Video: Obama's Failure to Reduce Hostility Towards Ugly Americans Abroad

Here's my Ugly-American story.  My ex-wife and I were traveling through Europe about 13 years ago.  We were at a nice restaurant, and there was a group of four portly middle-aged Americans at a table not too far away from us.  We were enjoying our dinner when one of the men at the other table began to shout "Vino!  More Vino!" to the waiter.  Did I mention we were in Paris eating French cuisine, not an Italian restaurant (not that that would have been much better)?

Just to be fair, here's an Ugly-Italian story.  My ex-wife was in Rome waiting in line for a museum.  There were so many tourists making their way through the museum, the line basically continued from the entry point until the end of the museum, like a cattle-call.  Throughout the entire viewing, a rotund Italian man in line behind her bumped her along with his enormous pot-belly.  Bump...step, step...bump...step, step, etc.

Finally, an ugly-German story.  My ex-wife and I were in Florence eating at a restaurant that had "group-style" seating.  The staff seated us at a table next to a German man and woman in their early twenties.   And when I say "next to," I mean right next to - if we weren't careful we would bump elbows.  They had already finished eating when we first were seated,.  We spent our entire meal with the German couple glaring at us from inches away and smoking cigarettes with practically visible thought-bubbles above their heads that read "...stupid...fucking...Americans..."  My ex-wife and I actually started discussing the situation while were eating, not caring whether they understood our English or not.  It was ridiculous enough to be amusing, but still extremely uncomfortable.  Since then I've read that Europeans apparently have a problem with staring.