Smart IT Travel, Adventures and Advice

I share what I’ve learned from traveling a lot more for IT work, from jet lag and sleep struggles to the small choices that make a trip easier. I lay out my personal rules for hotels, flights, packing, and exploring so work travel feels less draining and more worth it. 
• traveling more after switching roles and what changes 
• dealing with jet lag when you cannot sleep on planes 
• bed bug paranoia and luggage placement habits 
• avoiding in-room coffee makers and minibar fridge charges 
• laptop theft worries and why I carry it everywhere 
• why hotel safes can be misleading and alternative hiding habits 
• using do not disturb and noticing newer electronic room controls 
• choosing Airbnb for cost and skipping hotel check-in lines 
• taking public transport to experience a city beyond work 
• making time to explore so you do not leave with regrets 
• learning local etiquette to avoid being disrespectful 
• packing water and snacks to beat airline shortages 
• picking aisle seats and staying calm during deplaning 
• using electronic border options and checking bags to avoid aisle wars 

If you have any interesting topics around travel, maybe not just IT travel, maybe just sales travel.

Transcript

Welcome And Why It’s Late

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hello, everybody, and welcome to Simply Resilient Conversations Podcast. I am officially three days late. I try to get these out on the 5th of every month, but it's been busy, and you know when you're busy, you put things off. And the podcast was something that was the easiest thing to put off. Anyways, this month I want to go with an out-of-the-box topic. And so something that's not self-evident, it's not techie, but it's related to tech. What I'm going to talk about? I'm going to talk about traveling in IT. Now, what do I mean? Traveling like into a computer or something? No, I mean when you work in the IT industry and you travel a lot. Thought this would be interesting and fun. I've recently in the last two and a half or three years been doing a lot of travel. In fact, more travel than ever before. I counted my trips. I wasn't great at the air miles thing, and I realize now that I was really silly because I could have accumulated a lot of air miles. Nevertheless, I'm getting better and better. And when you travel a lot for work, you come up with great tips and tricks, things to do, things not to do, what to do. And I thought I would pass on some experiences. So I've traveled quite a bit in my life, but normally it's like one or two, three, maybe at most, big trips a year, and then maybe some small trips. But switching to a marketing role, I suddenly traveled a lot, lot more. Now, uh recently, in the last uh I guess what, four or five years, my big, big trips have been for the Veeam 100, which were held in Prague and Berlin, and that's a great trip always. And of course, the minute you talk about a trip like that, you think of sleep or lack of it because of the time changes. So that's one little thing which I was gonna bring up. And by the way, I'm really interested in hearing what your experience is and what you do, especially the folks out in New Zealand, Australia, or somewhere in Asia who have to travel, let's say to Europe or North America, because that's a huge difference. Um, so what happens for people who have never traveled anywhere? If you travel, let's say, from Toronto to Prague, there's, depending on what time of year, a six or even uh seven hour time difference. And when you're traveling that way, you get up in your plane, you're over the Atlantic, and morning comes a lot faster. Okay, now some people can sleep on a plane, I can't. So I just don't have sleep for that first day, which right away affects me. So jet lag's a term, by the way. But even if you do sleep somewhat, the fact that you're waking up a lot earlier is gonna affect you. And it normally sinks in really bad, like the second, third day, where you're literally falling asleep. And then by the time you're ready to leave, if it's a short trip, like a week, you're all you know, normalized in the new situation. You feel well, not great perhaps, but you're used to it. It's time to go back and you go through the same thing again. I really don't know what solution is for that. Different people react differently. I tried taking, you know, the kind of not sleeping pills, but the kind of like herbal things, and they help somewhat, but still, I think because I can't sleep at all on plane or very poorly, it doesn't really solve it. So I just have to live with it. Now, what other things when you travel IT do you get to learn? Well, one thing is hotel rooms. Things I've learned. And does this come from YouTube things? You know, I've been traveling, and then suddenly a YouTube video will pop up or an Instagram telling