In this day and age, book knowledge isn’t enough to win an argument. To be a successful pundit, you must have firsthand knowledge of your subject. Since nothing ever happens in your hometown, the first step to universal credibility is to build a “seen it all, been everywhere” appearance.
Unfortunately, travel costs time and money: taking time off from work, learning a language, buying and packing climate- and culturally-appropriate clothing and recovering from exotic microbial infections. But don’t you fret now, sugar dumplin’; The Guys got your back. We’ve put together a bunch of shortcuts so that you can learn how to be well-travelled.
Tools:
- Working proficiency in your native language
- A computer
- Your drinking liver
- List of Hard Rock Café locations
- Blog capability
1) Go to places where your language is the primary language.
Why bother learning another language when there’s a good chance some other country already speaks it? (Sorry, Farsi speakers.)
If you speak English, book trips to England, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand or Canada (non-Quebec provinces, of course).
If you speak Spanish, book trips to Mexico, anywhere in South America besides Brazil, Spain or the southwestern United States.
If you speak any other language, then you probably know where you can go. Moving on ….
2) Book a flight with as many stops as possible.
You know what’s just as good as visiting another country? Visiting their airport. When you book a flight to your English-speaking locale, pick a flight with as many stops and layovers as possible. It’s like a cruise, only without the seasickness and waterslides.
While in each airport, sample the local culture. By local culture, we mean the bars. Every airport bar is Casablanca: everyone’s from somewhere else, hoping beyond hope that they’ll get on their plane one day. (If you’re industrious enough, try choreographing a national anthem face-off!) You’ll have crazy stories about that fateful layover in Kathmandu when you had a bathroom quickie with the Irish girl you never had to see again.
What else is in airports? Evidence of your international savoir faire. Go to the gift shops and buy plenty of t-shirts, hats, towels and etc. that prove you do, indeed, <3 NY.
3) Go to the Hard Rock Café.*
OK, drinks are fairly international when it comes to your digestive system. Food, however, is a dicey proposition in foreign countries. Rather than risk amoebic dysentery, stick to what you know will only give you diarrhea.
Fortunately, almost every major city in every country has a Hard Rock Café. While there, try to pick up on bizarre local interpretations of American rock music, like how Iraqis love Lionel Ritchie or how U2 really is Ireland’s only rock band. Also, be sure to pick up a t-shirt: they not only demonstrate your love of mediocre burgers and rock music, but that you went to London.
*McDonald’s is also fairly global, but their souvenirs don’t list the city or country name on them.
4) Stay in a hostel.
Sure, you could stay in a hotel, but then you have to leave your room to meet foreigners. Hostels, like airport bars, throw everyone from all kinds of places into an international version of The Real World. Staying in a hostel also guarantees that the oldest person you’ll have to interact with is whoever runs the joint.
5) Blog it.
Going on a trip is like breaking a bone: once you get home, you’ll have to share the same stories with different sets of friends and family over and over again. By the third retelling, you’re trying to speed through it and might neglect the more interesting details. Let us remind you that the purpose of being well-travelled is to be interesting to other people, so missing important stories like shoplifting a rainstick from the Brisbane Hard Rock Café defeats the whole purpose of leaving home in the first place.
Thankfully, you don’t have to retell the story over and over again if you blog it as it happens. Everyone gets all the details with fuzzy camera phone pictures and your best narrator voice, and you only have to write the URL on a bar napkin for them. Or you could print business cards to save your writing hand.