[The Practical Nomad Newsletter] The Amazing Race 15, Episode 3

[Edward Hasbrouck]

This column with links:
http://hasbrouck.org/blog/archives/001748.html

In this issue:

Cambodia,  landmines, fear, and danger.

Why you can't count on an airline to find the best flights.

How not toloseyourpassport -- and what to do if yourpassport is lost, 
stolen, or damaged.

=====

Ho Chi Minh City (Vietnam) - Phnom Penh (Cambodia)

"The Amazing Race" was back in Cambodia this week. I've talked before 
about landmines and the continuing issue they pose throughout Cambodia. If 
you are thinking about going to Cambodia, you can make your own decision 
as to whether that's a risk you want to take. 

You may not think that my fear of mines in Cambodia is well-founded, and I 
may not think that your fear of, for example, swine flu (at least as a 
reason not to go to certain countries) is well-founded. The greater danger 
in both countries may be road crashes. But fear is neither an accurate 
measure of danger (airplanes are scary to many people, because of our 
instinctive fear of heights and falling, but are actually very safe, while 
cars seem comfortably familiar but are actually very dangerous) nor under 
fully conscious control.

Unless one of the purposes of our trip is to overcome a fear we ourselves 
believe is unwarranted, or unless we expect other benefits that will more 
than offset the fear, it doesn't make sense to go someplace where we 
expect to be afraid all the time -- regardless of whether we or anyone 
else thinks that fear is rational. "Will I be too afraid to have fun?" is 
a separate question, but no less important in travel planning, than "Will 
it be safe?"

Fear and danger aside, what can we learn from this episode of "The Amazing 
Race"?

*Why you can't count on an airline to find the best flights*

As has been the case so often on "The Amazing Race", none of the racers 
figured out what would have been the best flights (with the usual caveat 
that price is no object if you are in a race where someone else -- the TV 
producers -- pays for your airline tickets regardless of cost).

The racers started between 18:53 and 19:32 local time from the 
"Reunification Palace" (former seat of the government of South Vietnam as 
well as residence of its rulers, preserved and open to tourists as a 
fascinating museum exemplar of a 60's-modern dictator's palace) in the 1st 
"arrondisssement" (district) in central Ho Chi Minh City. Tan Son Nhat 
International Airport -- incorporating the runways of the former Tan Son 
Nhat Air Base, and today as during the American War handling both civilian 
and military flights -- is in the 2nd "arrondissement" (district), less 
than 5 miles straight down one of the biggest streets in the city from the 
palace.

Barring exceptional traffic, the first teams and possibly even the last 
ones should have gotten to the airport in time to catch the last flight to 
Bangkok at 20:50 on Thai Airways (TG). After spending the night in the 
airport in Bangkok (typically more crowded than the airport in Ho Chi Minh 
City, and busier at night, with less chance of finding a quiet place to 
sleep, but still OK) they would have been able to get one of the early 
morning flights from Bangkok to Phnom Penh on either Thai Airways or 
Bangkok Airways (PG), arriving around 9 a.m.

Instead, the racers all waited until noon the next day for the first 
direct flight from SGN to PNH on Vietnam Airlines (VN), arriving more than 
4 hours after the morning flights from Bangkok they could have been on. 
(The city name was changed to Ho Chi Minh decades ago, but as often 
happens in such cases the IATA airport code, SGN, continues to reflect the 
former name, "Saigon". The same is true for St.Petersburg, Russia, which 
remains LED for "Leningrad".)

The racers asked the Vietnam Airlines staff if any other airline had an 
earlier flight, and were told, correctly, "No". But they didn't ask about 
connections that would get them there sooner. And if they checked online 
or with a travel agency, the optimal route via BKK wouldn't have shown up 
in default displays of through connections, because of the length of the 
layover. Only someone who thought of the routing themselves, and checked 
separately for SGN->BKK and BKK->PNH schedules, would have found it. A 
knowledgeable and motivated travel agent would have done so,or possibly 
someone at the Thai Airways counter (since BKK is their hub), but probably 
not any other airline. Especially not Vietnam Airlines, which had a direct 
(albeit later) flight and didn't want to lose the business of 36 
(including the film crews) full-fare last-minute passengers.

*How not to lose your passport*

Sometime after arriving in Cambodia and showing his passport at 
immigration and customs, Zev dropped his passport on the ground and lost 
it. Zev and his partner Justin didn't notice when it went missing, and 
weren't sure later where it had been lost or even whether it might have 
been stolen. When they couldn't find the missing passport before all the 
other teams finished this leg of the race, Zev and Justin were eliminated.

What can you do to avoid the same fate?

First, keep your passport someplace secure and out of sight. Zev appears 
to have kept his in an external waist pouch, which is vulnerable to snatch 
thieves (slash the strap, grab, and run) everywhere, and robbers ("Give me 
your pouch or else!") in more violent places.

Second, keep vital documents (passport, ATM or credit cards, etc.) 
separate from anything you need to get into often. A "hidden" stash is 
useless if you go into it in public. If you know you are going to need 
your passport, a bank card, or the like, get it out in private, before you 
are in a crowded or public place, and wait to hide it away until you are 
back in such a place.

