Home > Still Traveling > Archives > 2005 > March > 09 > Entry
DEL.ICIO.USEasing travel fears
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Lonely Planet, the publisher of great travel guides to every country on earth, pulled together travel writers and editors on Tuesday for a symposium in Atlanta. For three hours, we talked about how Georgians travel and where, and why some travel hardly at all.
The Lonely Planet people are on a fact-finding tour of several states, whose bottom line, I’m sure, is to figure out how to sell more guidebooks and travel products. But they’re also interested in promoting travel and removing obstacles that prevent people from seeing the world. Money and time are factors, of course, but one of the biggest is fear — fear that you don’t know the language, fear you might have a health emergency in a foreign land, fear of flying post-Sept. 11, even fear that you might look dumb for not knowing what other travelers know, such as what happens when you go through customs.
The discussion reminded me that promoting travel and identifying places people might want to go is only part of my job description; it also includes helping people navigate travel pitfalls and feel more at ease. So, I thought it might help people who want to travel abroad but can’t get up the nerve to hear about travel experiences we cherish because we took a chance, or our fears about our first trip out of the country or our first trip alone (yes, traveling with a companion is usually more fun but when that’s not an option, traveling alone sure beats staying home alone!)
My suggestion if you’re apprehensive about a trip: Ask yourself what’s the worst thing that could happen? Sometimes the “worst thing” is a legitimate worry and you can do something to lessen it; for instance, if you aren’t in the best of health, buy travel insurance — in case you have to cancel the trip, or in case you need medical care while traveling. But often, the “worst thing” is just fear of the unknown.
So here’s my confession about conquering a fear. When I wanted to go dancing in Paris on my birthday, solo, I asked myself that “worst thing” question and came up with two answers. The first: That I’d go, the club would be full of couples, no one would ask me to dance and I’d have a miserable birthday. Then I realized the really worst thing that could happen: I’d leave Paris never having seen a French nightclub and always wondering what it would have been like. So I went, fully expecting to have a glass of wine and leave. Instead, I danced with lots of charming men — French, Italian, Spanish — and had a wonderful time and one of my most memorable birthdays. Not bad for a farm girl from Arkansas.
Years ago, a former coworker who has traveled widely told me how she got her start. A dutiful daughter, she’d taken care of both parents for years and thought she couldn’t leave them for a vacation, plus she didn’t want to go alone. She came to one day in her 40s and realized they could certainly do without her two weeks out of the year if she arranged care. And once she started investigating, she found people with shared interests to start traveling with. She comes back from every trip with tales of adventure and discovery, and lots and lots of friends.
A current co-worker is still wrestling with the idea of getting back on a plane post-Sept. 11. He’s borrowing travel guidebooks, though, so I have hope he’ll make the right decision.
What’s your fear? Or what was your impediment to traveling — money, time, family, fear — and how did you overcome it?
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By Jemille Williams
March 12, 2005 12:26 PM | Link to this
Live Free or Die!
Every rational person has fears, and nothing in life is without risk, but my bottom line is my mother’s friend who was killed in her bed by an errant car. My motto is live free or die. Perhaps one day I’ll live free AND die, but statistics prove that more of us die in our cars near our homes or slipping and falling within our homes than are done in by foreign kidnappers or plane crashes.
I was just talking to my Top Gun buddy who is organizing his Naval Academy 30th Reunion.
After seeing action in the Vietnam War, one of his classmates was killed when his tractor rolled over. My brother-in-law’s Emory roomie, Sonny Carter, was a Space Shuttle astronaut. Kinda scary job, no? He was killed in a small plane crash. I think it was the same one that killed Teresa Heinz’s husband. My own beloved father perished at 31 in his bed of a cerebral hemorrhage. None of us gets out of here alive, so you might as well go for it!
Who among us has forgotten that Atlanta was named Fear City - #1 in violent crime? I lived in Buckhead in those days. My European friends think it’s still the Wild West over here and wonder how we can live in such a violent land. You know, the way we think about people in Africa and the Mid-East.
