On my first trip to the USA, we went on business, to a video game conference in LA. We stayed in a hotel that seemed sooo exclusive from where I looked at it: I was broke after my first company failed, just went back to employment, etc, so I hardly could contain my excitement (ahh the good old days when the young me could get excited by a nice hotel with a pool). That excitement turned into wondering after we arrived to this particular hotel. With a pool.

There, a really pretty receptionist with beautiful blonde hair asked for our passports. I gave her mine to start with, she glanced through it and asked:

Receptionist: “Sir, is your middle name Hungarian?”

Tourist: “As long as your middle name is California…”

Blank stare.

Tourist: “Actually, that is my nationality. There is a country named like that in Africa” – the sentence was emphasized by my hand waving towards my colleagues – all standing there, jetlagged like dogs, but still very, very Caucasian. She made no attempt to connect the dots, just checked me in with “H” as my middle name.

Sucha H Tourist