Vacation Networking

Have you ever spoken with your taxi, bus or tour driver? I don´t mean conversations on take me to here or there, have you take some time asking things about the city you are visiting?

I went on vacations and had the opportunity to take a city tour. On the trip, the driver ask me to get for her some water bottles that will be handed in. She told me that I was really nice to her, I just thought it should be the famous Mexican hospitality, it wasn't a big deal.

When the tour ended, the driver get us to the hotel, and she decided to "return the favor" by explaining us how the city has been planed, and the logic behind the letters and numbers on each street, that allow us to move easier on the city center.

Consideration 1: Be kind with the personnel that serves you, it could be on benefit at some point. The people will feel the need to support you on the same way and in several occasions it will be of help for your visits to the places you haven't been before.

At the end of my trip, I ask for a taxi, and chat a little with the driver, he resulted to be foreigner and he liked to speak with his clients, he thought that inside an office he wasn't getting as much people contact. He came from an African country named Eritrea, maybe there are a lot of people that know this country, but in my case I didn't knew it. I struggled a little to understand where this country was placed, the economic activities, the commercial activities and the type of government it had.

Samuel was really kind to explain and tell me about his country. Furthermore, he also shared the reasons that take him into the United States. It was a really interesting conversation, I haven't met somebody from this world region and I promised him to share this information as soon it was posted. This gave me the opportunity to know a little bit about Eritrea, because I had reviewed it on wikipedia.

Consideration 2: Ask your driver for its origins, you never know the moment when you met global regions you never imagined.

Can you tell me some anecdotes of your international trips?