That said, in spite of my French-fried Lebanese name, I have always been terrified of the Middle East and never intend to step foot there, but I would have to say that I put myself out there pert near further than most mortals are comfortable doing and my goal is to live long and prosper. My own sister can’t conceive of how I can rent a car and drive all over creation by myself. After being incarcerated in a difficult marriage, living by my wits all by myself on foreign soil for a couple of weeks elevated me back to feeling pleased as punch with myself. If I could do that, I can do anything!
My particular affectation is genealogical research, which leads me to some extremely remote places. I have to take off my shoes to count the churches I have visited in complete solitude. It is a very holy experience with no one else around to detract from the mood. I’ve poked around desolate cemeteries, tromped through hulking ruins, and hiked o’er hill and dale completely alone in France and never felt threatened at all.
Yeah, my mirror does have three faces, and I find myselves great company, but there’s something so life-affirming about making yourself steam open that envelope and GET OUT THERE! Besides, not even my sister is interested in our genealogy, so why would any of my friends want to do it? My last visit to Paris was a thrill-packed day at the National Library, not on many’s must-see list!
The scariest thing that ever happened to me was when I was visiting my boyfriend in Italy. All his roommates were Jewish and had taken off to Israel to celebrate Chanukah. We got a wild hair and decided to pop under the Iron Curtain to Lipica, in what is now Slovenia, to visit the Lippizanner Stud Farm. (You know, those huge white horses that do the Airs above the Ground? They’re not Austrian, honey.) Since we were only going to be gone one night, we didn’t even bother to leave a note for our buds who wouldn’t be home for Eight Crazy Nights.
The authorities confiscated our passports and held us for four hours. That was the most hair-raising, skin-crawling, blood-chilling scared I’ve even been. I was a hot young kitten then. My boyfriend tried to make me laugh that they were going to hold me for their Lebensborn program. Not funny.
With neither explanation nor apology, they released us, but I was so traumatized I wouldn’t let him out of my sight. I even demanded to see his fingers around the door jamb when I went to the bathroom. We enjoyed the locals and riding the horses was a thrill, but I will never, ever again go somewhere where no one else in the world knows where I am!
So, that’s my bottom line. Take reasonable risks. That varies for everyone, but even val-de-ri types like me need to have an itinerary and checkpoints so search parties can be sent out. My son disappeared on European soil and I was taking steps to get Interpol on the case, when it was just a case of his military flight’s being delayed. He thought he was so grown up, he didn’t need to leave a note with Mommy. I lost 10 years off my life that day, and we all learned a good lesson. I know that guy who had to cut off his arm in Utah will never again go into the outback without telling someone else where he is!
So, don’t worry, be happy, but be wise!
And, Amanda, I am WAY more afraid of men in nightclubs than anything else I’ve ever done. You are very, very brave!
By Jemille Williams
March 13, 2005 1:13 AM | Link to this
Know Before You Go: Baby, You Can Drive Their Car
This is a big PRO:
I would like to add something I found out after I made my first auto trip and actually drove from and back to the car rental agency in Paris. (I’ve since been told that only a complete maniac would attempt such a feat, but my driving tenure in Atlanta prepared me well!)
I assumed that Europe was like the U.S. in that they tack on huge surcharges for one-way rentals, mais non! And because of the high price of petrol, I found it was actually economical to take the TGV (France’s bullet-train) out of Dodge, rent my car out in the hinterland, motor about, then turn it in at another outpost in the hinterland, and bullet back right into the bowels of Charles de Gaulle Airport!
When I think of that hellacious rainy Saturday that I toughed out my car return the day before I departed Not-so-Gay Paree, I couldn’t believe how sweet ‘n easy it was to zoom through the Phantom of the Opera’s lair practically to my gate! Try it, you’ll like it!
By Mark
March 13, 2005 12:11 PM | Link to this
Travel, particularly alone, can be very daunting. I had never left the U.S. before April of 2004, let alone really traveled genuinely alone. Even if I got on a plane alone before, I was meeting friends/family elsewhere.
Since that first trip alone, I’ve visited Mexico and traveled to the UK for over a week for New Year’s. After the initial fear was conquered, I’ve seen the value in travel. I know there must be other people like me out there who are just waiting, expecting to travel one day but always inventing reasons they can’t go now. My advice is to go.
I actually wrote an article on a travel site with this same message.
Thanks!
