If you’ve ever forgotten your eyeglasses, or don’t feel like pulling them out, but you want to read a sign in the distance, this trick will help you. It really works. I use this simple trick.
This is well-done Minute Physics video on YouTube.
Did you know you can open a bottle of wine WITHOUT a corkscrew or other wine-opening tool? This is a tip that every wine-drinking traveler should know. Thanks to Mirabeau Wine for sharing this tech-less tip.
As friends talk about the issues of traveling with children, I am reminded of the travel kit I made for a four/five-year-old child because he and his dad were heading onto a very long airplane flight.
Rather than just giving him some coloring books, paper, and crayons, knowing he’d soon be asking “what should I draw” or “may I have more paper,” I created play scenes for him — my own take-off on coloring and Colorforms®-like scene play.
As with all stories of theft, I post this story to help good travelers remain safe as they get to know the world. I strongly believe that if more people in the world knew more other peoples of the world, there would be more trade and less war. I want people to travel safely and give themselves the opportunity to get to know local people wherever they go. This story of robbery relates the theft of two clean, honest, well-presented European travelers by the driver of an official (or official-looking) Panama City taxi (license plate 588431). Both are good sized people, in shape, not overweight, not tiny or weak looking.
On Monday, December 10, 2012, TravelMole.com reported about a TSA agent leving JFK International Airport with iPads he stole from passenger luggage. The story is “TSA agent caught red-handed with stolen iPads.” Regarding action against the employee, the story says: Transportation Security Administration spokesman David Castelveter told ABC News that the TSA has “taken the steps to begin processing [Henry] for termination.” “TSA holds its employees to the highest ethical standards and has zero tolerance for misconduct in the workplace,” said Castelveter in a statement. What I do not understand is why the TSA does not have a simple rule: You steal, you lose your job! Granted, the USA is a country where we stupidly are not permitted to say something negative if asked to give a job reference, so a second rule is needed: You steal, you lose your job and the theft becomes a criminal record! It is […]
Maybe it is the extreme heat, but the plastic cording must stretch causing the lens to fall out. This is not something I can pop back in and be done with. That is, I’d put the lens back into place, but the lens falls out again.
This happened to me twice. First, in San Salvador at the beginning of September and again in Panama City on December 22 when the glasses are almost exactly a year old. (I believe each lens has now fallen out.)
Luckily in both cities, I have found that there is amazing reciprocity amongst the eyeglass stores. In each city, the first optician shop I walked into repaired my frames free of charge! Each time, with just a few words and a fast look at the situation, the plastic band has been fully replaced.
Deb’s Travel Tip: Do something to customize your luggage, suitcase, or backpack and your day bag or day pack in a major way. Backpackers, especially: Get yourself to a fabric store and cut the fabric and sew unique patches onto your pack on all sides. Buy flags of favorite countries and sew them on. Less effective, but maybe helpful would be to get handing dongles and put them on your pull tabs. This can work for soft luggage as well. Hard luggage users: Get some stickers and put them on all sides of your luggage so something is visible from all views. Just make your luggage or bags or backpacks unique!
A gang of three or four persons was involved. It happened on the bus at night and they worked as a team to distract me. They even played acting roles, fake bus employees, passengers. They had the routine down. It was a switch-a-roo trick. They switched his daypack for a stand-in pack.
Tonight’s plan was for me and two friends to hear a woman from Argentina perform at the bar in the Crowne Plaza two short blocks from where I am staying. I’d walked over there this afternoon to learn the times and even find out that her performance coincided with the last half hour of happy hour so we’d enjoy two-for-one draft beer in the warm evening’s air. I was happy that I’d gone over there and inquired in Spanish, gotten the information, and relayed it to my two local friends. However, we arrived to find she is not performing tonight. One of my friends’ response to me: “So your Spanish is not so good.” (Not meant in a bad way.) Really, I didn’t understand what I’d done wrong. I am certainly not fluent in Spanish. I lack many, many words. But I knew how to ask about a female singer […]
It is the middle of the night, the pre-dawn hour of 2 a.m. and Wednesday, June 6, 2012 is is its first hours. Crickets chirp outside under the full moon. The sky is clear. I love this time of day. In NYC it was always my favorite time; back in my 23rd or 24th years I would often be walking home at this hour and I loved the sky, the emptier (not empty) streets, the relative quiet of the city, and it’s maybe “new” energy at the 2-3 a.m. hours. In Los Angeles the air was often cooler at this hour and I would finally wind down from my day, feel I had had enough of my Mac, and would finally get outside for a cool, calm walk. Tonight, in the town of San Marcos on the shore of Lago De Atitlán in the Highlands of Guatemala, I am not […]
Many a traveler or backpacker is acquainted with the challenge of having enough money to cover his or her costs in a country while leaving with as little spare currency as possible. We will often play the where-are-you-going-wanna-swap-cash game with other travelers. That gives us a bit to get our first bus or cab inn the next country. From Mexico to Belize I had it measured perfectly, but then ended up with extra pesos which I swapped with someone Mexico-bound — and that gave me the perfect amount to depart Belize with. From Belize to Honduras I thought I was perfect but later found a couple of extra dollars so I changed them upon arrival to Honduras — which gave me money for my first bus. Leaving Honduras I thought I was doing well, then realized I am a whopping 74 Limpera (under $4) short on my share of the […]
A little way I keep in touch with my family: My brother sends photos of his kids every few days and I change out the photo that is my iPhone’s lock screen.
