The Vibrator Story

Funny Travel Tale

*Bear in mind that the word pax in tourism = client

Now I have heard many similarish stories to this on the grape vine, and kind of thought they were an urban myth, but during my last guiding contract with G Adventures I was witness to an absolute cracker.

Only a few days into a trip we were taking the plane from San Salvador to San Jose. Everything going smoothly, nothing out the norm to report, until we all passed through security. As standard I let the group go first so I could confirm there was no problems. I was waiting in the queue and noticed one of my pax having their bag looked through. Thinking it was most probably a bottle of water I thought nothing of it. That was until that same pax was rather physically led into a private room.

I approached security explaining I was her guide, and therefore translator, so would he please let me through to assist. He obliged and escorted me to the office.

Picture this (I will NEVER, EVER, EVER forget this), 3 x heavily armed policemen standing, 1 x tomato red faced crying pax sitting, 1 x vibrator and butt plug on the table. Hahahahahahaha a-maaaaaaazing!!

Again, I cannot stress the difficulty of keeping your cool in this type of situation. Every single molecule in my body wanted to burst out laughing and take a selfie 🤳

After swallowing down what could have been the most inappropriate laugh in my guiding career, I asked what the problem was. The police pointed at the vibrator and said it was a gun, which is illegal, and that she was going to be arrested until they did further tests.

Now in the polices defense, this vibrator was not a classic wang shape. It was small, black, with kiiiind of a gun like appearance. I am not gunna say it looked like a gun, as it did not, but it had a sort of morphed gunnish shape to it. I am sure all westerners would recognise in a flash it was a vibrator, but in El Salvador, a beautiful, yet super Christian country frozen in time, I am not 100% sure they had ever seen a vibrator before, let alone a super modern, quirky travel edition.

I explained what the police said to my pax, trying my utmost to maintain a serious face.

Leon “So it appears they want to arrest you for having a weapon.”

Pax “whaaaaat? Leon it is a vibrator not a gun. What am I gunna do, orgasm someone to death?

I know I should not, but I was really, reeeally enjoying this moment. For me one of the best parts of being a tour leader is the incredible variety of crazy situations you find yourself in, that your pax in one way or another usually land you in, and this one was shaping up to be a ‘why I do this job’ level story.

I explained to the police that it was a vibrator and NOT a gun (so many jokes came to mind to link the two together but I held myself back). Their reply, “what is a vibrator”?

The next couple of minutes were hands down some of my favourite Spanish speaking moments of all time as I proceeded to explain, in detail, what, why and how to use a vibrator. I did not hold back at all if anything I may have been a little over enthusiastic. Ann Summers would have been proud .

All the police looked massively uncomfortable as they tried to process what I was telling them. I asked permission to have the pax turn it on, which was granted.

Again, this scene was absolutely priceless. My pax proceeded to turn on the vibrator, which then buzzed aggressively. She proceeded to offer the police the buzzing vibrator to inspect which made all of them jump backwards with their hands up saying, “no no no” (weirdly similar to a reaction of a gun)

I explained again what it did, and why a traveler would bring it with her (which was my favourite part), again to faces of pure astonishment. It was clear the topic of the female orgasm was not so common in these parts.

There was something quite fascinating about watching heavily armed ‘macho’ police look so embarrassed (even so, clearly not on the same level as my ‘travel savvy’ pax)

They said they wanted to X Ray it on its own to be sure. So, there it went, accompanied by a butt plug (which the unfortunately they did not ask about, but I wish they had) which majestically came out in a tray the other side, right in front of my entire group who had been waiting.

Needless to say, that was not the last time that was brought up that trip.

Leon

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