Replacing a debit card overseas
Late on Saturday, the day before my scheduled Jan. 19, 2014, departure for a long-anticipated solo vacation in New Zealand, a defective ATM in San Francisco ate my debit card. That left me with $123 in cash at the start of a 2-month trip.
How do you stretch $123 for two months? Don’t ask me; I didn’t do it.
What I did do was use Skype on my iPad mini to contact my credit union as soon as they were open. (The iPad mini, a retirement gift from former office mates in San Francisco whom I had been visiting, saved both the trip and my sanity.)