me some horror story about what happened to people in hotels. I I don't know why that is, by the way. So if I'm searching for something on the internet, I know what happens, cookies and all that, but why do they always send the negative stuff, right? Um, so and I've heard this from other people. There's one thing that's very scary about traveling, okay, when it comes to hotels bed bugs. Yes, they do exist, and you can get into a very expensive hotel, everything's nice and clean, and you'll get bed bugs. Now, I've never had them, but I've heard enough stories that I now have some rules. Rule number one my suitcase, my shoes go in the washroom. They go in the room where the shower is, where there is no carpet and there's just tiles. Because the bed bugs don't like to go there, apparently. Okay. If you put your shoes or anything on the carpet or on furniture, and there are bed bugs there, guess what? They're gonna plant their larvae there. Uh, when you're in the bed, they're gonna eat you alive. And of course, you'll move out of that room, the hotel will say we're sorry, and they'll probably even pay for cleaning and whatnot. But the larvae might stay in your luggage or in your shoes or in whatever. You get home, and guess what? Surprise! So I am super paranoid about bug bugs now. It comes to the point now. I saw a video where what you're supposed to do is go in the hotel room, first thing, take the sheets off in the dark, then quickly turn on a flashlight and look underneath the sheets. And apparently you can see them. Like they're they'll run away and they're fast, but you'll catch them off guard and you'll see them, right? So right away you get out of that room, you go down to the to the you know, reception, complain, make sure you complain enough that they're gonna give you like a freebie, um, and then get another room, obviously. And the problem is it's not really the hotel's fault because they can't like deep steam a room every time someone's in there, they clean it. But bed bugs are pretty hardcore, and anyone can have them. And it could be that someone was in the airport and their luggage, I mean, I get this, I don't know. This is maybe stretching it that the bed bugs jump, jump from one luggage to the next. That probably doesn't happen. But somehow they get into people's, you know, luggage and they go to the hotel room and there they are. So, bed bugs. Rule number two, which I found out recently, don't use the coffee maker or the uh coffee tea maker in the room. Apparently, despite the claims, they're really not clean that often. Okay. So this might be a bit more extreme, and I don't know if I'm being silly, but yeah, I stopped using those. In fact, it's probably good too, because I would wake up and have coffee twice, and you know, the free ones, I wouldn't pay for it. And then I go down and have free coffee as a conference, and by midday it had like five, ten coffees, and I'm shaking all over. So that's probably a good thing. Never open up the fridge door in a hotel room. So, this from a former job, I actually learned this. We had a customer who was a hotel, a really classy hotel in Toronto, and I was helping him restore something. He goes, This is a really important piece of software on the server. I go, what is it? Well, it's the thing that monitors the room. And I immediately thought, you know, secret cameras there and all that. So, you know, I would, you know, go and like never take my clothes off. It's like that, sleep in my clothes and whatnot. No, I didn't go that far. But what it is, like the fridge, this is all, it's got, you know, um, what do they call chips in them? You open that door, ding, there's a charge. Now you could probably fight them and say, No, I just opened the door, look inside, I didn't buy anything, and it'll probably work. But apparently, and I don't think he was pulling my leg, you open the door, and that's like 10 bucks, right? Because they assume. And they don't want people like switching bottles, you know. You you bought you you drink one and then you go to the store, the cheap store, and bring another bottle. They got you know, bottles have been something on that too, tags or something. So basically, don't even open the fridge, don't be tempted to open the fridge, okay? Just pretend it isn't there. The next thing is safe. Okay, I'm super paranoid about my laptop being stolen because I've heard people getting their laptop stolen, and I do save, I back stuff up, but the laptop is just everything. So I carry my laptop everywhere with me. Not to mention it's a good workout too. So I go on long hikes when I'm traveling, I'll talk about it in a second. But people say, Well, why are you so silly? You're carrying your laptop. I go, yeah, but guess what? You're paying for your you know$60 gym every month, and you're not even using it because you're traveling. This