Connecting with Locals: 2006
Good travel requires connecting with people. Get creative: bring a Frisbee, look up a bridge club, assume a fake last name and get out a phone book. Connecting with locals puts a shine into your travel memories. How do you make sure you connect with the locals in your travels?
Read the Distillation: Connecting with Locals, 2005
- Please don't post questions here. Use our Travelers Helpline.
Ireland friendliness continued
continued from below: 7 or 8 of them took turns singing solos, and their buddies all joined in on the chorus. A couple of them came over to our table and had a quite lengthy visit. We had a great time!
Dan
WA USA Sat 10/14/2006
Ireland friendliness
It's true folks! Everything we found posted here about the hospitlity and friendliness of the Irish people was right on. The best experience was in a pub in Dungarvin during a "session" A group of about 15 guys from Cork walked in about 10 PM. They had been golfing, and had stopped in for a couple of pints. 2 were drinking cola....must have been the drivers
Dan
WA USA Sat 10/14/2006
Theading a needle in Europe
Mike, relax, you will find more people who want to have a friendly conversation, willing to help you, etc., then you find trying to scam you.
USA Sun 09/10/2006
threading the needle in Europe ...
reading the graffiti wall and the book "Europe Thru the Back Door" I alternate between terror and anticipation! I'm going to Europe soon, and to me one of the attractions of the methods Rick advocates is the chance to be (as he says) a "temporary European", taking part in their life and culture. The terror comes from the multitude of warnings both in the book and on the Graffitti walls of all the scams that befall unwary tourists.
So if a charming person invites me into a bar for a drink have I made contact with a local or am I part of the scam where I'll end up buying a $200 beer? Is the stranger helping me find my train really helping me or trying to make me miss it? Is the stranger showing me the way a person taking pity on the lost foreigner or a scammer sending me down a dark street where his pals lie in wait?
Both scenarios (friendly contact and complete ripoff) are amply described in the book and in the multiple warnings on this site. So how do I know which play I'm in? I'm no idiot, but if I wanted to play it safe I'd stick to American travel and American culture where I know a bit about the scams and what is normal and what isn't. As they say, in a card game if you don't know who the patsy is within 5 minutes then it's you. But in a different country, with a different culture, people speaking a different language ... How does one tell?
If I walk around paranoid and suspicious of everyone and everything, I'll miss out on the adventure and fun I'm looking for. But if I'm trusting then I'm the easy mark every con artist has waited for.
So how do you, the experienced traveler, thread the needle? How do you stay safe but at the same time make contact with the real people and culture?
Mike <email>
Los Angeles, CA USA Mon 09/04/2006
Fly a foreign airline
Start connecting with locals on the flight over. You are more apt to find a foreigner on a foreign airline. I try to fly KLM or Lufthansa instead of Northwest or United. The flight attendants will definitely be locals. I have recently had pleasant conversations with a German/American woman who was just starting a job in Berlin and with a couple of German girls who had finished a short exchange visit in Michigan.
I have to force myself to be an extrovert. Instead of just raising my eyebrows and pointing I speak. "Excuse me. I have the window seat. Sorry. Thank you."
The most successful icebreaker questions for me are, "Where are you from?" and "Where are you going?" Be prepared to pull out maps of Europe of the United States to find home towns and then proposed travel routes.
Sharing a minor treat like a Lifesaver candy also helps, but you can't just hold out the roll. "Would you like a lifesaver?"
Chip
Iowa USA Sat 09/02/2006
Scottish Pubs
Just got back from Scotland, and had a great time in 2 pubs frequented by locals in Inverness. In Scotland, if you ask for ice in your whiskey, you'll definately draw the locals w/advice on how not to ruin a good glass of whiskey! At the second pub, came across a fantastic duo rocking the place w/Scottish folk music. Bottom line - find the pubs where locals, not tourists, congregate.
