Travel

Free Walking Tours

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I love free walking tours. First of all, they’re free – my favorite price. My very first blog post was about finding free things in New York, and this is a great way! Second of all, they allow you time to walk around and explore new places while learning. And best of all, they require no tour books or preparation; you just show up and absorb knowledge.

It feels like there should be a catch, but in fact, there is not one. Here’s how it works: You google the place you want to explore + “free walking tour” and then you show up at the specified place at the specified time. Sometimes it requires a sign-up ahead of time, but they never require payment. Then at the end of the tour, you tip the guide whatever you think the tour was worth. This varies based on the tour (and the country… Americans always tip more!).

I discovered free tours last year in Spain, where I went on 5 tours in 4 cities in 10 days. You may think I got carried away, but why not? Tours last anywhere from 1-3 hours, and sometimes cover a lot of miles. I went on tours in Cordoba, Sevilla, Granada (x 2!) and Madrid. As I said above, the best part is learning about your surroundings, both contemporary and historical, without having to get a book from the library. Also, you can meet other tourists and locals. I love to walk close to the guide and pepper him/her with questions along the way. In my experience, they always know more than they let on, and rarely can’t answer a question. My favorite part of the tour is always the end when I ask local tips about the best happy hours, free tapas, best paella, etc. The local guides are the key!

Also, the guides know their way around if you need directions. Once, we were on a tour when the skies opened up and it started to pour. Our guide found us a covered place to wait it out, but when it became obvious that the rain was not going to stop, she told us how to navigate the back roads of Spain to get to our Air BNB as quickly as possible with the most overhead coverage. Also, if you are booked back to back (I often over-plan my trips), the walking tour guides can tell you which attractions are must-see, and which ones you can skip. And their advice and tips are all free!

Although I have taken free tours internationally, and I find them to be more popular in Europe, they also have them all around North America! I went on a tour in Chicago last year after my success in Spain, and I LOVED it! Our guide was a young woman who had a true love for the city, which came through in her tour. I learned about architecture, city history, and some of their landmarks. I was so inspired, that I decided to also go on a free tour in my own city! I had a random day off last summer (Jewish holidays FTW) so I went on a free tour of the Financial District, Little Italy and Chinatown in New York City. I learned a LOT about the original colonization of New York, the Native Americans who were displaced, and of course, the mob in Little Italy. Later last year, I went on another free tour from the same company, Free Tours by Foot, of Grand Central Terminal. I found that one incredibly interesting because it’s a place I have walked through MANY times, but never knew anything about! Did you know the famous clock in the middle is made of opal and is worth $10-$20 million?? Did you know that there are hidden acorns throughout the terminal architecture because it was a Vanderbilt family symbol? Try to find them, like hidden Mickeys!

Inside Grand Central Terminal, with the most valuable clock ever.

Although I said there is no catch for the FREE tours, the way most of these companies make money is that they offer tours for a cost, as well. Often at the end of the tour, they will plug their non-free tours, and offer discounts if you sign up then. In Cordoba, we happened to be in town during the infamous Patio Festival (Fiesta de los Patios). In fact, our Air BNB was even one of the Patio destinations! After our free walking tour, we found that the same tour company was offering a tour (for a cost) of the patios. Since these patios are hidden all around the city, we decided it was worth it. It was. Not only did we get to see hidden gems of beauty throughout the village, we also learned history of the festival, found out how winners are chosen, and learned about how the owners of these homes work all year to prepare their courtyards for the fiesta. Our guides were amazing. Best part: your guide is a built-in photographer! She took fantastic group pics of us, some of our only non-selfie group shots of the trip!

Patio Festival with our tour guide photog.

If you haven’t realized yet, I am addicted to these free tours. I am now in the habit of googling “free tour + [some city]” whenever I have a free block of time! Most recently, I went on a free tour of the New York Public Library and learned a BUNCH. I also got to see the original Winnie the Pooh dolls they have on display in the children’s reading room. And that one didn’t even require a tip because the docent is an employee! I am leaving for Italy in 3 weeks and you can bet I have a few free tours on the itinerary. I can’t wait to report back! Do you guys have any free tour ideas for me to check out? Let me know in the comments!

