“Hallo. Sprechen Sie Englisch? I missed my connecting flight and I wanted to phone my friend to say that I’ll be late, but my cell doesn’t work here. Could I borrow yours to send her a message?”

“No.”

All right. Not the best first impression, Germany, but the important thing is that I have a ticket for the next flight from Frankfurt to Hamburg. I’ll get there eventually.

Then I can worry about calling Anja, who’s currently in Terminal 2 of the Hamburg Airport, looking for my face in the crowd at arrivals. Anja is a PhD student at HafenCity Universität in Hamburg; this summer I’ll be assisting her with her thesis on the natural ventilation of Macedonian architecture.

But at the moment, I’m 300 miles from where I’m supposed to be, and I have no phone. I don’t always travel abroad, but when I do, I forget to call AT&T to let them know first, and then I end up 300 miles from where I’m supposed to be without a phone.

And also because that guy wouldn’t let me borrow his. I choose to blame him.

I could pretend to thrive on adventure or claim to be a super chill, relaxed traveler, but the fact of the matter is I’ve inherited my mom’s travel anxiety gene.

01.06.12