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Thread: Tell Others Your Travel Traps here!

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[quote=GRIZ326,508468]A story from a 2008 trip to China:

Flew into Hong Kong and caught the bus to Guangzhou.

FIRST MISTAKE: I did not have the hotel name & address in Chinese characters and got dropped off a long way from my hotel. BIG mistake!

SECOND MISTAKE: Didn't have any Chinese money; USD did pay cabbies; credit cards weren't working.

THIRD MISTAKE: More than one hotel with nearly the same name. First taxi took me to the wrong place...but took me to the second, correct hotel.

Things that went well:

* I was smart enough NOT to walk through a suspicious alleyway.

* I was lucky enough to find a police officer to walk me through the alley.
(In truth, China is a REALLY SAFE PLACE compared to many parts of the world.)

* A cab driver took me from a wrong location - knowing I didn't have any money. He drove me to the wrong hotel (one with a similar name); and then got me to the correct hotel; and waited for me to get the hotel to give me some money on my credit card. 
Trust me; that would never happen in New York or Los Angeles.

When I was a merchant seaman, I had a few rules for myself:

* Never drink to drunkenness.
* Never mistake your "new friends" for friends.
* Be constantly aware of the environment and the people around you.
* Never flash your money. (You should never carry more than one day's money - although sometimes that is easily said, but difficult to do)
* Travel well-lighted and well-travelled roads. 
* If you think a taxi driver is taking you to a bad place, be prepared to jump out of the taxi when you can. (That rule may have saved my life in the Philippines.)

...and life will be easier if you notify your credit card companies that you will be traveling in China to prevent them from shutting down your credit cards. (That happened to me once and it is difficult to fix when you're in China and the bank people are in your home country.)

I haven't been back to China for five years now and look forward to going again. Even though I'm certain that it has changed, it's a pretty safe place to travel...you just have to keep all of your teeth in your head  [mood7]
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