  • Outside the infamous 5th Avenue Library (yes, it was in the Sex & The City Movie)
  • The Reading Room
  • The original Winnie the Pooh dolls!
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Big City Living

⭐Hamilton⭐

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Saturday night I went to see Hamilton. If you’ve been living under a rock and you haven’t heard of it, it’s a musical on Broadway. According to Wikipedia, “in 2016, Hamilton received a record-setting 16 Tony nominations, winning 11, including Best Musical, and was also the recipient of the 2016 Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album and the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.” So yeah, it’s sort of a big deal. And since it’s such a big deal it’s semi-impossible to get tickets. For example, on Ticketmaster right now, the cheapest seat is $448. Per person.

To be honest, there are some serious Hamilton-heads out there who know every single lyric and even go to themed-spin classes with the songs. I am not one of them. Or I wasn’t. In fact, I didn’t even know any of the music before this weekend. Except the one song performed on the Tony’s. I always knew I wouldn’t have the money to go to see it on Broadway so I figured, why bother trying to know the songs?

My best friend was in town over the weekend from Seattle because her boyfriend bought tickets to Hamilton on presale OVER A YEAR AGO. He flew from Seattle to see it! He had 4 tickets, and at the last minute, one of the people going to the show canceled. I told him I would advertise the ticket on my Facebook so he wouldn’t lose the money. My brother, the protagonist of this whole story, LOVES Hamilton. He has seen it on tour, but never in NYC. He saw my Facebook status and texted me asking why I wasn’t going. He said “do you know the music? Is money the only thing holding you back?” He knows my student loan situation. I was about to text him back when I heard phone “CHA-CHING!” and I saw that he Venmo-ed me the money for the ticket!! I texted him back my extreme gratitude and deleted my Facebook post advertising it to anyone else – I WAS GOING!

HE’S THE BEST!!

I called my brother, so he could tell me his favorite songs, and I got to listening! I had 24 hours to learn a VERY LONG soundtrack. Literally, there are 46 songs. I listened to the songs all day Saturday and by the evening, I had a better idea of what would go on. The play was LONG. But it didn’t seem like it! The lyrics are fast, since most of the songs are rapped, and my brother had warned me I would probably not understand all of the lyrics. However, maybe it’s the decades of listening to rap, but I understood a lot of it! The music is super catchy and I’ve been listening to it ever since.

  • Mandatory pre-show marquee pic!
  • Playbill pic.
  • THE ROOM WHERE IT HAPPENS!
  • In our seats waiting for an amazing show!
  • Besties on Broadway.

The coolest part of the story, if this isn’t cool enough already, is that my best friend’s boyfriend and his brother, went to school with the musical director, Kurt Crowley. They’re from Helena, Montana, and not too many people are from there, so they kept in touch. Kurt stayed after the show and let us onto the stage to talk with us about the show, and to take photos. There were actors from the show all around us on stage signing Playbills, but since I didn’t know the cast well, I didn’t ask for any signatures. We did get some awesome pics, though! And it’s an amazing experience to be on a Broadway stage, looking out at the theater; it’s not as big as you’d think! We took some more photos, and then left. We hadn’t realized that more than 3 hours had passed! A testament to a great show is that there can be nearly three hours of FAST speaking, and it seems quick.

  • Full cast post-show, asking for donations for something (I wasn’t paying attention when they started asking for more money)

I feel the need to end this post with some serious cliché’s – it was such an incredible experience to be IN THE ROOM WHERE IT HAPPENED IN THE GREATEST CITY IN THE WORLD! I recommend it to anyone who has the money, or a SUPER SWEET BROTHER with the funds. THANK YOU AGAIN, BABY BRO!