is my gym. That that added weight in the laptop is gonna help, right? So that's good. And also doesn't get stolen unless someone, of course, you know, comes up to you and and robs you, right? So okay, that's fine. But the the safes in the hotel room apparently can all be picked relatively easily, so it's more a visual thing. And in fact, one person told me that they have valuables, they put them somewhere in the room, right? But not in the safe. Because if anyone comes in and they don't have much time, they're gonna go to the safe. They're not gonna go like behind the toilet and look there, right? Not I don't put anything behind the toilet, but think about it logically. If someone has limited time, an attacker who's gonna rob, they're gonna go to the safe, right? They're not gonna look in some weird crazy place. So that's what this friend of mine does, and he's never been robbed. Okay, what else about hotel rooms? I put up the do not disturb sign for many reasons because then again, attackers and hotel cleaners. I got nothing against hotel cleaners, but I always feel guilty when I don't leave a tip. And and I know I should, but sometimes they still have the small change, right? Um, and so I figure, okay, don't clean the room, I'm fine, right? But also, if there's someone gonna rob your room, they don't know, you might be in there, right? You might be sick and just lying there. So there you go. Another reason to put the do not disturb room uh thing on. And by the way, there's some new hotels that it's electronic, and I didn't know that. So I was looking for the do not disturb, you know, thing you put on the tag on the door, and it wasn't there. And then I went to the reception to complain, hoping I get a freebie, and they said no, it's electronic. So I look kind of dumb as an IT guy. And yeah, it was electronic. You you press in some buttons do not disturb, which is cool. And that I guess they they have their like headquarters where they have the fridge control and all that stuff, and they know you're in there. But the problem is that doesn't work because they know you've left because they see the door coming in and out, so they know you're lying about the do not disturb, and they that you probably don't want to leave a tip, so they get angry. You have to risk that. What else about hotels? Well, personally, I really preferred Airbnbs myself because it was much easier. If you go to a big conference and there's lineups, it really annoys me. You're paying an enormous amount of money to stand in a line, right? Now I know that if you're uh Hilton Honors member and all that, you can jump online. I haven't figured out how to do it. Airbnb, you show up a lot cheaper. You get into some neighborhood, you see how people live. I just find that more fun, but it's up to you. Okay, transport. Now, I get it, Ubers and taxis are easier. They're easier, but you know, think about how often are you in these cities? And they're different cities. And really, if someone else is paying, like your your company, or if you're a Veeam 100, you're going, you know, Veeam's being very nice to pay for you. You're an experience, you want to experience this. An Uber, a taxi is the same everywhere in the world. Okay, you look out the window, it'll be a bit different. But the highway, the car, exactly the same. There's no difference. Public transport is different. Now, of course, you're gonna, wherever you're going, you're gonna look up to see if it's safe or not, because you don't want to just get on public transport and then and then have your laptop stolen, right? It kind of kills the whole not use the safe thing in the hotel. But uh on the subways, on the metros, on the public transport, you see people the way they live. And it's fascinating. And when you think about it, that's a huge experience. You'll remember that trip a lot better because people are different everywhere. I mean, they okay, they kind of look the same going to work, but they're often talking a different language. You'll see how people commute. You kind of live their life for a moment. And and okay, unless you got a lot of luggage, they won't know. They'll just think that you know, or unless you, you know, look totally different. Like if, for instance, uh, I was in one country where uh it was really hot, and I just come from the north and I was all dressed up. And so the other thought I was some kind of you know person with problems because I'm I was dressed for winter, I didn't have a bag, I put my coat in, and so I'm this and I'm sweating like a sauna people. I saw people looking at me thinking, okay, um, okay, that can happen. But otherwise, they're not gonna know, and it's a lot of fun, so there's that. Also, if you're in a city you've never been in before, uh, don't have the regrets. And I had this a few times during my career where I was in a city, it