Category: Travels

Third World Adventure

Behind Enemy Lines, Gummint

I once knew a German professional photographer (let’s call him Georg) who, along with a fellow German photographer (“Klaus”), decided to do one of those photo safaris — driving from Cairo to Cape Town, snapping pics along the way — that sounds so good back in Hamburg, but is completely foolish in reality.  Anyway, driving a mil-surp G-Wagen (not a bad choice, BTW), they set off and made it through Egypt without incident.  At the border, they had to get a “passing through” visa to get across the Sudan, which essentially allowed them to be in the country for three days.  When they got to Sudan’s southern border, however, the sole guard at the border post (just a hut) wouldn’t let them leave the country because they had the “wrong visa” — and they’d have to drive back to Khartoum (a two-day drive) to get the right one.  When Georg pointed out that their existing visa would expire en route and they would, in essence, be in the country illegally and imprisoned if caught, the guard just shrugged.  Not his problem.

I told you that story so I could tell you this one.  Last week, faced with a looming legal deadline, I had to fly up to Chicago to get a legal document out of the Cook County Court archives.  (Why I was unable to access the document online, or even manage to talk to someone in the County Clerk’s office to send me the document is a story all by itself.)  Anyway, after having had my 5am flight canceled (thank you, American), I made the 7am flight only by dint of paying the full fare (don’t ask) and arrived at the Cook County courthouse (2nd District in Skokie) at about 11am, with all the data needed for the request on my trusty laptop..

Of course, there’s TSA-type security at all these places these days, which is where I had a Sudan-type encounter of my own.  Reason?  No laptops allowed in the courthouse by members of the public.  I know, it’s inexplicable but hey, Cook County.  I looked around for any storage lockers:  none.

“So where can I store my laptop?”
“You’ll just have to take it back to your car.”
“I don’t have a car;  I just flew in from Dallas.  So what can I do?”
Like the Sudanese border guard, the fucking security guard just shrugged.  “Not my problem.”

At this juncture, I should point out that every single glass window and door at the courthouse has one of those idiotic little “No Handgun” stickers displayed.

I’m not saying that I would have shot someone — in fact, I absolutely would not have, even if I’d been able to bring the 1911 with me — but let me tell you, after a day which had begun at 3am, experienced a canceled flight and a massive fare surcharge along with all the other hassles of modern-day travel (full flight, idiots with too-large bags, crowded train from the airport into the city etc.), only to be faced with indifferent bovine officialdom at the end of it, I can quite believe that some other guy  might  have dropped the hammer.

Which, by the way, is what Klaus did at the Sudanese border.  He told the guard that he had the correct visa back in the car, fetched his gun instead and shot the guard dead.  Then he and Georg got in their G-Wagen and raced off into Uganda.  A real African tale, that one.

And now, the rest of my  story. Read more

Then, And Now

Travels

It would appear as though Miami Beach is no longer the “in-place” for the glitterati, because of rowdy behavior:

South Beach is losing its appeal with some buyers “because of how loud it can be, how dangerous it can be,” said Antonio del Rosario, a New York real-estate agent who also works in Miami. “Many of my clients don’t want to be there.”

Let me tell it like it is.  I used to work for a South Florida-based company, spent a week a month down there for nearly four years, and South Beach was always a scummy area.  So no matter how trendy the place, or how highly it was regarded by “celebrities”, I never felt safe there and couldn’t wait to leave.

I mean, Madonna  supposedly owns a condo there, which should tell you all you need to know.

Scarcity Scare Tactics

Business, Marketing / Advertising, Travels

Via Insty comes this silliness:

Companies in certain sectors use the same behavioral interventions repeatedly. Hotel booking websites are one example. Their sustained, repetitive use of scarcity (e.g., “Only two rooms left!”) and social proof (“16 other people viewed this room”) messaging is apparent even to a casual browser.
For Chris the implication was clear: this “scarcity” was just a sales ploy, not to be taken seriously.

Well, duh.  The oldest advertising gimmick is to threaten shortages:  “while supplies last”, “today only”, “limited to the first 50 customers”, and so on.

I’ve used Expedia quite a bit for my international travel planning (they usually handle cancellations better than the establishments themselves do), and the “only 1 room left” warning elicits a response from me of, “Oh well… if the room disappears I’ll just have to find another hotel.”

You see, true  scarcity can and does work to drive a purchase decision — World Cup tickets being a good example because it’s one event, one time, one place — but all the artificial scarcity (as above) should get just a shrug from the prospective consumer.

Even more, if the establishment uses it constantly (e.g. Expedia), it becomes just white noise:  unless, of course, the customer is a stupid dickhead, in which case they get what they deserve.

