i'm sitting in the rio de janeiro airport, & its total chaos. angry mobs of people are literally chasing airline employees around. there's no flight info on any of the monitors. i don't speak portuguese. i definitely don't understand portuguese. its getting crazier. my flight seems to be late, but the gate agent tells me to keep waiting there. Things are getting uglier by the minute, and police have arrived to control the angry people. i'm sitting there, listening to announcements i can't understand. i can't find gate agents anymore. they're all in hiding. the monitors are still blank. its about 2 hours after my plane to salvador, brazil should've left. no planes have landed. no planes have taken off. i check my email; 2 of them are disturbing. 1 is from expedia (who i bought my plane ticket to salvador with) saying that "changes have been made to my flight that could impact my travel plans severely" & that i need to get airline help right away. the 2nd email says i have $11 in my bank account. Which can't be possible. so first things first. i deal with my plane. i find someone, which is only slightly easier than flapping my arms to get to salvador. they tell me i missed my plane. my portuguese is not good enough to say "listen asshole, i've been here for 4 hours, no planes have come or gone, & i have an email from expedia saying you changed things, so explain to me how i missed it." instead, i let them hand me a new ticket & i get to salvador 6 hours late.
i decided to go to salvador because i heard amazing things about it. that its culturally very rich, & a brazilian must-see. so when i get settled in my room & ask the front desk where to go for dinner, i'm surprised when they encourage me to stay in the hotel. i say no, i wanna go out. they inspect me to make sure i'm not wearing any jewelry, they get a taxi for me & decide to let me go out on my own, under 1 condition. when i'm done eating, the restaurant has to get the return taxi for me, i am not allowed to get a taxi on my own. fine. the food was terrible. i get back to my room & have a look at my bank account. yep. my account is empty and i'm not the one who emptied it. looks like my ATM card got cloned in a town called Paraty and now some one is having quite a good time. its definitely not me. i cancel my bank card. i now have very little cash & no way to get more. i have to 2 more days in salvador, the whole place smells like pee, & I'm pretty sure someone would stab me for a stick of gum. my bank is completely useless & not helping me at all. so i call american express (collect, because they're amazing) I'm clearly upset, they patch a call through to my brother for comfort. The first thing he says to me is "I thought you were in jail." very comforting.
in my bag, i have discovered turkey jerky, too many pairs of socks for someone who doesn't wear shoes, & 2 liters of hair conditioner. Do I have extra back up cash? Nope. Extra bank card? Nope. So now find yourself in a town, by yourself, where you don't speak the language, you are literally stalked like a wounded gazelle in the Serengeti, the whole city smells like pee, you have no money, you have no way to get money. I called Amex, collect, about 137 times. I cried every one of those times. They gave me a ONE TIME USE ONLY PIN to get cash. I opted to do this in Colombia, in 2 days, because I figured I'd get robbed where I was. I had to go thru all of my pockets to scrounge together enough money for my taxi to the airport, because if I opt to get on a bus here I will surely never be seen again. I get to bogota. I go straight to the ATM. Stick in my card, but discover the ATM has a low limit. This is my 1 shot at cash & $150 isn't gonna cover it. So I cancel the transaction & hit the next atm with a higher limit. But I'd squandered my single use PIN. Now I can't get cash. I've got nearly the entire bogota airport helping me. I'm back to calling Amex who is happy to western union me money, but its Saturday evening & they can't find a location that's open for me to pick it up. They tell me to wait on hold while they figure something out. I get disconnected. It takes another army of people to try to get another collect call out. But something has happened to the whole operator system. It is officially impossible to make an operator assisted phone call in the entire country. I do not have even enough money to take the taxi to a hotel. Colombian people are the best people in the world. The airport employee calls a hotel, has them send a taxi, and run me a tab. I have other credit cards, like the more widely accepted visa & MasterCard options, but I left them behind in the US. Another colossal mistake, as not many 3rd world countries take Amex. The hotel pays the taxi in cash, and basically takes my word that I'll pay when I have money. I just have to get thru one more day of no cash. Once I make it thru Sunday, I am home free. I've decided to be ok with this. I have a great day walking around taking pictures. I manage to find a place to eat that takes my Amex. Monday morning at 9am, I'm in front of western union. They're closed. Well, it is Colombia, I'll give it to 9:30. Still closed. Ok. Fine. 10. Still closed. I ask the shop next door what's up. They inform me that, yes, they're closed. Back to the hotel. I ask why. It's a holiday! Commence crying. Again. The poor guy at the hotel has watched me cry a lot at this point. He takes it upon himself to find a western union thats open on a holiday. He calls the same taxi driver who picks me up, drives me to the other side of bogota, where I get cash after 5 days, 3 airports, & 2 countries with no money. I have about 4 hours left before I get on a plane to Cartagena. I go to this touristy church on top of a mountain that has a beautiful view. I want my picture taken, so I'm looking around for someone who looks like they won't steal my camera when I hand it to them. I find him. "hey, can you please take my picture?". Sure. Then he tells 2 other men, each in uniform & carrying multiple guns, to get in the photo with me.
Cool. Thanks. Turns out that he's the police captain for bogota & those guys are his security team. One is police, the other is a special forces soldier. I spend the rest of my time with them, he gives me his information & tells me to call him if I have any problems while in Colombia. Things feel back on track. This is what usually happens to me when I travel. Not imagining myself on an episode of "locked up abroad". I am flush with cash, I love Colombia & colombians, I'm headed to Cartagena, life is good.
