1st thing I worry about when I land!

This is about one of the first things I worry about every time I land in a new country. 

What the hell is this money actually worth? 

I still do my research, but until my flip-flops hit the ground, I don’t know how greedy the locals are yet. 

The photo that inspired this episode is from Costa Rica. 

Suddenly I’m holding thousands and thousands of colones, and for the first few hours it feels like I’m either rich… or about to accidentally spend a hundred bucks on lunch. 

That learning curve is what I call my tourist tax. 

It isn’t a real tax, and I don’t blame the locals for it. 

I’m the visitor. 

I’m the one who doesn’t understand the currency, the transportation system, the normal cost of a meal, or what a fair price should be. 

So it’s on me to learn quickly. 

Over the years I’ve dealt with Canadian dollars, Mexican pesos, Guatemalan quetzales, Costa Rican colones, Dominican pesos, Peruvian soles, Chilean pesos, Argentine pesos, Uruguayan pesos, British pounds, Bulgarian lev, Hungarian forints, Icelandic króna, Polish złoty, euros, Swiss francs, UAE dirhams, Egyptian pounds, Thai baht, Vietnamese dong, Cambodian riel, Malaysian ringgit, Indonesian rupiah, Japanese yen, Philippine pesos, Hong Kong dollars… and plenty more. 

Different money. Same problem. 

I don’t try to memorize every exchange rate perfectly because they move constantly. 

I mainly want to know three things. 

What is about five dollars? What is ten? What is twenty? 

Once I know those numbers and the cost of a beer, I can function. 

One of my favorite tricks when I arrive somewhere new is opening Uber, Grab, Bolt, or whatever the local ride app is. 

Even if I don’t book it, the app immediately teaches me something. 

A fifteen-minute ride costs about this much. 

Five kilometers costs about this much. 

Airport to downtown costs about this much. 

Now I have a benchmark for time, distance, and money. 

That is real-world exchange-rate education. 

And that’s why I almost never walk out of an airport and jump into the first taxi waiting outside.

Those drivers have been sitting there waiting for somebody exactly like me… 

Tired. Jet-lagged. Carrying luggage. And completely clueless about what the ride should cost. 

Prime tourist-tax territory. 

The taxi driver in the Episode 42 meme holding the “SPECIAL PRICE FOR YOU” sign pretty much sums it up. 

Maybe it really is special. 

Just probably not special for me. 

When I’m somewhere where prices are negotiable, I usually assume the opening number has some room in it. 

My rough rule is that if the first price sounds inflated, I may start around half of what they’re asking and work upward from there. 

I’m not doing that at Starbucks, McDonald’s, a grocery store, or anywhere with posted prices. 

I’m talking tuk-tuks, private rides, markets, and places where negotiating is already part of doing business. 

And I don’t take it personally. 

They’re trying to make money. 

I’m trying to understand what something is worth. 

That’s travel. 

The finished meme probably explains my first few hours in a new country better than I can. 

I’m sitting there scratching my head with a handful of strange currency. 

The taxi is waiting. 

A monkey is smiling from a tree with my money. 

And the sloth? He’s sleeping through the entire financial crisis. 

That sounds about right. 

For me, global geoarbitrage isn’t simply finding the cheapest country. 

It’s understanding what things actually cost locally and learning how to live comfortably inside that economy. 

A three-dollar meal isn’t automatically a bargain if the normal local price is one dollar. 

A twenty-dollar taxi ride isn’t cheap just because it would cost sixty back in the United States. 

The goal is to learn the local value of money, not just convert everything back into American prices and congratulate yourself. 

Real costs. Local apps. 

Negotiate when appropriate. 

Avoid the airport taxi trap. 

And pay as little tourist tax as possible while you figure everything out. 

I’ve gotten much better at it over the years. 

But believe me… 

That monkey has still gotten plenty of my money and watch for him dressed as a human too!