  • The guys & Kurt Crowley.
  • Selfies on Stage.
  • THE STAGE WHERE IT HAPPENED!
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Long Legs and other Personal Problems, Miscellaneous

Credit Card Churning

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You’ve probably heard the phrase “money doesn’t grow on trees” or, “there’s no such thing as a free lunch.” Well, ladies and gents, I’m here to tell you that everything you learned is FALSE and there is a such thing as free money. It’s in the form of credit card bonuses and it is complete sorcery.

http://gph.is/1a4df5e

I was never part of the magic until I met my emoji boyfriend who got me in DEEP with “credit card churning,” and I’m loving every second of it. We actually have a little jig we do in our house called the “free money dance.” Not lying. Churning basically means that you get a new credit card to access the sign-on bonus, and then after a certain amount of time, you get another one, and start all over again. Some people think that this affects your credit score, which it does, but usually not enough for it to matter if you do it right. In general, a hard inquiry, which is what a credit card company does every time you apply for a new card, affects about 10% of your credit score. But if you do it infrequently enough, then your credit should be fine.

Yesterday, I just signed up for my 7th credit card in 3.5 years’ time. Aka the amount of time I have been with my boyfriend. It all started when we began to talk to each other about finances. These finance bros get off on this stuff. JK. But really, he was very interested to hear about my student loans, etc. We got to talking and he found out that I had a credit score in the middle 700’s, but had a credit card running balance of about $4,000. He was FLABBERGASTED. Literally, I think I had to pick his jaw off the ground. Maybe not literally, but he was gaping at me. He told me he didn’t understand how a person with my credit score could be paying interest on a balance, when I could just open a new card and do a balance transfer to buy myself time. Now, guys, if you’re confused, I was, too.

Quick explanation: Another reason people like to open credit cards is because they offer “balance transfer offers.” This means you can open a card, transfer your outstanding debt to a new card, and they offer to not charge you interest on it for a certain amount of time. I looked at this, realized I was getting free money, and I was HOOKED. I was able to pay off my credit card debt by saving all of the money I would have been spending on interest, and I did the same thing with my private student loans! I transferred my $6.5K from Wells Fargo to a credit card, and I have been making minimum payments for 18 months, without paying any interest! I have enough money now to pay them off by May, when the interest will kick in (this particular card had a 21-month interest-free grace period).

Again, balance transfers are not even the tip of the iceberg of this money, as the “real money” lies in the sign on bonuses. It seems crazy to me that this free money exists out there in the universe and people don’t access it left and right, but the truth is, most people don’t know how! There are millions of Reddit threads on the topic, but it can get very technical, very quickly. I am lucky to have an in-house financial advisor who is patient with me and explains the intricacies. I will try my best to give an equally-as-elementary explanation here.

I am not new to this credit card business. In fact, growing up, our family used to carry around little laminated cards in our wallets that my dad would make, to remind us which cards to use every quarter based on the percentages back we would get on different categories of purchases. Example: January through March, you should use the Discover card for gas, and the Visa for groceries; they’re 5% back. My parents still do this! This is #LevelExpert, and I do not recommend it for novices. Also, although 3% v. 6% does add up, most people “churn” for the bigger money bonuses. The Showcase Showdown, if you will, is the sign-on bonus.

Here’s the simple summary: credit card companies want to hook you on their cards, so they offer a bonus if you sign up and spend a certain amount of money, generally within the first 3 months. These bonuses differ from card to card – sometimes it’s miles, sometimes it’s points, and sometimes it’s cold hard cash in the form of a statement credit. The catch here, of course, is that you need to “spend money to save money.” The trick is not to open a card with a sign on bonus if you will need to make purchases you wouldn’t normally make in order to get the bonus. However, sometimes it’s still worth it if you come out on top!

Here’s an example: when I signed up for the Amex Platinum card, they offered a $1K bonus but you needed to spend $5K in 3 months. That is MUCH more than my budget, if you don’t include rent. So, I paid my rent on the card for a month to make the minimum. Rent in NYC is high. Now, this complicates things because my landlord charges 3% on credit card payments. But overall, it was still worth it to get the bonus.

I see some of you guys rolling your eyes, saying that this whole process isn’t worth it. But I ask you, if someone said you’d get $1,000 for it, wouldn’t it be worth it? That’s the trick. You need to get a bonus that’s big enough to be worth the work.