Mark Alpharetta, GA
By Amanda Miller
March 14, 2005 12:28 PM | Link to this
Way to go, Mark. I read your complete entry — thanks for providing the link — and it’s well worth going to the site to read your full account of deciding to travel alone. I loved this paragraph about wrestling with the question of “to go, or not to go.” “There was a deadline to this decision, as there is with anything involving a sale. As the deadline loomed, I likely drove one friend in particular to distraction. We exchanged e-mails almost daily, always including conversation about my inner turmoil. Finally, trying to be helpful, she replied that maybe it wasn’t time yet. She had been one of the first to say that I should go if that was what I wanted. Intentional or not, her words suddenly placed everything in perspective. For days I had not been seeking reasons to go, I had been building a case for why I should not. I would travel “one day” but not this day. Somewhere in my subconscious, the fear of the unknown had already made up my mind. That was the night that at midnight, I found myself online booking my flight to London for the following April.” Aren’t you glad you made the right decision? I had a similar problem at your age — no one to travel with — and I passed up some opportunities I kick myself for now.
By Amanda Miller
March 14, 2005 12:37 PM | Link to this
Jemille Your comments are right on. You can die because someone was talking on a cellphone instead of paying attention to the road. And believe me, I think about that every day as I traverse Atlanta’s freeways. I feel a lot safer in an airplane.
What I don’t want to do is to die never having lived! And to live you have to step out of your comfort zone a lot, try new things, meet new people, experience what the world has to offer. Amanda
By Mark
March 14, 2005 10:08 PM | Link to this
Amanda,
Thanks for the comments! I have another article up there plus another one pending. But that was the only one that really pertains to this topic.
Jemille makes the point perfectly. If you keep delaying living life, you might run out of chances! It seems like some of us must spend half of our lifes putting off the future when the future is always right there. I don’t know where I’m bound for next, but I sure won’t wait another 30 years to go!
Thanks,
Mark My Vacation Photos
By Amanda Miller
March 15, 2005 12:26 PM | Link to this
We’ll be expecting a blog or two from your next trip! Amanda
By Lisa Stauffer
March 15, 2005 4:04 PM | Link to this
Hi Amanda and everyone I traveled alone (Europe and US) because of school and job from ages 21 to 29, when I “retired” with my first-born. One thing I learned which helped overcome the lonesomeness that often goes along with solo travel — when you’re dining out, and want some company, eat at the bar and talk to the bartenders. Not only did I have company, the bartenders were helpful in case of any unwanted attention. And they gave great advice on local sightseeing.
Also, in Europe, staying in youth hostels (if you’re the right age) is a great way to make friends who can be temporary sightseeing and travel companions.
It’s also nice to have a list of acquaintances-of-friends, just in case. Even if you never call these people at your far-away destination, you have names and phone numbers in case of trouble.
The worst travel incident my family has ever had was when my father had a stroke as he was boarding a plane between Australia and Tasmania. The flight attendant had an ambulance waiting. The hospital was excellent. He made a wonderful recovery, but had to spend the last two weeks of his vacation in/near that hospital. Local people from a church even invited my Mother to their homes for meals. My Dad’s stroke could have happened anywhere. Had he been at home alone, it would have been worse.
The worst thing that’s ever happened to me when I traveled alone was the time I put diesel in a company car … and it stalled on the Autobahn during rush hour. A German man came to my aid, just like a person would stop to help here. There are good people everywhere. (The car was gasoline-powered, by the way. Didn’t the people back at the office get a laugh out of that one! But from then on, everytime I had to drive a company car, it was gasoline-powered, and came with a full tank!)
Like I said, there are good people everywhere.
By Amanda Miller
March 15, 2005 4:34 PM | Link to this
Lisa Great suggestions on making friends while taveling alone. And you’re right, bad things can happen even if you never leave your house! Amanda
By Lisa Stauffer
March 15, 2005 9:31 PM | Link to this
Hi again I know getting seriously ill overseas is often a fear — not just for the quality of care, but for the unknown costs involved. So…Just in case anyone wondered whether my Dad’s regular US medical insurance paid for his care in Tasmania — Either the hospital filed with the US insurance carrier (my Mom was a teacher at the time) or the government covered it, which sometimes happens with socialized medicine. My parents did not have to pay out-of-pocket for his excellent Tasmanian care.
