:via Netscape (slightly condensed):
"When you think of Austria, no doubt you think of such cities and towns as Vienna, Innsbruck and Salzburg. There is another one and, because of its name, tourists steal the signs. A name we can't print here: it's F---ing (actually, pronounced Fooking).
Interestingly, it is only the British who seem to have such a fascination with the name of this little town. A local guide told the Telegraph that the Germans want to see the Mozart house in Salzburg, while the Americans only care about the area around which "The Sound of Music" was filmed. The Japanese just want to see Hitler's birthplace in Braunau. The British are different. Agence France Presse and Britain's Sunday Telegraph report that the residents of F---ing are quite perturbed with British tourists who think the name of the town is so hilarious they want to take a piece of it home with them. A woman who runs a guest house told the paper, "Just this morning I had to tell an English lady who stopped by that there were no F---ing postcards."
This is what police chief Kommandant Schmidtberger told the Sunday Telegraph: "We will not stand for the F---ing signs being removed. It may be very amusing for you British but F---ing is simply F---ing to us. What is this big F---ing joke? It is puerile."
These Austrians may be on to something about the Brits. The BBC News reports that a Northamptonshire secondary school in Great Britain has had such a problem with its students swearing that they have instituted a five-word limit in each class. When a student swears, the teacher writes a mark on the board. After five marks, no one is allowed to swear for the duration of the class. If the rule is broken? They get a severe talking-to by the teacher. We're thinking there won't be any field trips to F---ing, Austria."
