Confused tourist buys an airline ticket to the wrong Sydney

How do you think this man got a ticket to the wrong city?

What do you think happened? How do you think the story ended?

A Dutch backpacker has found out the hard way there is more than one Sydney in the world when he found himself in Canada rather than Australia.

Milan Schipper, from Amsterdam, only discovered he was going to Sydney, Nova Scotia in Canada. And that he was not going to Sydney, Australia. He felt something was wrong when the plane was about to land.

"I thought I was going to Australia, but the result was different" Like many Europeans Milan was intending to spend a year in Australia.
"I was planning on going backpacking, working over there and just enjoying the land."

The first hint that he might not be going to a city of 5 million - where the average March temperature is 25C, but rather to a town of 31,000 people where the temperature is 1.5C was the plane was small.

Other airfares from Amsterdam to Australia were more than 1000 euros. So Milan  snapped up his ticket to Sydney for less than 800 euros.

It was just a very good price, he thought, and so he happily bought the ticket.

When did he know that he had made a mistake?

"Well, quite late - when I was already in Toronto," Milan said.

I saw the plane was really small. So I thought, would that plane be able to go all the way to Australia?"

He got on the tiny Air Canada jet but the sense that all was not well only got bigger.

"I checked the screen on the seat in front of me and I saw the flight plan was going to go right and up left.

"That was about the time that I realized there was another Sydney," Milan said.

"I felt terrible. I was saying bad words in my head. But there was nothing I could do about it because I already was up in the air."

Astoundingly, Milan said he wasn't the only person to make the same mistake in the tiny airport. He said he met another woman from the US, who also thought she was going to Australia, but was going to the north of Canada.

However, there is a silver lining for the blundering backpacker. As compensation for his error of continental proportions, and to help him on his way, the airline offered him free tickets to Sydney.

Sydney, Australia, that is.

Try to guess the meaning of the words in bold and match them with their closest meaning from the choices in the right. Some of the answers are very close and have similar meaning. The meaning of these words is how they are used in the reading. Some of these words have different meanings in the dictionary depending on how they are used.

 The answers are below the table.

A=7, B=1, C=5, D=2, E=6, F=3, G=8, H=4

Some example sentences using the new words or phrases from the meaning of how they are used in the reading to help you understand better.

1.      She found out the hard way that her boyfriend was meeting another girl when she saw him with her holding hands.

2.      Mr Choi intends to become the next president.

3.      Tickets to the concert have all been snapped up.

4.      She could sense that there was danger in that street, so she walked another way home.

5.      Getting lost had a silver lining because I met someone that would become my wife.

6.      It is astounding that you should ask for more money because I have paid for everything.

7.      The drunken man blundered his way home from the bar.

8.      LG is offering the best compensation for computer engineers this year.

Some questions using the new words/phrases. Try to use the words/phrases in your answer.

1.      What do you think of the airline compensating this young man for his mistake?

2.      What do you think of the silver lining of this story? Tell about a time in your life when something was bad; was there a silver lining for you?

3.      How astounded would you be if you discovered you were flying to the wrong country?

4.      What can you learn about the blundering of the man in this story? How can you avoid making a blundering mistake?

5.      Tell about a time you found out the hard way that you had done something foolish.

6.      What are you intentions in learning English?

7.      If you saw a very cheap air ticket, would you snap it up, or would you check the conditions first?

8.      What is your sense for making money or good ideas?