A View from the Kiosk

Here’s my View from the Kiosk for Saturday the 16th of March

This was my third St. Patrick’s day in the kiosk, and I forgot how distasteful this day can be. The park was crowded, but with a different type of crowd. There weren’t many fashionably dressed Europeans or lost Latin Americans. The majority were loud, somewhat drunk white people dressed in Green. Many had press on shamrocks on their faces and it wasn’t a great look. As you can read, the majority wanted to know where the parade was rather than where Alice and Wonderland, Balto or even Strawberry Fields is located. The day started off really chilly, but after 30 minutes, the sun came out and it warmed up nicely. Handed out about 60 maps and helped about 180 people in the two hours.

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#1 Best Question? “Is the parade still on?” This was at 11:30am. My answer? Guess.

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#1 Worst Interaction?This drunk 17-year-old girl, dressed head to toe in emerald green insisted that I had to high five her in honor of St. Patrick’s day. I refused to touch her.

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#1 Best Interaction? Believe it or not, but a group of visitors from France must have read my blog and committed to changing my experience with French visitors. They were a group of about 5, spoke almost no English and we had the best time trying to communicate with my broken French and a lot of sign language. They wanted to know where they could rent bikes. I LOVED them.

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#2 Best Interaction? “Where do we return the bicycles?”

-“Where did you rent them from?”

“We don’t remember”

-“Where did you enter the park from?”

“We don’t remember, we were with friends”

-“Where are your friends now?”

“They left”

-“Do you remember any buildings or landmarks where you rented the bikes”

“No”

-“Go to Columbus Circle, I’m sure you rented them there.”

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#1 Uncomfortable question?“Why are there so many police in the park and is this the usual number for a typical Saturday?” I don’t work for Homeland Security, but this question really scared me, and I refused to answer.

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#1 Best Overheard? A very large group of high school kids on a tour walked past the kiosk. I kept hearing them talking about Miss Ellis. “Miss Ellis won’t like that!” “Don’t let Miss Ellis know!!” “Miss Ellis is going to kill you!” “How can we do that without Miss Ellis finding out?”

I wasn’t able to spot Miss Ellis, but I really hope she gets to have a cocktail when she gets back to the hotel.

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Visitors? Nobody.

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#1 Annoying? Parents who use the kiosk free map as a way to teach their children manners and to say “please” and “thank you”.

#1 most asked question other than “where is Strawberry Fields?’ “Where is the East Side?”

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Most Popular Language? Drunken English