By Lisa Stauffer
March 15, 2005 9:35 PM | Link to this
Amanda, you mentioned tour books. To my surprise, I found Rick Steves’ guides to be the best at explaining how to get around and what to do and what-does-it-all-mean, especially for novice travelers. For instance, in his guide to Paris, he tells tourists not to expect down-home friendliness - after all, it’s one of the most sophisticated cities in the world. We don’t go to New York or Tokyo and expect people to be friendly like they are back home. And he explains why the paintings in any given art gallery are important, not just what the paintings are. His tour of the Musee d’Orsay was like a short art history course. His forthright manner takes a lot of fear out of travel.
By Amanda Miller
March 16, 2005 4:07 PM | Link to this
Lisa You are so right about Rick Steves’ guidebooks putting first-time overseas travelers at ease. Another good series of guidebooks is Lonely Planet. But any guidebook is a good investment to help you get the most from your trip; they all have their pluses and minuses. And the bookstores would hate me for saying this, but I often browse through them all picking up tips for the planned destination and sometimes decide to buy only one. Amanda
By Radhika Subramanian
March 16, 2005 10:45 PM | Link to this
I really enjoy reading your Sunday travel section, especially articles by Jemille Williams. Last weekend’s article on Bienvenue au Château, with the link was very timely. We may get to visit France this summer, and I am sure that I will use the link Jemille provided.
Thanks for the great Euro tips, and keep up the great work on making travel fun for your readers.
By Mark
March 16, 2005 10:46 PM | Link to this
Hey Amanda,
Whenever I figure out where/when I’m going again, I’ll be sure to drop a BLOG here, but if anyone has the deep, dark desire to read it, I did make comments about both my trips in my own BLOG.
The first trip was mainly a recap from notes when I got back, but the second, I made fairly regular logs. Both are archived by now, but the first trip was in April 2004 - and the second began in December 2004.
Lisa, I have to say being ill in another country is still one of my big fears. I actually contacted my insurance before my first trip just to find out if they would cover emergencies. Their answer was so round-about that it seemed to amount to yes, but please don’t…
As for guidebooks, I got them as gifts for both trips, but I did a LOT of online research as well.
Mark
By Ann Lombardi
March 19, 2005 10:56 PM | Link to this
Why is it that many of our fellow Americans are reluctant to avail themselves of their hard-earned vacation time? I am convinced that travel is our last great freedom, and the world’s best education. And vacation time is good for our health. Yet somehow in our workaholic society, many of us seem to put vacations low on our list of priorities, even losing accrued vacation time we need and deserve. Just a short weekend getaway now and then can refresh our outlook on life and give us the down time so vital to our well-being.
Two thought-provoking books on this topic are Fighting Overwork - Time Poverty in America (John De Graaf) and Work to Live (Joe Robinson). We Americans apparently have fewer weeks off than other western countries. Life is still too short not to savor our leisure time. And a world beyond our own boundaries beckons too.
Not long ago, I came across a very surprising statistic: that only 15% of Americans have passports. The earth would be a different place if each one of us made it a mission to encourage our friends and family to travel, both here and abroad, to reach beyond our comfort zones, to learn from those with whom we share this planet. It’s time to “take back our vacations.” Now more than ever it’s time to travel.
By Amanda Miller
March 21, 2005 1:09 PM | Link to this
Hi Ann
Your comments are right on. I know I’m guilty of not always taking the time I need to decompress — it’s hard to get away for two or even three complete weeks without feeling like you’re dumping work on others. In this business, someone has to get the Travel section out when I’m not here, and usually it’s a co-worker who already has a full-time job.
Travel gives you a fresh perspective, a feeling of adventure, an escape from the day-to-day. And you know the old saying: Nobody ever died saying they wish they’d spent more time at the office. Amanda
By Ann
March 22, 2005 2:01 PM | Link to this
You hit the nail on the head, Amanda. And on another note, I’d like to add that nobody ever died saying they wished they had packed a bigger suitcase for their vacation! Traveling light is the way to go, unless of course someone is traveling with a wedding party and needs to cart along a wedding gown, etc! :-)