When I’m not writing articles for the website, one of my guilty pleasures is watching videos on YouTube. If you ask Sharon, I probably spend a little [Sharon: a LITTLE? Ha!!!] too much time scrolling through videos instead of working. 🙂
However, every once in a while I’ll find a clip that’s relevant to travel. I’m not talking about a video about points or award bookings, because most of those are useless. I mean a video that actually gives a good trip about travel. Recently, I found two travel tips in a video that was less than 40 seconds long. Even less likely was that it was from a clip from an ex-CIA agent about three things to do when traveling. (FWIW, the title doesn’t do a good job describing the clip).
The three pieces of advice were:
- Always wear shoes with laces
- Always have $100 with you
- Carry a laminated paper with your 7 most meaningful phone numbers
For starters, I almost always wear sneakers when traveling, so no problems there.
I admit that occasionally I travel without carrying much cash. There are several reasons for this. If we’re traveling internationally, I plan on getting currency when we arrive. In fact, I went for 2 days in Tokyo with no Japanese currency in my wallet, just to see if it could be done.
However, it would seem to be a good idea to stash $100 in my wallet in case of emergency. As said in the video, for most places in the world 100 USD will get you where you need to go.
The last tip I think is the most important one for people traveling, particularly if you’re traveling solo or with just another person. Print out a piece of paper with the seven most important phone numbers, laminate it and put it in your wallet. If you’re incapacitated, this will give EMTs, the police or anyone else a clue of who to call. In addition, if you’re robbed, it’s unlikely that the thieves will take a laminated paper.
I felt the same way when hearing these tips as I did when I heard about the $15 rule, which has transformed the way we travel.
I can keep the $100 with my travel money I store for when we go away. Every few months I go to the bank and get a bunch of small bills. I keep this envelope of $1, $5 and $10 bills in the drawer and I use it for tip money when we travel.
Finally, I’ll print out a list of phone numbers and keep it in my wallet. This isn’t just for when we travel as I think this is a good idea to have with you all the time.
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