Q: Can you send me the Vienna Boys' Choir schedule? (USA)

A: Aus-tri-a is that quaint little country bordering Ger-man-y, which is...oh forget it. Sure, the Vienna Boys Choir plays every Tuesday night in King's Cross, straight after the hippo races. Come naked.

(Thanks and a tip of the bush-hat-with-corks-hanging-off-it to Khorbin at Geeks Incognito.)

Tags: Olympics, Sydney, Australia, stupid questions, even if somebody made all this up it's still funny

Comments

[auriond.livejournal.com]

It is mostly likely made up, unfortunately:

http://www.snopes.com/travel/foreign/olympics.asp

But yes, I cracked up too reading it for the first time.

[fiveforsilver]

On the other hand, I am still a firm believer that there is such a thing as a stupid question. Lots of them, in fact.

Otherwise I would have to go with the saying "there are no stupid questions, only stupid people" and that's just plain mean.

[allasomething.livejournal.com]

Drop Bears! I've seen people actually fall for that one. Its highly amusing.

[fiveforsilver]

This reminds me a little of last Sunday's West Wing and the tall tales Leo apparently told.

[megabitch.livejournal.com]

It doesn't happen to me as often, but I used to get "Oh, you lived in Australia? So did my cousin's husband's sister-in-law's cousin, I think her name was Karen. Maybe you knew her?"

To be fair, I used to get almost exactly the same questions when I lived in .au - "Oh, my next-door-neighbour has a son who's back-packing around England (or "pommie-land"), have you met him? His name's Shane."

*headdesk*

[keristor.livejournal.com]

It happens everywhere. Anywhere which is sufficiently distant shrinks in the questioner's mind to the size where it seems likely that everyone there knows everywhere else. Heck, I didn't even know everyone in my school in the 5 years I was there, and that only had about 600 people, there's no chance that I know everyone in my town (20 thousand or so people). Although when it comes to SF fandom it does seem that pretty much everyone in active fandom is connected through much less than the traditional 6 degrees of separation (almost everyone in UK fandom knows Teddy, for instance)...

I dare say we'll someday have people saying "You're from Earth? Do you know so-and-so? They went there once."...

[azurelunatic]

I get that with Alaska, which is still sufficiently small that for any given person you meet, you probably have at least one mutual acquaintance.

It has to be the person who's also from there, though, because the relative of the person who's from there doesn't know the history and the people.

[wobin.livejournal.com]

Man, you have to watch out for those Drop Bears...

Deadly creatures.

All they eat is gum leaves mind you.

So they have to get their liquid intake by absorbing the blood of innocent victims by sucking it through their scalp.

*shudders* wouldn't want to poke one with a ten foot pole attached to someone else.

[sesquipedeviant.livejournal.com]

That's Not that far from the truth (http://sesquipedeviant.livejournal.com/103063.html?thread=80023#t80023) you know!

[wetdryvac.livejournal.com]

*stumbles around in a minefield of King's Cross puns*

That last answer just about destroyed me - thank-you for passing this bit of madness on.

[azurelunatic]

... face South, then turn 90 degrees?