DO Take Advantage of the Free Wine on International Flights

Red and white wine is complimentary when you’re traveling overseas, and you should absolutely have a glass if that’s possible for you. It makes watching the movies on the flight way more fun, and then it makes you nice and sleepy all while not having the obligation to socialize with anyone (it could be just me, but I LOOOVE getting wine-drunk alone). Plus, the quality of the wine is pretty decent! As a modern and frugal gal who only buys $2 bottles of wine from Aldi, I was pleasantly surprised that the airplane wine didn’t taste like the battery fluid I’m used to drinking.

 

DON’T Forget Your Passport

This seems like the kind of travel tip that would naturally lend itself to some kind of dramatic story about how I forgot my passport and made an Uber driver do a u-turn in the middle of a bustling highway so that I could retrieve it and heroically make it to the airport with just enough time for me to jump onto the airplane as it was pulling away from the jetbridge. That didn’t happen. I remembered my passport for this trip, but while I was packing I thought about how easy it would be to forget. Sometimes I forget to pack socks and/or underwear, so leaving behind a pocket-sized booklet seems highly likely for me. One time, my mom forgot her ID and didn’t realize until she was at the front of the security line. She missed her flight. It was a bummer. It would have been even more of a bummer had it been an international flight.

 

DO Get Lost

Nothing humbles a person more than getting lost in a place where almost no one can help you. The sense of helplessness is altogether terrifying and exhilarating. You fight-or-flight response kicks in, but then everything kinda mellows out like, “ok, well I’m either NOT going to be lost in a minute, or I’m making this place is my new home¯\_(ツ)_/¯” It’s what I imagine life was like in the prehistoric age before Google Maps. Maybe all major cities are just places where a bunch of people got lost and gave up on trying to be un-lost? Regardless, getting lost is good because then you’re less likely to make that mistake again, and you have an interesting story to tell once you become un-lost (see: NUMTOT Queens).
 

DON’T Look at Your Phone Too Much

This isn’t some sort of millennial-culture shaming thing about how we’re all connected to technology too much or whatever -- I’m hopelessly addicted to Twitter and my hands shake every second I’m not scrolling through memes, so this is a hard suggestion for me to follow. It’s more because maintaining battery life is hard when you’re out and away from chargers for long stretches of time. You never know when you’re really going to NEED to use your phone (i.e. if you get seriously lost or see a puppy that you HAVE to take a video of), so I personally suggest only checking it every couple hours or so.

 

DO Pick Good Travel Partners

When you’re traveling to a foreign country with other people, you really have to trust the other people you’re traveling with. Getting lost and confused is inevitable, and you’ll likely feel embarrassed, isolated and lonely at one point or another. The best way to maintain some sense of sanity while navigating the unfamiliar is to go about it with good people, and I am eternally lucky that I ended up with Ali, Ryan and Doug as my travel partners. If you can, find people who are adaptable, proactive, funny, smart, kind and supportive. Get a group of friends who are equally fun to talk to and great listeners. Travel with people who care about you just as much as you care about them and who will look out for you no matter what happens along the way. I have no idea how I got so fortunate to have these kinds of people in my life, but I definitely consider it one of my biggest accomplishments.