Travel agent stories

A little geography lesson here courtesy of my travel agent friend.

The following are actual stories told by travel agents in the
States and you wonder why US citizens generally score less than
the rest of the world on geography):

A client called in inquiring about a package to Hawaii. After
going over all the cost info, she asked, "Would it be cheaper
to fly to California and then take the train to Hawaii?"

I really did have someone ask for an aisle seat so that their
hair wouldn't get messed up by being near the window.

I got a call from a woman who wanted to go to Capetown.
I started to explain the length of the flight and the passport
information when she interrupted me with, "I'm not trying to
make you look stupid, but Capetown is in Massachusetts."
Without trying to make her look like the stupid one, I calmly
explained, "Cape Cod is in Massachusetts, Capetown is in Africa."
Her response....click.

A nice lady just called. She needed to know how it was
possible that her flight from Detroit left at 8:20am and got
into Chicago at 8:33am. I tried to explain that Michigan was
an hour ahead of Illinois, but she could not understand the
concept of time zones. Finally I told her the plane went
very fast, and she bought that!

A woman called and asked, "Do airlines put your physical
description on your bag so they know who's luggage belongs
to who?" I said, "No, why do you ask?" She replied, "Well,
when I checked in with the airline, they put a tag on my
luggage that said FAT, and I'm overweight, is there any
connection?" After putting her on hold for a minute while I
"looked into it" (I was actually laughing) I came back and
explained the city code for Fresno is FAT, and that the
airline was just putting a destination tag on her luggage.

I just got off the phone with a man who asked, "How do I
know which plane to get on?" I asked him what exactly
he meant, which he replied, "I was told my flight number
is 823, but none of these darn planes have numbers on them."

A business man called and had a question about the documents
he needed in order to fly to China. After a lengthy
discussion about passports, I reminded him he needed a visa.
"Oh no I don't, I've been to China many times and never had to
have one of those." I double checked, and sure enough, his
stay required a visa. When I told him this he said, "Look,
I've been to China 4 times and every time they have accepted
my American Express."

A woman called to make reservations, "I want to go from
Chicago to Hippopotamus, New York" The agent was at a loss
for words. Finally, the agent said, "Are you sure that's
the name of the town?" "Yes, what flights do you have?"
replied the customer. After some searching, the agent came
back with, "I'm sorry, ma'am, I've looked up every airport
code in the country and can't find a Hippopotamus anywhere."
The customer retorted, "Oh don't be silly. Everyone knows where
it is. Check your map!" The agent scoured a map of the state
of New York and finally offered, "You don't mean Buffalo, do you?"
"That's it! I knew it was a big animal!"