Will they all be wearing perfume?

A friend of ours just came back from Prague and the one thing he remembers most is the smells. Everyone smoked everywhere, there was a lot of pollution in the air, and it seems everyone poured bottles of perfume on themselves.

Back here in Vancouver, there is no smoking allowed in public buildings (or within 10 metres of doors, or on restaurant patios), the pollution is not that bad due to the ocean breezes, and most people don't feel the need to wear perfume. If anything, the perfume of Vancouver is marijuana smoke that you pass through very frequently while walking downtown (very herbal).

A couple of nights ago, while we were in a restaurant in downtown Vancouver, we wondered who had dropped a bottle of perfume. Looking around to see what had happened, we saw a group of tourists sitting down at the table next to us. Oh, that's where that smell is coming from.

I remember working in an office once where there was a woman known for her smell. She doused herself in so much perfume you could smell her coming, and her desk was the place to avoid at all costs, because you couldn't breathe when next to it. No one wanted to say anything to her because she would have started crying, but she really overdid it, and probably had lost her own sense of smell from dousing herself with so much perfume.

The tourists sitting beside us at the restaurant, bathed in way too much perfume, were speaking German. They had Olympics pamphlets and stuff at their table, so we assume they are here for the games. So these are some of the people we will be welcoming here for the games.

People who come to visit from other areas of the world are fascinating to be around. People from different cultures are great to see. But will they all be wearing so much perfume? It's hard to be welcoming when you can't breathe when sitting next to someone.