Food poisoning on vacation stories

Ha! I can tell some stories.

I love trying new foods, and I eat whatever looks or smells good when I travel. I've eaten street food all over Asia, Africa and even India. Never had a real problem.

You want to know where I got food poisoning? At Harry's Bar (THE Harry's Bar, of Bellini fame) in Venice. Had a nice (and pricey) meal, a Bellini to start, and subsequently spent the night worshiping the porcelain goddess.

The second time I had a problem was in Madrid, where a Peruvian restaurant poisoned me.

Goes to show -- it never happens where you expect it to happen.

Not mine, but my father’s. He was poisoned by shellfish while in Kona. He was 76 at the time and is a Type 1 diabetic. He ended up hospitalized for five days. It took him months to recover.

bunp

On a summer road trip, we were driving through Michigan and stopped at a roadside fruit stand. I bought some cherries, which I ate in the car when we got back on the road. A cherry had a soft spot, but I didn't spit it out. I swallowed it. Bad move. The worst case of food poisoning I ever had. And my BF was a total jerk about pulling off the road so I could lie still until it passed. I swear he was deliberately driving over every bump he could spot.

I spent a month traveling around Malaysia and Cambodia...was careful, had no problems. The night before my flight, I stayed at a hotel next to the Kuala Lumpur airport and stupidly ate some kind of seafood stew in their restaurant. Got sick right before my flight back to Germany with a long overlay in Qatar, spent half the first leg in the loo shitting and puking. Had to find a doctor in the Qatar airport to give me something...most miserable flights ever. My digestion was messed up for months afterward.

OMG, r5!

My husband and I spent a week in San Juan, Puerto Rico, before beginning a cruise of the Caribbean. Had no problem with anything we were eating UNTIL the day of embarkation. We had dropped our luggage off at the cruise ship dock and decided we would walk around Old Town one last time before the ship left that afternoon. As we were heading back to the ship, we decided to stop at a hamburger place very near the port. My husband’s stomach turned within minutes and we had to stop for him to use a bathroom, but I thought I was fine.

As we are going through the check-in and security screening prior to boarding, my stomach starts with the warning gurgling, but I’m confident I can wait until we’re on the ship and in the room. The cramping escalates as we are finishing, but I’m determined I can make it. We get to the deck that our room was on, and now I’ve got a red alert emergency. I sprint down the hall looking for our room, the carry-on I’m dragging behind me now nearly airborne and ricocheting off the walls. I’m frantic because I can’t find our room number, then realize I’m on the wrong side of the ship; our room is an even number and I’m on the odd number side. I’m now pushing room attendants and fellow passengers out of my way in my haste to reach the room. Luckily, I made it in time, but was so sick I spent the rest of the day in bed.

Went to LA for a week. Rockstar had just come out and I decided to give it a try since it was cheaper than Redbull and a bigger can. That whole week I was in pain. Cramping waves that felt like I was being stabbed, painful shits and headaches that would kill a moose. I thought I was dying. Went to the emergency room. They could not find anything. The doctor says "maybe you are allergic to something, have you change your diet?" It was the fucking Rockstar. They used Maltitol as a sweetener and I was allergic. Dummy, I was doing it to myself.

I was on a Tasmanian road trip with my mate years ago. We had a seafood basket at a pub, and the tartare sauce was dodgy. Ended up being the worst food poisoning I've ever known. I painted the entire hotel bathroom in vomit. At one point it shot out of me like a missile and I sprayed the top of the shower curtain. I was sick the rest of the trip and just lay in the backseat of the car in a delirium. My mate gradually lost patience, which didn't help. I'll never forget it.

A few years ago, I spent two weeks in Shanghai for work and an add-on vacation. I ate in fancy restaurants, the hotel buffet, fast food -- you name it. All totally fine. The day of my departure, I checked in for my flight and saw a "Shanghaiese" restaurant in the sterile area of Pudong and thought, I don't think I had "Shanghaiese" cuisine... So I ate there.

About an hour into my 15 hour fight to LAX, I awoke from a slumber to sprint to the lav. For the first time in 30+ years of air travel, I took a dump in an airplane lav. Shortly thereafter, the second, third, fourth, fifth, and so on. It was the most miserable flight I have ever taken. A sympathetic flight attendant took note and kindly made sure I rehydrated frequently. By the time we arrived in LA, I was feeling human again.

Stealth scat thread.

“Stealth scat thread”

Agree. You just know there are some shit eating grins here.

Yay! An odorous thread that isn’t centered on me.

I got the food poisoning in Hong Kong at the Intercontinental hotel where we were staying, I assume. But it started to really get me on a bumpy flight from Hong Kong to Bali. By the time we were in steamy Bali, I was in a full blown gastric meltdown. It lasted about 5 days. I actually could eat in the morning but after that I was painting the town brown, explosively. I came to a head when we went to into town, about 1/2 hour from our hotel. We were in a hot taxi heading back and I wasn't going to make it a minute longer. So we pulled over near an open air restaurant, I ran in to the toilet which was a hole in the ground and a bucket. I'd never seen this set up and didn't know how it worked! So I just kicked the bucket out of the way and took an explosive shit in the hole. Poor guy that used it after me was in for a treat. I slowly got better after a few more days, but that was not the best vacation.

You are all missing the joy of these posts:

They each had SOMETHING TO EAT — before all the messiness started.

Got food poisoning in Venice. Was visiting the Doge’s Palace. The toilets were by the entrance and I was at the far end of the museum when it hit. I vividly remember running at full speed across the Bridge of Sighs to make it to the toilets in time.

Interesting: No one ever poo-poo‘s these stories as EST.

Kusadasi, Turkey. Ate some baklava from a street vendor, by night time I was squatting in the bathtub shitting AND vomiting at the same time. Why the bathtub? Because so much diarrhea was flowing that my hemorrhoids started popping out like a prolapse. The diarrhea was like urine, just a yellow liquid. So I’d use the hand shower to rinse my asshole with cold water in order to sooth the irritation. Then another wave would come over me so if just stay in there and rinse the mess away. Also had a low grade fever, shivering, abd pains, and weak. Spent the next day in bed, miraculously recovered the next day after. Couldn’t have been anything too virulent since my body seemed to clear it, but it was a rough 24 hours.

It can happen anywhere, especially Europe. My husband was sick as a dog for about 36 hours during our honeymoon in Vienna, Austria. It was weird as we didn’t know if it would be temporary or something more serious.

Not vacation, but I was in Cairo and made the mistake of eating salad. Even though it was at the restaurant in the Nile Hilton, I ended up vomiting in the street several times. Quite embarrassing!

I got from eating a salad at Heathrow when connecting there. Fortunately, I didn’t get sick an vomit until I’m my own house. The downside was I had houseguests. But I vomited once, and that was the end of it.

Spent two weeks in India, ate everything, was fine. Normally I have a cast iron stomach. Waiting for the flight back, I had some salad in the United lounge. When I got to New York, I was barely hanging on. Made it back to DC, got home, and lost it. Was sick for several days and only moved between my bed and the bathroom. But I lost weight!

My father got food poisoning bad enough to end up in the hospital from eggs on a trip to Amish country. Just driving him to the hospital I had to pull over about 10 times for him to puke. I really thought he was going to die because he was a diabetic with heart problems. I never ate an under cooked egg again after seeing that, at least until pasteurized eggs in the shell came on the market. Now it's the only egg I buy and I can enjoy sunny side up eggs or taste raw batter. The only problem is there is only one store in all of Brooklyn NY that I know of that sells them, Shoprite, and they don't always have fresh ones.