Chuck <email>
Phoenix, AZ USA Wed 07/19/2006
Conversations with Locals
Our efforts to connect with locals in a laundromat in Florence ended up with a conversation with 2 American college girls who are attending the same university from which one of my cousins graduated. :)
But--on the train between Rome and Naples, an Italian woman about my age (50-60) noticed my cane and my efforts to sit down. I noticed her shopping bag was from a toy store. We ended up having a pleasant, fun conversation for about 15 minutes--she in Italian, me in English--about my knee replacement, her hip replacement, and our grandkids! We used a lot of body English also! It was one of the most fun moments of my trip.
Daisy
USA Thu 05/11/2006
Go to a laundromat
Go to a laundromat to talk to locals. You can have some very interesting conversations and if all else fails, at least you have clean clothes!
Linda
Haverhill, MA USA Fri 05/05/2006
Arty Party
Find out where the art galleries are- many galleries have great opening parties (with free wine and cheese!) on Thurs, Fri and Sat nights. Best of all, you will have hit the pulse of the city; the modern culture rather than what can be found in museums.
RP
Canada Tue 04/18/2006
Internet Service
ROTHENBURG: if anyone is looking for internet svc go to "Der Computer Shop", on ansbacher str on the way from the train station into town. Great owner, cheap internet, also games and computer services if needed. happy travels!
Kendra
Stoneham, MA USA Tue 04/18/2006
Meeting at the market
My husband and I love to go to the markets. We talk with the vendors and other shoppers. Even if we are just looking, we enjoy! The food, crafts, books, etc. give you loads of options for starting a conversation. We've made lots of new friends this way and gotten great tips about getting around, shopping, wbere to eat, places to avoid, etc.
Toni Yates
Charlotte, NC USA Sat 03/25/2006
Locals on a bus
I think one of the best ways to meet the locals is to go on their local bus service. My husband and I were in the lovely wilds of the North York Moors and decided to take the steam train from Pickering. We were staying in Hutton-le Hole and had to walk to Kirkbymoorside and catch a bus that left from the front of the "chemist's"(drugstore). We met a man with a beautiful English pointer dog on the bus. He told us how his dog had won a prize at a show the weekend before. He pulled out a ten pound note proudly, apparently the purse for such an honor. Though I can have fun with the drunken soccer hooligans at London pubs and the euro-trash of the nightclubs, nothing makes England more real than a proud, tweed capped Brit and his beloved dog. On a bus, in the middle of the moors.
Lorretta <email>
Houston, TX USA Wed 03/01/2006
Traveling in Wales
Welsh male voice choirs are a popular attraction in Wales. On our recent trip, we not only attended a weekly concert in Llandudno and a massed choir event in London but also a local choir rehearsal in Cardiff. We had emailed ahead and had a choir member to contact once we arrived in the city. He confirmed that the rehearsal was on that night. We were the only visitors and so many of the choristers came over to say hello, to tell us of their trips to the U.S., and to wish us a safe journey. It was a highlight of our trip! In Llandudno, the practice is to ask who in the audience is from outside Wales; there was actually another couple from Massachusetts in the audience that evening. Once we had identified ourselves, audience members in front and back of us introduced themselves. A very friendly people!
Fran
Natick, MA USA Wed 03/01/2006
The road less traveled.
I agree with Terry in California, I much prefer to go off the path to meet with the locals. I have been to Ireland many, many times yet have never seen the Blarney Stone, Waterford Crystal factory or the Guinness brewery. Why bother? I'd prefer to go see the other gems. I was once at a pub in Cloghane, Co Kerry and met the "village idiot" He was a drunk guy who warned me his back tooth was rotting so he wouldnt get too close to me because he knew his breath was "stinkin" He went on to tell me his Mom was an Apache Indian and started spouting off these fake Indian impressions. I informed him he'd been watching Dances with Wolves a few too many times! He also told me about how he wrestled an Oraca whale in Brandon bay and took his took and proceeded to show me this tooth looking thing on his neck. Needless to say after a few pints the guy actually started making sense (that was when I knew I had too many!!!) He did tell me about the history of the "black and tans" and how they fought the English and didnt allow them in Cloghane etc. It was a wild night, the guy was so full of bologna but it sure beat being stuck with a bunch of Yanks on a bus kissing the Blarney Stone!
Nora
Surprise, AZ USA Mon 01/23/2006