Travel Safety Tips

For most international travelers, travel safety tips means packing bug spray and drinking bottled water. However, sometimes there's a lot more at stake. Like your life, or a risk of being seriously injured. If you've been following the news, you'll have seen or read about the chaos in Mumbai, where terrorists have been holding tourists and visitors hostage inside a couple of luxury 5 star hotels - The Taj and the Oberoi-Trident.

Leaving aside the ghastly and tragic implications for those killed (over 120 people including six tourists - a Briton, Australians and a Japanese businessman), let's talk about the living. Both hotels have been almost completely evacuated, and where these people are now - on their way back home, or shifted to another hotel or city or...

I'm also pretty sure most other tourist in nearby hotels and maybe even in the rest of Mumbai and India are probably in a panicky state, not knowing what to do - Whether to stay or pack up and go back home, or find some other temporary accomodations.

Photo by babasteve via flickr (creative commons). This photo of Marine Drive shows the normalcy of life life in this part of Mumbai. Nariman Point is usually alive with the buzz of office-goers commuting and taking breaks and meals at the cafes and street vendors. And the Taj and the Oberoi, along with the Gateway of India and the CST Railway Station, are symbols and landmarks of Mumbai's historic past as Bombay. Anyway, it is this commerical merve center of India's financial capital that the terrorists have attacked. And that creates a lot of panic. So here's a few tips which could have saved some of the tourists, and helped others to get through a rough time without feeling helpless.

Point being that travel safety doesn't just mean that you prepare for problems which you know are there. You also need to prepare for things which you may not foresee, like natural disasters or accidents or emergencies like this one faced by the tourists in Mumbai.

The State Department offers plenty of tools and help for Americans traveling abroad. That starts with country specific travel advisories (btw, the state dept. is also twittering advisories) and other information.

Secondly, you should register with the U.S. embassy at your destination, so that they know your travel plans and your location. In case of a disaster or some problem wjhere all Americans need to be evacuated or provided shelter, the embassy will know where you are, and will provide all the assistance you need. You can register via phone, email, fax, online or in-person.

There are seperate departments inside State which provide assistance for victims of crime, natural disasters, arrests, kidnappings, missing persons reports, and death or injury. All these divisions have seperate and dedicated lines and personnel ready to assist you at any time of the day or night. More details on the State Dept. website here.

There are, of course, lots more things you can do to make it easier in case you do face the unexpected. First thing you should do is know where the embassy is. Memorize the address and telephone number, note it down somewhere handy, whatever... Just make sure that in case of an emergency, you're able to get in touch with them right away.

Speaking of which, a mobile phone with a pre-paid card which you can use for the duration of your stay would be handy in such situations. And make sure your family back home knows exactly where you are every single day while you're away. Don't need to tell you about insurance - both life and travel, but sometimes, its difficult to get medical attention in a foreign land, even if you're fully insured back home.

In India, for instance, most medical treatment is paid for in cash. Its way cheaper than what similar treatment would cost you in the U.S., but still, you'd end up paying for it out-of-pocket. There are some insurance companies who will cover the cost of your treatment, even if you're abroad, but that's more of an exception than the norm. If you have any serious ailments which could possibly flare up, requiring immediate surgery or extensive hospitalization, then you need to be prepared for it.