The Kidlington Mystery - Comedy Open Mic round 43

It was an ordinary Sunday in the village of Kidlington, Oxfordshire. The first rays of the morning sun were reaching through the treetops into the kitchen where Janice Ballthrush was just about to finish potting her homemade gooseberry jam. Her husband, Roger, was sat at the kitchen table reading the Financial Times and dipping a toast soldier into his boiled egg when Janice suddenly dropped her jam jar. The sudden crash startled Roger, causing him to tip his egg over into his lap. 'Bloody Hell Janice,' he yelped angrily as he began to clean the yolk from his crotch. 'Roger,' Janice said slowly and cautiously. Roger stopped and looked up immediately. 'What is it dear?' he replied anxiously. 'There's a China man looking at your spuds.'

Image: SWNS

Alright...that never happened; but it could have. A couple of years ago, Chinese tourists started turning up in Kidlington. Of course, England, the home of Big Ben, Westminster, Stonehenge, Stratford and the Lake District is no stranger to Chinese tourists....but Kidlington....well that's another story. Ninety nine percent of English people have probably never heard of Kidlington. Indeed, when the BBC received reports of Chinese tourists looking through peoples windows and admiring their bins, they sent one of their finest journalists to ask the tough questions, dig deep and get to the truth. The BBC went to great lengths and handed out questionaires to some of the local residents to get the tourists to fill in for them. The highly skilled BBC journalist in this article speaks to a local resident about the questionaires. He says 'We've taken a punt. Hopefully it's in their language but it's the biggest one.'

In the article the BBC claim to be revealing the real reason why these tourists are showing up in Kidlington. According to them, they are quashing the stories that these tourists had been scammed by Chinese tour operators into believing that Kidlington was used to film 'Harry Potter' movies. Indeed using facebook and a tour guide the BBC claim the reason why so many Chinese tourists were photographing peoples bins, houses and gardens was simply because they like to see ordinary English life. This information was retrieved from the Chinese tour guide because she had filled in the detailed questionaire. The article states 

The tourists were first identified in Benmead Road and the Moors in July, the Spotted: Kidlington Facebook page reported. Anne Clifton, who lives in the Moors, handed the BBC's question sheet to a member of the tour party when they reappeared in the road on 23 October. She said: "I asked a woman standing at the door of the coach if she would be good enough to complete the form. "She was not actually one of the tourists, but was leading the party." 

The questionaire asked three questions

1. We are happy to have you here but why have you come?
2. Do you like it?
3. What do you like here?

With a questionaire like that; facebook and a Chinese tour guide you can't go wrong. Mind you, they did put in more effort than quality British newspaper 'The Sun' who simply took the BBC article and used that to create this piece of prize winning journalism.

Of course everything that comes from the BBC is government controlled bullshit, so I had a dig around to get to the bottom of this mystery. Despite one of the two guys in the below CheNews video stating at the beginning that he knows the answer to the mystery, they merely speculate on a few ideas that don't seem to ring true. They suggest that the tourists were scammed by the Chinese tour operators by being told Kidlington was the home or birthplace of someone famous. Personally I don't think that seems feasible in the age of the internet where a quick search can reveal the truth. 

In one particularly enjoyable part of the below video the two speculate as to whether some local residents were cashing in on these tourists. They suggested the locals could be selling real English cups of tea and cucumber sandwiches to them at exorbitant prices. I was in hysterics because I'm English. We're just not like that. Most English people would probably just keep their heads down carry on with their day as though they weren't there and if approached would be more than willing to help and may even invite them in for a free cup of tea and a sandwich.

So what was so special about Kidlington? I was intrigued and next I turned to google maps to see just where in the hell Kidlington was and more importantly, what was nearby.

Image: theindependenttourist.net

I found that Kidlington is nestled between the city of Oxford and Blenheim Palace. This explained why the tourists would be in the vicinity of Kidlington but I wasn't buying this story about them being dropped off in Kidlington to see ordinary English life. That sort of thing doesn't happen with coach loads of people. It is the reserve of the more intrepid and independent traveller....the eccentric weirdos like me, who go off the beaten track to see genuine local life. There must be some other explanation. So I dug a little deeper.

After sifting through many variations of the BBC article presented by different media outlets from reddit to Vice to the New York Times, I came across a very interesting internet forum page which I can't find again unfortunately. The thread was about this very topic and to my surprise a few Chinese people had commented and one of them claimed to be familiar with the Chinese tour operators and their ways. I felt I was getting closer to the truth.

This individual said that the tourists are charged around a hundred US dollars for the short excursion from Oxford to Blenheim Palace and a tour ticket. Some tourists found out how much the general public were paying for their tickets and soon people began to decline the excursion. The tour operators were losing money. They needed to do something.

Their masterplan was to offer them a different excursion, a less expensive option to keep the dissenters on board. The tour operator didn't want everyone to take the cheaper option so the dissenters would be taken to somewhere a bit shit with few facilities, dropped off and collected after the palace tour. Kidlington seemed to fit the bill perfectly until some tourists found a nearby bus stop and made their own way to the palace causing the tour operator to choose a different location further away. Indeed according to this article in inews.co.uk the tourists did indeed disappear from Kidlington after a few months....but where do they go now? I suppose that's another mystery to be solved.

Have a lovely day.

STEEMONKEY🐒

This is a comedyopenmic entry so I nominate @simix and @veromina to give us a chuckle.