Canadian Tourist

Like I said in a previous blog, I have this sort of luck of always attracting tourists of all sorts and my latest I met Sunday afternoon while I was trying to make my way home from the park by the Fortezza. I never did get his name but I do know he was from Canada and approximately 55 years old. As I was walking home along a street far from the city center, I saw this man in the distance stumbling around looking at every street corner and as I approached him I tried to ignore him because, lets be honest, he looked like a homeless man. He immediately made contact as I came closer and started asking franticly in English “where is the Michelangelo??” I had my pepper spray in my pocket and decided to be friendly and answered back “which one?” At the time I didn’t think anything of it that he asked where the Michelangelo was I had already interpreted that statement as “where is the David”. Then he proceeded with “ I don’t know what do you mean? I just have to find a hostel by the Michelangelo.” He then continued telling me how he was cold, how he just arrived to Florence from Germany, and that he had broke his ankle last year and it was bothering him. So I told him that there were three statues of the David around the city and if he had any other idea where the hostel was. He had written down only the name and no address or anything. So I told him the original was in the Galleria dell'Accademia and pointed in the direction of the museum. I didn’t know how else to help him without further information. I continued walking home when, all of a sudden, there he was walking with me telling me all about his travels to Greece and Germany and how he was trying to arrive in Africa. I started tuning out and just nodding, he talked so quickly and constantly that I wouldn’t have had room for a response anyhow. Not knowing what to do with this guy, I started off for the Accademia to hopefully lose this guy.
After what seemed like 20 minutes we finally arrived at the Piazza San Marco located by the Accademia and I started looking for something that resembled a hostel. He continued talking about solar power in Canada and drunks in Vancouver. We walked up and down the street looking for a hostel when finally he asked a street vendor if he knew where there was a hostel and the guy replied down further. We went further down the street finding nothing until we dead-ended into the Duomo. I still didn’t see anything and wanted to lose this guy but he just continued talking, now he began taking pictures of the Piazza and I really think he wanted me to be some personal tour guide or something. I became sterner saying, “I don’t know where this hostel is.” Then he approached a man who was picking up trash in the piazza and asked him “Do you know where this Hostel (insert name) is?” The man who obviously didn’t speak any English just looked at him with a blank stare and started shaking his head. I intervened speaking to the man in Italian and he replied very friendly saying he didn’t know of any hostels in the area. Discouraged we moved on, I saw two police officers and decided to approach them. I asked the woman police officer if she knew of any hostels. She immediately started speaking very quickly in Italian of several hostels and how to take the bus to get to them etc. I wanted to get rid of this guy so I asked which was the closest and found out there was one across the Ponte Vecchio to the right. I told the man, and then he started off to the entrance of the Duomo to take more pictures. So I told him “Okay, that’s all I know, across the Ponte Vecchio and then right.” He then asked how to reach the bridge and I pointed in the direction, which was a straight shot. I think by this point he could tell I had lost my patience and he thanked me for my help and we parted by shaking hands and I wished him happy travels. 45-50 minutes later, I was on my home!