Category travel

I ventured down to New York City today from upstate today. This is a typical fall trip and first off, it was amazing being free from the vices of covid while in the city. Last time I went we had to show proof of vaccination to get in anywhere and a year later it was like covid never existed.

My thoughts quickly turned from covid to the merchandise hustlers as we traversed the streets and park. I don’t know if “hustler” is the right term, but I’m not sure how else to refer to these multitude of people that independently offer jewelry, compact discs of their latest recordings, prayer cards, and a host of other DIY merchandise to unsuspecting tourists. I say “offer” because they aren’t “selling” this merchandise, per-say. They are sticking merchandise into your stomach as you pass by, leaving you little choice but to grab it, then forcing you to pay for it, the whole time smiling and pretending you are friends.

I have found this practice to be quite common no matter where I seem to be in the world. In Costa Rica it was jewelry and massages. (Yes, they come up to you while you are relaxing on the beach and try to get you to come under the shade of a tree beyond the sands to have a massage). In Greece it was flowers. In Italy it was homemade jewelry that looked to have a one-week shelf life. In Paris you have to deal with the gypsies. In New Orleans I was actually blocked from moving as one of these people knelt down in front of me and shined my five-year old pair of sneakers for thirty seconds while I stood helpless to move. Then after when I placed five dollars in his outstretched hand, he cursed at me, and I honestly thought he was going to attack me as he demanded more money.

On another occasion my wife and I answered the call to have our children sketched by a street artist in NYC. Why not? The sign said $15. Not a bad deal. So we had the kids sit and waited while he sketched a beautiful portrait, then subsequently demanded $75. Of course, my wife fought him off and ultimately gave him half that amount, but it was yet another lesson learned.

The issue I have found isn’t necessarily that there are hustlers trying to make jewelry, shine shoes, sketch portraits, or sell their basement-made cd’s (Yes, cd’s still exist). The issue more often is that they offer a product or service with no price tag, but then often turn menacing if you don’t meet some unknown payment quota.

At the end of the day, the smartest move for a tourist to make when traveling the streets of any city is try not to look like a tourist, keep your hands in your pockets, look straight ahead as you explore, and if someone approaches you don’t indulge them. Don’t look them in the eyes, don’t smile, don’t talk to them, and keep it moving. They’ll move on to the next target soon after. Oh, and keep your wallet and phone in your front pockets, not your back pockets.

Finally, if someone blocks your path and starts shining your shoes, if those shoes are five years old, it’s probably best to slip out of them during the shine and run as fast as you can barefooted to get away.

I am comfortable enough with overseas travel now that I can honestly say, I don’t think I’ll ever book another trip through a travel company again. Not that I actually booked with a travel company this time around. I just bought a Groupon and unfortunately those packages are sold by random travel agencies. They didn’t sell me a tour group, mind you. Tour groups are annoying. All this agency did was book my hotels and flights basically, and then said screw you figure out the rest on your own. Which is fine, but the trip I purchased in Greece was an 8-day excursion to three different locations, two of them islands.

The problem is, the visitation of three locations in Greece is not practical for an 8-day visit. Especially when two locations are islands that require hours long ferry rides…ferry rides that cancel when the wind blows hard. At this point, who knows if I’ll even get back to Athens in the morning like I’m supposed to. So there were numerous problems with the ferry transfers and I spent almost a full day’s worth of travel in the economy section of a ferry boat. Which is actually better than the economy section of a plane, but still not fun.

So, why did this agency sell a tour of Greece to three separate locations given the annoyance that most travelers would have with so much travel in a week’s time? You got me there. I thought these ferry transfers were twenty minute rides, like the ferry to the Statue of Liberty. Lord, I never dreamed they would have put me on ferries that were five hours a rip. And then one ferry didn’t go because it was windy. What in the world? Stop it. Don’t sell a tour of several Greek islands for customers who only have a week. What are you doing? Go to Athens for a week. Go to Mykonos for a week. Go to Santorini for a week. But for God sake’s don’t go to all three in a week.

Listen people, travel is easy now. You can find a place you want to go…research your hotels and book them online. Book your air flight. You have GPS to get you anywhere on foot or by car. You have the Uber app that works most places in the world to get from point A to point B, you have apps that translate, and foreign people all around the world who speak English better than many Americans. You can do this easier than you can probably bake a cake. So, don’t use a travel agency. If you do use Gate1. But, I recommend you do it yourself. You’ll save yourself a lot of time and headache. Because at the end of the day, these travel companies are just agents sitting behind a desk while you are out in the world dealing with all the problems they cause with their nonsense. Most of their workers probably never been further than the local Walmart.

You can always email to and I’ll take you on my next trip….well, okay, maybe not. But, you get the point.

Ongoing adventures remind me that from lemons we must make lemonade. In my previous entry I made mention of being left on the side of the road by the taxi driver in Mykonos because I only had cash to pay for half the distance. (You’ll be happy to know I figured out my PIN and now have plenty of cash!).

