Steve, the middle-aged Australian backpacker is the most irritating person I have encountered on my travels so far. We happened to meet at the bus stop in Auckland, both on the way to Whangarei - a small town in the north. After exchanging the usual backpacker pleasantries, Steve inexplicably launched into an endless stream of boring stories about his previous travels. I nodded politely, and pretended to be listening, while I was actually trying to calculate how many meals I would have to forgo in order to afford an Icebreaker shirt. As the bus pulled up, I quickly hopped on board, happy to end our association, and begin two hours of uninterrupted reading. How wrong I was. Though Steve had to walk past plenty of other empty seats, he decided to park himself next to me so “We can have a bit of a chat, roight?” Great. More Steve stories followed, all liberally sprinkled with his catchphrase “if you know what I mean.”
So, we were there in Yosemite, if you know what I mean, talking to a ranger about a trail, if you know what I mean…”
No Steve, I’m having trouble following your subtly nuanced conversational style. What could you possibly mean with these cryptic sentences? What deeper meaning is hidden beneath the mundane?
In another stroke of luck, Steve and I were staying at the same hostel in Whangarei. Once there, I quickly retreated into the sanctuary of my room, but not before I had foolishly communicated my plans to walk to some nearby caves the next day. Steve thought this sounded great. Cursing my mistake, I hastily recruited someone else to come with us, hoping she would help offset Steve’s trying personality. This worked pretty well until Steve permanently entered my black books while we were all sitting down for some food after I had explored the caves. Noticing a small cut on my heel, Steve exclaimed “Crikey! We’ve got some blood over here. Someone pull out the first aid kit! Only problem is (he pauses for comedic effect)… we haven’t got one!” Immediately, I whipped out my well-equipped kit hoping to shut Steve up with this display of competence and preparedness. Unfortunately, Steve felt that he was now compelled to supervise the wound cleaning process and give me advice.
“Yeeah, just pull off that bit of skin, I reckon.”
“Rub some alcohol on there, then pop on a bandaid I reckon.”
“You should still be able to walk, I reckon!”
Well, you know what I reckon Steve? I reckon you should stop giving me advice before we have a real reason to use the first aid kit.
“They teach you some of this first aid stuff at raft school do they?” asked Steve, speaking as he might to a small child.
“I have my Wilderness First Responder” I replied frostily. “It’s an 80 hour course. We managed to go over bandaid application in that time.”
Steve was oblivious to this cutting sarcasm, and continued to annoy me for the rest of the day. I’m starting to think Australia might not be worth it.
