ksandness

Studying in Japan in the 1970s, I was coming to the end of my time there, and since it was before deregulation, finding an affordable one-way flight back to the States was a challenge. (There were rumors that some agencies organized fictitious tours on Korean Airlines to get a low fare.)

Anyway, I was making the rounds of the travel agencies, looking for cheap airfare (unchin). Only I didn't remember the word quite correctly and went around asking for cheap unchi.

I got the strangest responses, either hysterical laughter or pop-eyed amazement. But all agreed that the best deal was the fictitious tours on Korean Airlines.

That evening, I was telling a Japanese student about the day's adventures, and when I mentioned that I had been looking for cheap unchi, he gasped and said "Never say that!"

I asked him what it meant, and he wouldn't tell me.

Once I was home, I got out my unabridged dictionary and learned that unchi was the baby word for...uh, excrement.
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My second embarrassment was more recent. I did a grand tour of Scandinavia in 2011 in conjunction with an international family reunion. I decided to take the overnight ferry from Oslo to Copenhagen and made my reservation from home a couple of months in advance.

The last night in Oslo, I took out my reservation form and found, to my horror, that I had made the reservation in the opposite direction, Copenhagen to Oslo. Early on the morning before the intended crossing, I went to the ferry offices and asked if there was any way I could trade a Copenhagen-Oslo reservation for an Oslo-Copenhagen one. Unfortunately, all tickets in that price category, indeed, in all categories except the super-duper high-priced category with gourmet meals, were sold out. Even though they agreed to give me credit for my previous purchase, the price was over my budget.

I trudged back to my hotel, told them that I'd need to stay another night, and then headed to the train station to figure out what my land-based options were. My best land-based option was a 7:00AM train, which was before the breakfast buffet opened, but the hotel kindly packed a ham and cheese sandwich, an apple, and a carton of juice for me to pick up on my way out.