Columns

“You can leave earlier if you travel standby on Delta,” the reservation agent told my cousin, Marcus, when he called Northwest Airlines about his JFK-to-Seattle flight.

Hello! My name is Steven Venables.

Meningitis is a dreadful word and an even more dreadful condition.

Dear Globetrotter:
Welcome to the 358th issue of your monthly overseas travel magazine.

I first visited Egypt 22 years ago. On my fourth trip to the country, in November 2004, I traveled with my 25-year-old daughter, Katie. I wanted to see her eyes light up at the sights that make Egypt one of this world’s greatest tourist destinations. I wanted her to say, 40 years from now, “Way back in ’04, I saw the pyramids for the first time with my MOM.”

Katie could only take one week off from her job. Friends and relatives questioned, “Only one week? What can you do in just one week?”

Well, as it turned out, quite a lot.

(Second of two parts)

In the last issue I analyzed the ins and outs of bill paying abroad. In this issue, I offer additional suggestions on this topic.

Debit card checklist

When we return from an adventure, we count on photographs to tell the story and convey the excitement and the feeling of the place we’ve been. But often we end up with “George in front of the Eiffel Tower,” “George beside the Blue Danube,” “George riding on a camel,” “George staring into the camera”. . . . You can just hear your audience yawn.

One of the most mysterious and arcane topics among airplane travelers is jet lag and its incapacitating effects on the traveler. Having firsthand experience from traveling frequently over a 6-year period from New York to numerous destinations in Asia, I have found that jet lag is a debilitating experience that, fortunately, can be dealt with.

by Chris Springer, Contributing Editor

Too often, we cruise passengers think of our cabin stewards and stewardesses as 2-dimensional persons, without families, lives or futures. So aboard Crystal Symphony on a cruise through the Mediterranean in the summer of 2005, my wife and I decided to have a chat with our energetic, attractive, 24-year-old stewardess, Rasa Janonyte of Klaipeda, Lithuania. The following reflects our conversation.

Q: What does your name mean?

A: Rasa means “dew.”

Q: Tell us about your family.