Funniest Thing for December

Tell ITN about the funniest thing that ever happened to you while traveling in a foreign country. There are no restrictions on length. (ITN prints no info on destinations in the US, Canada, Mexico or the Caribbean.) The ITN staff will choose each month’s winner, who will receive a free one-year subscription to ITN. Entries not chosen cannot be acknowledged.

This month’s winner is PEGGY PARKER of Milwaukie, Oregon:

Before the start of an organized tour of Italy, my father and I decided to spend a few days in Rome on our own. Neither of us spoke a word of Italian, but we had always been able to make ourselves understood, so we had very few reservations about being there on our own.

We had a glorious time finding our way around and had a few good laughs at ourselves as we continued to get lost. On our second day, we were getting hungry and decided to find a place to eat. Many of the local people were entering one small restaurant. It was extremely crowded and noisy but looked like fun, so we decided to stay and eat.

The daily menu was posted on a chalkboard behind the bar, and after reading it we recognized only one thing; we ordered the ravioli.

Since the place was extremely busy, the wait was quite long and we figured out that we were going to be waiting until all the locals were served first. That was fine, as these people had to get back to work.

Finally, our meal was delivered. It looked nothing like the ravioli we supposedly had ordered. When we questioned the waiter, thinking we had gotten someone else’s order by mistake, he said, “No, this isn’t ravioli. We are out of ravioli, so just eat this. You’ll like it.” Then he turned and left.

He was right. We liked it, but we could never order it again because we didn’t know what it was!