Tourist Tips (and Traps)

BY Isabella Orus

If you have the chance to study abroad, I highly recommend it. The experience is exciting and enriching, and gives you the opportunity for lots of cultural immersion with college friends. However, it’s important to take steps to ensure you don’t look like a tourist (and get treated like one) while abroad. 

My father is from Barcelona, a popular tourist city in northern Spain, which gave me the privilege of being able to travel to Europe every few years to reconnect with family. Both his teachings and my own experiences have given me a lot of preparation on how to stay safe while in foreign countries. Of course, I was still nervous about being on my own for study abroad, but quickly realized that by blending in with the local culture and taking easy precautions, everything ends up totally fine. Besides, most of us already have built-in safety measures from living in New York City! Here are a couple of important take-aways I’ve found useful so far:

Functionality Over Fashion

This point applies more to when you are traveling away from your study site and visiting different cities or countries you aren't as familiar with. Avoid wearing any expensive or flaunty jewelry, and try to leave important things like passports back at your Airbnb or hotel. Instead of having your phone in your back pocket or wearing a big backpack, try to wear a cross-body or fanny pack. The better the bag is secured to your body, the harder it is to be snatched or opened while you’re not paying attention. Make sure that you zip up all compartments of your bag each time you retrieve something from it!! (I still need to work on this)

In addition, make sure to research if there is any local dress code for the place you are traveling to. (For example, in Morocco, you cannot wear anything that shows your shoulders or pants that are shorter than your knee). If you are unsure of what to bring on a trip, I suggest bringing at least one long sleeve shirt and long pair of pants – also super useful for unexpected changes in weather!

Too Good To Be True

If something seems too good to be true, it is. These “free” scams are seen a lot in cities like Paris and Barcelona, where tourist concentration is high. If anybody is offering you something for free, whether it be a wristband, flower, or even a picture – it isn’t free. After you take the item, they’ll harass you until you pay them a donation (similar to the Elmos on Time Square). 

Another tip is to try and avoid street shows if you can. Usually these shows are meant to bring in a big crowd, and once your attention is on the street performers, there are people in the crowd pickpocketing anyone who isn’t paying attention to their belongings. Sometimes this isn’t the case, but it’s better to be safe than sorry.

Fanny packs, friends (feat. Maya and Sanya, who are also Study Abroad Liaisons!), and fantastic sights.

Most of these may seem obvious, but it is also easy to get lost in the excitement of study abroad and the overload of new and unique experiences. However, do not let this deter you whatsoever!! If you are nervous, I suggest starting small with travels in a group, like a different city in the same country. My friends and I traveled to Seville (known to be safe) for our first trip and it was amazing!  Once you realize that you can travel safely to one place, the others all become much much easier.