was all work, work, work, no play, no fun. And I left the city, and someone said, Hey, what was it like in that city? I go, Oh, it was uh well, it was, you know, hotel room and work. I go, you didn't you didn't see anything? I go, no. And then I thought about it, I go, geez, that was dumb. Maybe I'll never be back there again, you know. So I make the extra effort. Maybe I'm tired, maybe I'm exhausted, but you know what? I can sleep when I'm at home. I go out, I look around, I find out interesting things about the city. If anything, it's conversation topics. You know, you're you're talking to the CEO and you really want to get a pay raise and you want them to think you're an interesting person and worth keeping. You start talking about the city and all these things you saw. You'd be surprised. Like, oh, this person, okay, it might not be great at the job, or maybe they are, but at least they're interesting, right? They just don't take, you know, the the Uber and then work all day. Um, but you have to check out your boss. You also don't want it to be uh like collateral damage where you're doing tourism stuff and your boss says, wait a minute, you're not supposed to be doing that. So you have to do it like after working hours or take the extra day. But I would highly recommend you to do that. Um, and it it does add to yourself, it's like a form of education, to be honest. Um, yeah, so apart from that, also learn different cultures as much as you can. So, like, don't go and uh look up. I always before I go to a country that's new, I try to look up, you know, their rules of behavior and what they do because I don't want to show up there and people say, Oh, there's a dumb North American, you know, loud and you know, I don't know, yawning, not putting their hand in front of their mouth, you know, that kind of thing. Different countries, you have to respect wherever you're going. I mean, you you if someone comes to your town or your city, you don't want them doing something which is not acceptable there, right? Right. Okay. And generally it's not. I mean, we're not talking about huge differences, it can be minor things like, oh, there was something silly that uh like shaking hands or something. Of course, after COVID, you know, everyone punches each other. Um, but you know, things like that, greetings and whatnot. Okay, so what are the things about travel? Well, packing is always a big issue. And I'll tell you, I remember the days when um air travel was fun, the seats were bigger, and not everyone felt compelled to bring all their luggage with them, which creates huge, you know, bottlenecks and you know, combat in the aisles for the last empty spaces and stuff. There was a time when airlines didn't do that to people and it was actually fun to travel. Those are the pre-three pretzels days. And what I mean by three pretzel days is they would you like a snack, sir? And then they give me this little, uh, I mean littles, I don't know if you call it little, but plastic kind of thingy, and there's three pretzels. And I'm not taking biggies, I'm talking the baby pretzels, I'm talking the pretzels that should be thrown back into the water because they're too small. And all they do is make you hungrier because it's not enough to make you you feel, you know, uh full, but it's enough to wet your appetite. And of course, the the free soft drink or tea or whatever, giving to you in the minimalized glass. They don't even give you the can anymore. They used to give you the can. No. Well, some airlines do, but often they don't, right? And they just pour it and they take the can back. And you look at that can going, hey, that's my can, man. And they're gonna give that to somebody else. They're gonna what they're gonna do is pour the rest of it to someone else and then open another one and pour. So, really, we're talking prison uh level consumption. Never used to be that way, but that's the way things are now. So, what do you do? Well, first of all, obviously you can't bring liquids in through the uh security, so you can't do that, and it's overpriced once you get on the other side, security. Okay, but even overpriced, you know, buy a thing of water. I always buy a thing of water because there'll be that time you're on a flight, and in the air at altitude, you do get dehydrated faster. And if you're in a plane and you're in goodness gracious, the worst seat, let's say in the window, and the uh the people, the you know, the the flight attendants are avoiding you, like they try to do that now. You just won't get a glass of water and you could like dehydrate. So I take one of those, and it's cheaper than buying on the plane. And then, of course, on the plane you can buy too. But I've noticed a new trend with airlines now, they don't even have what they've got in their overpriced menu. I mean, it's just it's insulting. So