After several days in Cartagena, I've been drinking, eating, shopping, seeing old battle forts, & floating around in giant mud baths. I decide I'm going to get on a sailboat to panama. I change my plane ticket, I make all the arrangements. Now I need more cash. I call Amex. They explain that they gave me a PIN, & they just gave me cash less than a week ago. They're worried about fraud & no I can't have more cash unless I can prove why I need it. Its not like I'm going on a carnival cruise ship. I can't prove what the money is for. I just need it! Shit. I call my brother. Hey, I'm in Colombia, I need money to get to panama where I catch my plane back to the US. His response, "I don't have any money." You apparently didn't hear me. I'm in Colombia and I need money. I get him to concede that he has money. Now keep in mind I'm arranging things from a 3rd world country, so the way I am talking to my brother, who will not get with the 21st century & download skype, is that I'm using prepaid skype credit to call his cell phone. So while we are talking, I run out out of credit. Damnit. I'm trying to buy more credit to call him back. The power goes out for an entire 4 block radius. So that means no more Internet. Shit. When the power comes back on an hour later, I try to buy more credit, so I can call my brother so I can have money. Turns out buying skype credit is a transaction that requires a lot of information traveling thru space. As a matter of fact, too much information, for the server I am using, to handle. So I skype call my friend (who has joined the 21st century) and she calls my brother like a translator. Done. My money is at western union, it's Friday afternoon. All I have to do is take my passport to them, & boom, I have money again. Hmmmm. Where's my passport? I can't find the thing anywhere. Stay calm. Oh god, now I remember, I gave it to the boat captain because he handles all the immigration stuff when you leave the country on his boat. I call him. My passport is busy at the immigration office. I'll never get it today. Luckily western union is open on Saturdays in Cartagena. So after another round of drama, I get my money, & I get on a 39 foot sailboat with 8 other people, & we sail to panama. I don't get sea sick, but turns out when you don't drink enough water & are exposed to the sun for every minute it is in the sky, somewhere around day 3 you begin to vomit. A lot. You are already dehydrated, so the fact that you cannot keep down even a sip of water becomes somewhat distressing. The sun goes down, and you miraculously recover. Sailing with 8 other people, you've never met before, for a week on a 39 foot boat has potential for disaster, and probably isn't for everyone. Especially if you're really attached to the idea of personal space. Because thats a little over 4 feet of space per person. But I had a fabulous time, except for the puking part. Now, I also travel with an extra bank card & spare, for emergency use only, cash. I definitely felt like parts of the trip were trying to kill me. Once, the thought even crossed my mind to give up, and get on a plane to the US. But then I realized that, for me, giving up is harder than finding a way to get thru it.
Cool. Thanks. Turns out that he's the police captain for bogota & those guys are his security team. One is police, the other is a special forces soldier. I spend the rest of my time with them, he gives me his information & tells me to call him if I have any problems while in Colombia. Things feel back on track. This is what usually happens to me when I travel. Not imagining myself on an episode of "locked up abroad". I am flush with cash, I love Colombia & colombians, I'm headed to Cartagena, life is good.
After several days in Cartagena, I've been drinking, eating, shopping, seeing old battle forts, & floating around in giant mud baths. I decide I'm going to get on a sailboat to panama. I change my plane ticket, I make all the arrangements. Now I need more cash. I call Amex. They explain that they gave me a PIN, & they just gave me cash less than a week ago. They're worried about fraud & no I can't have more cash unless I can prove why I need it. Its not like I'm going on a carnival cruise ship. I can't prove what the money is for. I just need it! Shit. I call my brother. Hey, I'm in Colombia, I need money to get to panama where I catch my plane back to the US. His response, "I don't have any money." You apparently didn't hear me. I'm in Colombia and I need money. I get him to concede that he has money. Now keep in mind I'm arranging things from a 3rd world country, so the way I am talking to my brother, who will not get with the 21st century & download skype, is that I'm using prepaid skype credit to call his cell phone. So while we are talking, I run out out of credit. Damnit. I'm trying to buy more credit to call him back. The power goes out for an entire 4 block radius. So that means no more Internet. Shit. When the power comes back on an hour later, I try to buy more credit, so I can call my brother so I can have money. Turns out buying skype credit is a transaction that requires a lot of information traveling thru space. As a matter of fact, too much information, for the server I am using, to handle. So I skype call my friend (who has joined the 21st century) and she calls my brother like a translator. Done. My money is at western union, it's Friday afternoon. All I have to do is take my passport to them, & boom, I have money again. Hmmmm. Where's my passport? I can't find the thing anywhere. Stay calm. Oh god, now I remember, I gave it to the boat captain because he handles all the immigration stuff when you leave the country on his boat. I call him. My passport is busy at the immigration office. I'll never get it today. Luckily western union is open on Saturdays in Cartagena. So after another round of drama, I get my money, & I get on a 39 foot sailboat with 8 other people, & we sail to panama. I don't get sea sick, but turns out when you don't drink enough water & are exposed to the sun for every minute it is in the sky, somewhere around day 3 you begin to vomit. A lot. You are already dehydrated, so the fact that you cannot keep down even a sip of water becomes somewhat distressing. The sun goes down, and you miraculously recover. Sailing with 8 other people, you've never met before, for a week on a 39 foot boat has potential for disaster, and probably isn't for everyone. Especially if you're really attached to the idea of personal space. Because thats a little over 4 feet of space per person. But I had a fabulous time, except for the puking part. Now, I also travel with an extra bank card & spare, for emergency use only, cash. I definitely felt like parts of the trip were trying to kill me. Once, the thought even crossed my mind to give up, and get on a plane to the US. But then I realized that, for me, giving up is harder than finding a way to get thru it.
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