Today, I was woken from sleep by the hotel manager with a series of bangs on my door. Flashback time. The travel company I booked with (GVV) never provided me tickets for the ferry from Athens to Mykonos, to Santorini, and back to Athens. Keep in mind this was all part of the vacation package. They provided no details of ferry departures, and provided me with no tickets. So, while in Athens, I was woken by telephone to tell me at 6:30 in the morning that someone was there to bring me to the ferry. Since when? There was no time to pack or catch the ride. So she left. I had to make my way by taxi to the port, pay for a ticket that should have been included, and basically make my own way to Mykonos.

In Mykonos, I thought to get ahead of the game by seeing if the hotel had any tickets or any idea when my departure to Santorini was. No idea. I call GVV. No idea. They referred me to Tour Greece. I call Tour Greece and they say sorry and they will send someone with tickets the next day at 9:30. Port departure is at 12:50. Sounds like a plan.

Back to today. The hotel manager bangs on my door at 10:00 a.m. I scurry to the door and he says the 12:50 ferry has been cancelled and I have ten minutes to get to the port to catch the only ferry out for the day. Yes, ten minutes to pack up my hotel, find a taxi, get to the port (a fifteen minute ride), and get on the boat. Apparently I’m the only one that can do math in Mykonos. Of course, nobody ever left tickets at 9:30. Apparently they cancelled all ferries after the early one due to wind.

My only choice…stay in Mykonos. Thankfully, the hotel had the room still available, but I have to pay out of pocket for the night! What’s more, they told me ferries may continue to be cancelled due to wind for the next two days!

As I eluded to in my last blog, nobody cares that I’m stranded. Nobody cares that I had to pay for ferry tickets and hotel rooms that were already paid for.

So, what do I do? Write, relax, sleep, sip coffee and enjoy Mykonos another night…or two…promising that the only complaining I will do is to the travel company to be reimbursed and to my blog audience. Outside of that, life is good! It’s not always good, but when it’s not, power through it.

–Styles

Let’s face it, having expectations of others is the source of all frustrations. As soon as you expect anything from the world, from loved ones or…from anyone, you set yourself up for disappointment.

On my travels I got off a ferry from Athens to Mykonos in Greece and immediately a taxi driver greeted me, which was great because I needed a lift to my hotel. I used GPS to pinpoint where the hotel was so I was aware that it was not an outrageous walk if I had to. So, I had no expectation that I would have a ride, but not disappointed that a taxi driver approached me.

That said, as I was following the taxi driver to his car I told him I only had credit card, to which he informed me that no taxi driver in Mykonos accepts credit cards. The problem was, I only had $20 in cash on me and he had quoted me a $40 fare (which, let’s be real, I knew was a laugh and he was exploiting me, but I wasn’t going to argue). He drove me to a local ATM and I couldn’t retrieve cash as I didn’t recall my PIN number so he ended up driving me halfway and dumping me on the side of the road. I took my bags graciously and went on my way.

When I told others the story, the reactions were clearly shock. Who would ever? I never took that position, personally, because I understood two things about this particular situation. First one, time is money for business people, so my expectation that this person would drive me the entire way at half cost is not realistic. It’s altruistic, sure, and maybe some drivers would have, but not him. No worries. Secondly, I understood that to have an expectation of anyone i.e. that they will go above and beyond, that they care, that they somehow value humanity over their personal agendas, is not realistic. In the end, the one the cares most about you is…YOU. Don’t expect anything from anyone. If you are dying in the street of thirst I’m quite sure that someone will offer you a drink, but if they don’t…do not be surprised. Find a drink on your own.

Once you realize that all you have at the end of the day are your own devices, the less frustrating the world becomes and the more of a strategist YOU will become.

I recently tweeted about my feelings of insecurity over not knowing another language fluently. I’ve traveled abroad many times, and as I began scheduling visits to countries where the native language was something other than English there came feelings of trepidation. Not questions like, will I be taken and need someone with a particular set of skills to rescue me? Will the food be good? Will I be able to navigate the given area in which I’m staying? My biggest preoccupation was regarding communication.

As it turns out, wherever I seem to roam, the language barrier never seems to be a barrier at all. Not because I can point to what I want on a menu and smile a toothy grin, or because I have an understanding of the basic words pertinent to survive, which I can mutter as needed. But because in most places you go the natives not only know their own language, but they seem to have a more than elementary grasp on the English language as well.

Of course, in tourist areas where people come from around the world, it makes sense that the people would need to have a grasp on varying languages. I just have it in my mind that when people come to the U.S. nobody can help tourists who don’t speak English. Not only that, but we tend to get flustered by visitors who don’t speak English. I have been to Disney World many times, and let me tell you it is a cultural melting pot, with guests coming from around the world. Yet, your average worker most definitely doesn’t know French, Chinese, Italian, or Greek.

It could be how we educate our youth in the U.S. Foreign language instruction is an afterthought in our schools. They don’t immerse you in the language, and you don’t even take a foreign language until you are practically an adult. So, maybe our educational system needs to start prepping kids for the C.I.A. or for a job in a tourist hot spot early in life. Then we’ll be prepared as much for our tourists as the rest of the world is prepared for theirs.

October 3, 2022