I was flying back. I won't say where and I won't name the airline not to get in trouble, but I was flying back and I was hungry. I thought, okay, well, I put this on expenses, it's expensive, it's not, it's not super expensive, don't be wrong, but it is more expensive than it would be, and it's unjustifiably more expensive. But anyways, fine. So I'll get this. And I and I so I I got the um, that was my phone by the way. I forgot to put it on on mute. I got the menu, and I'm looking through okay, well, it's probably not great food, but hey, I'll bite the bullet. So the flight tank comes by. I go, I'd like to have this. Oh, we don't have that, sir. I go, what do you have in the menu? Oh, we've only got that, and it was like half a breath fix thing, and this was like at 5 p.m. I'm going, like, folks, come on. I mean, it's overpriced, it's false advertising. You're saying you're selling this, and it's not even there. So I had to get the half breast breath fix thing. It made me feel sick because I don't like to have like breath fixed at five in the afternoon or whatever it was. Very disappointing. So I also now, just in case, buy a bag of like trail mix or something like that, also with the water, because that'll that'll get rid of your hunger 100%, right? So you don't need to um wait for the meal that doesn't exist, kind of thing. Apart from that, I always get the aisle seat now. Always, and I'll tell you why. The seats, I mean, maybe I'm getting bigger, it's a possibility. Hey, I you know, I gotta admit that you never know. But I know for certain the seats are getting a bit smaller because I've got a buddy who's taller than me and is thin as anything, and he can't fly normal economy anymore. If he flies normal economy, he's like you know, he has to take go to a chiropractor or something. So the seats are getting smaller. If you're in the middle seat, that can be just the worst time in your life because I got in a middle seat once, Veeamarn 2015. I thought I'd be smart and get the midnight flight back, thinking there'd be no one on the plane, okay? Las Vegas to Toronto. I get to the airport. The first thing I see, which scares me, is I find out it's a Boeing 767. That's a big plane. I'm thinking, why would they put such a big plane on for a flight no one's gonna be on? Well, I can tell you why, because it was full, but it wasn't just full, it was full of these guys who were all hung over and had lost all their money, obviously in Las Vegas gambling, and were in really bad moods. And I got a middle seat on a 767. So there were a whole bunch of arguments and almost fights on the plane, but also then they all fall asleep and they all start snoring. I I'm not making this up. It was an orchestra of snoring. I didn't have any earphones or headphones, and it was just basically when they and they you know what's funny too, they all started to snore in in unison. It's almost like subconsciously, all their brains got together to say, hey, let's all snore at the same time. And they would snore, and uh it came, it felt to me like the plane was shaking, like every time it was like the whole plane, and that was five hours or four and a half hours. I it was that was so after that, I never got a uh a middle seat because also the two guys who next to me fell asleep and started falling on me because they fell asleep and they were, I think they'd had a few beers beforehand. Absolutely horrible. And I won't even tell you about the fact that I don't know if there's supposed to be air conditioning or not, or maybe they turned the heat on for some reason. It was boiling. So if I had an aisle seat, I could get up and like hang out near the washroom for a while, you know, and and kind of try to get some fresh air, but I couldn't. So that was horrible. But also, too, if it's a long flight, um, I want to stretch my legs, being in the aisle, okay, I can't see out the window. But if there's the slight chance that the flight's not full, you might have a window seat anyways, right? If no one shows up. So that's always a possibility. So aisle seat, I always get. Uh, it's much more comfortable. I don't try to rush to get out anymore. It's no point. Um, I always sit towards the back, by the way, because the chances of that window seat being open, if it's two rows, uh, two seats in a row, and I try to aim for planes that have two seats, uh, not three, because then the chances are less, is much higher if you're closer to the back. Yes, you're near the washroom, which can be good, but also you might have the washroom lineup standing there looking at you, you know, you which is kind of embarrassing. I when I did have some food once time, there was a really long lineup for the airplane washroom, and all they did was stare at me. At least I thought, I don't know, they might have been looking out the window, but you don't know that, right? So