The very best reaction to this ploy is to simply say, “Well, if I miss it this time, I’ll just find another vendor or postpone the purchase until the next sale.”  Department stores, who seem only to sell merchandise when it’s “On Sale”, have learned to their cost what happens when you turn discounted shopping into an everyday event:  people only buy during “sale” periods — which is why department stores are dying.

As for the various online travel sites:  if you do find an unbeatable deal for the hotel stay of your dreams at, say, Expedia, check the same hotel’s rates at one of the other booking sites as a backup before making your decision.  (By the way, if the deal “disappears”, try calling the hotel direct;  I once got a rate lower than Expedia’s “Great Deal” at an Edinburgh hotel during the Royal Military Tattoo Week simply by asking for it.)

And ignore the bullshit.

Back Home

Travels

Back home from our trip to New England, and New Wife is absolutely sold on the place — not to live, but to spend the odd week Down East during the summer.

I’ve been to New England (both the coast and inland) on many occasions in the past;  in fact, my very first trip to the U.S. back in Fall 1985 was to New Hampshire’s White Mountains and coastal Maine, and I’ve loved the area ever since — hence my desire to take New Wife there as part of my long-term plan to show her around the various parts of the U.S. that are not Texas.

The first couple days were cool and misty/rainy, e.g. this pic taken just outside Belfast, ME:

…and another of the Bass Harbor coastline:

…but the last three days were nothing but glorious.  Here’s one taken from our rental cottage on the Damariscotta River:

And another couple from the bridge at Southport Island:

Right-click on any to embiggen (and feel free to copy and use as wallpaper etc.).  Please forgive the pics’ imperfections:  Idiot Kim forgot his trusty Nikon and had to rely on his phone instead.  Ugh.

Finally:  while we were there, several Readers wrote to me and invited us to join them at their houses, on their boats, or for a meal/drink.  My sincere apologies for not replying to any of you:  I didn’t check my email account until last night (my vacations are pretty much that — a getaway — and much of the time we had zero connectivity anyway).  So please don’t think I was being rude.  Rest assured, the next time we go Down East, we will meet up and socialize, if the invitations are still open.  Invitations to go shooting will, as always, receive priority.

What a pleasure.  The only regret is that we missed the arrival of the tall ships during Boothbay Harbor’s Windjammer Festival.  (I think they’re scheduled to arrive there today, in fact.)

And en passant: at the KIttery Trading Post, I saw a second-hand Browning A-Bolt rifle in .300 Win Mag with a laminate (not the usual composite) stock for sale at a very  reasonable price.  I’m still kicking myself…

Sans Blade

Behind Enemy Lines, Guy Stuff

Because we flew up to New England and didn’t check any bags, I couldn’t bring a handgun or knife onto the flight because TSA [25,000-word rant deleted] and because they have some strange shitty laws about Texans carrying handguns around New England [250,000-word rant deleted].

Of course, our first full day of vacation was spent shopping in Kittery, Maine — home to a jillion outlet stores — so New Wife was well pleased to spend a morning shopping (as was I, you will see).  While she was shopping in the Ladies’ sections, I was off looking at guys’ stuff — and at Eddie Bauer, found a couple of beautiful white cotton shirts (my go-to everyday wear) at 50% off, which made them only a little more expensive than the Target / Wal-Mart equivalent, at much higher quality.  (And  made in Sri Lanka and not in China, for the win.)  Also a summer-lightweight cap from Barbour, at 70% off (making it merely expensive rather than Barbour-price i.e. nosebleed). Then it came time to remove all the price tags and such, which required cutting the little plastic loop thingy on the shirts, and a sturdy piece of string on the cap.

No knife.

Well, I wasn’t going to be put about like that, and because I’ve been to Kittery before, I went over to the giant Kittery Trading Post to buy a knife.

My original intention was really to buy a cheap $10-Made-In-China POS, then just throw it away before getting on the return flight.

Unfortunately, the Trading Post has an excellent selection of lovely knives… and you all know where this is going, right?  Here’s the rather old-fashioned Case two-blade pocket knife that followed me out of the store:

I have probably about three or four Case knives at home, and I love all of them:  they are the perfect “working” blades, and I have a soft spot for the “sheep’s foot” type (the upright one, for those unfamiliar with the term).  So for $35, I now have a(nother) decent pocket-knife, and  made in the U.S.A. withal.   And yes, it’s a fingernail-opener rather than the modern button-opener type;  don’t care.

And I’ll just have to check my bag when we fly back, because I’m not going to risk having this lovely little thing confiscated by the Airport Gestapo.

En passant:  KIttery Trading Post has an excellent selection of lightly-used second-hand rifles, so I did spend a little quite a long time browsing that aisle.  New Wife of course was shopping downstairs in the Ladies Department, so the trip ended up costing a little rather more than $35.  Don’t care about that either.  All worth it.