Zev appeared to have kept his passport mixed up with a thick pile of other 
papers, such as the clues and directions for the race, that he kept having 
to pull out and look at. It was probably at one of those times that the 
passport came out of the pouch as well, and was lost.

The one time I lost something important on my last trip around the world, 
it was when I was hurrying to put away a credit card in a train station 
where I had used it to buy a ticket. I thought I slipped it into a hard-to-
get-at inner pocket with the tickets, but apparently I dropped it on the 
floor. I should have waited to stash the tickets and credit card until I 
was somewhere private where I could do it carefully.

The last place Zev and Justin remembered having the missing passport was 
at the airport. Once you've made it through the last passport inspection, 
and the guards say that you are free to go, it's awfully tempting to hurry 
on into the new country that awaits just outside. But that's exactly when 
you should stop, and put your passport away securely and out of sight 
before you go through the final door or opening in the barrier into the 
welcoming scrum of friends, family, and taxi-touts meeting arriving 
flights. Do whatever it takes to block the view of what you are doing -- 
go into a toilet stall, go behind a partition or face a wall, turn your 
back, spread your coat, screen your companion from public view, or do 
whatever you can -- but don't wait until you are out in the crowd to put 
your passport away.

*What to do if your passport is lost, stolen, or damaged*

No matter how careful you are, it's possible to lose your passport, or 
have it stolen (uncommon, if you are careful to keep it on your person but 
under your clothes and out of sight -- most stolen passports are stolen 
from places they never should have been) or damaged. Water damage is 
perhaps most common: passports are surprisingly resistant to prolonged 
damp, even in the humid heat of a money belt against your body in the 
tropics, but can be ruined by total immersion or getting caught out in a 
heavy rain.

If your passport is missing or unusable, contact the nearest consulate or 
embassy of the country that issued it (e.g. the USA if it's a US passport) 
as soon as possible. It's more important to contact the consulate or 
embassy, so that they can blacklist the missing passport (so you are less 
likely to be held responsible if it's used by someone else) and to start 
the replacement process, than to make a report to the local police. 
Procedures vary by country of citizenship, of course. But for US 
passports, it may or may not be necessary to make a local police report of 
the loss or theft. If it is, the US consulate or embassy will tell you, 
and can probably provide instructions for how to do so.

If you don't know where your country's nearest embassy or consulate is, or 
you can't get there or contact them (perhaps because you've lost all your 
money along with your passport), have someone such as a relative or friend 
back home contact the State Department's Overseas Citizen Services office, 
which can give them the necessary information to relay back to you about 
what you should do.

Don't expect the U.S.consulate or embassy to lend you money while you are 
waiting for a replacement passport. If you've been left destitute after a 
robbery, natural disaster, etc., you'll probably depend on the generosity 
of people around you to put you up and/or lend you enough to tide you over 
until you can get money (or a replacement ATM or credit card you can use 
to get money) sent from someone back home.

Other ID (e.g. drivers license) or documents (credit cards, etc.) may help 
establish your identity to the consular officer when you apply for a 
replacement passport, but those are likely to be carried in the same place 
as your passport, to be lost along with your passport. The most important 
single thing that will expedite replacement of a passport is a legible 
photocopy of your missing passport. Keep a set of copies of all of your 
vital documents -- on waterproof paper if you can find it, such as is sold 
at some print-on-demand map kiosks -- in each piece of your luggage that 
might be separated: suitcase, day pack, purse, laptop case, etc.

If you are travelling with someone, especially someone of the same 
citizenship who still has their passport, they should go with you to the 
consulate or embassy to testify that you are who you say you are. Someone 
back home may also be able to confirm your story or supply other evidence 
to the State Department to assuage any doubts they have about your 
identity.

The embassy or consulate will get the State Department to send the file 
from your last passport application, quiz you about it to see if you 
answer the questions the same way you did on the application, and 
scrutinize whether you and your signature resemble the photo and signature 
on file.

If they like your looks, especially if you are white-skinned and sound 
like a 
native speaker of American English, you might get a replacement passport 
the 
same day. More often it will take a couple of days, sometimes up to a 
week. If 
you are alone, non-white, and speak with an accent, it might take 
considerably 
longer to convince them you're not an identity thief. Yes, this is unfair, 
and 
the State Department may deny it, but like it or not it's the way things 
work. 
They are under orders to presume the worst of any applicant for a passport 
or visa, and the burden of proof is on you. If you don't like it, get 
Congress to make it easier for citizens of other countries to come to the 
USA legally, so there would be less incentive for them to try to get US 
passports.


----------------
Edward Hasbrouck
<edward at hasbrouck.org>
<http://hasbrouck.org>
+1-415-824-0214

"The Practical Nomad: How to Travel Around the World"
(4th edition 2007)
"The Practical Nomad Guide to the Online Travel Marketplace"
<http://www.practicalnomad.com>

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