you're sitting there thinking, are they looking at me or are they looking out the window? So that was kind of embarrassing. But anyway, so aisle's better, you've always got a chance that you might have the window, anyways. Don't rush to get out, there's no point. Just be calm, relax, breathe deeply. Once you're out, you're out, you're fine. As far as uh what time, I used to get really early morning flights. I find that can be better depending on where you're going. If you have to cross a border, that can sometimes be better not to arrive when everyone else is flying in. Um, and also most countries have the electronic stuff that you can speed up your arrival. Uh, it's not like Nexus where you go and get fingerprints and they know you're, you know, they know you inside out kind of thing, but it's it does speed up the lineup a bit. And I tell you, the one time I didn't do that recently because I thought, well, you know, what are the chances I'm coming at this time? It was absolutely packed. It was packed. I was in lineup for an hour and a half. So after a long flight, being in a lineup is not fun, obviously. Luggage, I obviously uh I try to honestly put my luggage in every time because I don't want to get into the corridor wars or the the aisle wars I call it when everyone's trying to find the empty space in the luggage bins, you know, and this there's always some drama around that, right? Um, I said, you know what, I'll wait in the airport calmly and it'll come eventually. I've never had, okay, I don't want to say that, knockwood, never had luggage lost. Um, but I just don't want to deal with that kind of hassle. And also, the trick is though, sometimes they are charging for everything now. Uh, you get tickets where it's included, one bag, but if they don't, and it's a full flight, often they'll they'll want volunteers because they don't want you know all the hassle people fighting in the aisles. And so they'll not only take your luggage for free, but they also bump you up in the zone thing or the the you know, when they board the plane. Um, some airlines were born, you know, uh obviously, you know, people with dis uh, you know, who who who need help boarding or children, and then they have their elites, right? You know, the frequent flyers, the people in super duper class that costs a billion dollars. And I'm normally in the last, you know, whatever. And so if you do put your luggage in, often they'll say, okay, because you did this, you get to go up to the second kind of group. So it's a little bit better in that sense. You end up sitting waiting, anyways. So it's not as if it's a huge difference, but at least you feel more comfortable and you get settled down. Okay, so other than that, whatever things I've I've taught forgotten, maybe talk about is depending on where you're going, look around, see what's around the city, what other cities are nearby, because you never never might never get that chance again. And so, you know, be nice to yourself. Maybe take that vacation time and go around the area a bit, especially if you're traveling over. Overseas. Like if I'm going to Europe, I don't want to go to Europe for four days or five days because, first of all, I'll have the jet lag issue, but also, you know, it's a missed opportunity, especially if you know you're going officially. So I will then try to see what's nearby and take some vacation time and visit those places. So it's a real kind of vacation and work as well. So that's kind of my take on traveling. Next week, I've got some traveling coming, which I'm very excited about. Knockwood, though. I I'm very super, I'm not super superstitious, but I'm superstitious that I don't want to brag or talk about anything before it happens because you're superstitious. No, I'm just being careful, put it that way. Um, but next week's gonna be a lot of fun, and I'll probably do a special podcast about next week. All right, today was a shorter podcast. When am I gonna have a guest? Some people say, Jeff, you know, we're just tired of listening to you. Bring somebody else on, for goodness sake. Yes, I'm gonna get a guest when things calm down a bit work-wise. Um, I'm gonna bring in some aces, I might bring in some experts. We'll see. Hold on, just put up with me for a little bit longer. That was Simply Resilient Conversations. If you have any interesting topics around travel, maybe not just IT travel, maybe just sales travel. They have a lot of fun traveling as well. Except they always dress really nicely. Uh, the good thing about being a techie in IT is you can kind of, you know, well, I mean, I dress relatively nice, but I don't have to have like a tie and a jacket when I get on a plane. That would be that would be really rough on top of everything else. All right, we will see you next month on Simply Resilient Conversations. Thank you very much.