So far, I have gotten:

  • Citi Double Cash for 18 months interest free
  • Citi Diamond Preferred for 21 months interest free
  • Chase Sapphire Preferred for 40,000 bonus points
  • American Express Platinum for 100,000 bonus points
  • American Express Charles Schwab Platinum for 60,000 bonus points
  • American Express Blue Preferred for $200 back
  • Barclay’s Arrival Plus World Elite for $700 in travel back
https://gph.is/2OWJkaQ

I want to let you guys know, I am not the only one out there doing this. A lot of people do, especially if they know they have big purchases coming up where they will be dropping a lot of mulah anyway. Another example: a friend of mine got the Amex Platinum because he bought his fiancée’s engagement ring with it. So savvy.

I have traveled many times now by using bonuses. My trip to Spain last year cost me $120 out of pocket. My trip to Costa Rica was completely free. Durham, North Carolina? Free. I also transfered $110,000 Amex points to a Charles Schwab investment account at 1.25 cents/point, which means I got $1,375 FOR FREE! I have been very fortunate to have someone explain this to me and I hope I have been helpful as well.

Still confused? Try checking out The Points Guy; he is one of the most famous churners on the internet nowadays, and you can filter cards by the category you want rewards for (airline, cash back, etc.). He does receive money from clicks, and he does have partnerships with certain cards, but he is pretty clear when he receives kickbacks from companies, and he is also very reliable with his information. He even has a beginner’s guide!

A few warnings & tips:

  • If you have bad credit, you may not get approved for certain cards. Most credit cards rely on your credit score when they decide whether to approve you. You can check your credit score for free on Credit Karma to see where you stand.
  • Opening cards does affect your credit score, as I said earlier, so don’t do it too often. The general rule of thumb is to not open more than 2/year, or one every 6 months.
  • Closing accounts too often can also affect your score. When you close a card, your overall credit limit decreases. This increases the percentage of credit you are using (or “utilization”), and lowers your credit score. Try to keep the account open. You don’t need to use the card, just keep it in a safe place. At home.
  • Beware of annual fees! Some of these cards charge hefty annual fees. Sometimes it’s worth it for the bonus but be aware. You can always downgrade the card after you get the bonus, before you have to pay the annual fee the next year. Downgrading means keeping the account open but changing it to a less prestigious card without an annual fee. This way you aren’t closing an account, but you aren’t paying fees. I did this with my Chase card, switching from Sapphire Preferred ($95 annual fee) to Freedom ($0 annual fee).
  • Don’t carry a balance on cards. It can be very tempting to buy things. Especially when it takes 45 seconds to be approved on a new card, and they grant you a $12K credit limit straight out the gate. IT’S A TRAP! Make sure you can pay off your statement balance when it’s due, otherwise you owe interest and then THEY WIN.
  • A related point: If you’re opening a card to do a balance transfer, make sure you set up auto-payments for the minimum payments. You don’t pay interest, but you still have to make minimum payments, and you don’t want to miss those. Just set it on auto-pay and forget about it. Otherwise they charge interest and again THEY WIN. DON’T LET THEM WIN!

I hope this was helpful. I am not a financial planner. I am not good at this stuff. But I am understanding it more and more every day, and if I get free money and free trips, then I feel obligated to share the wealth. By wealth, I mean knowledge. Y’all b*tches aren’t getting’ any of my trips!

Do you guys have any other tips or tricks? Card recommendations? I’ll need a new one in 6 months!

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Miscellaneous

Reproductive Rights Conversation with Jodi Picoult & Dr. Willie Parker

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As you may know, I LOVE to read. I have many “favorite” authors, but my all-time favorite author is Jodi Picoult. One of the best parts of the internet is that you can follow celebrities, keep up with them, and even sometimes (if you’re lucky!) interact with them. One of my 2019 resolutions is to be better at Twitter, and one way I discovered that I am more likely to check in on my Twitter is by following people I’m interested in. Enter: Jodi Picoult. She has such a great Twitter. Not only is she funny, but she’s very liberal, like me, and often retweets other people I want to follow. But I digress, this is not about Twitter in general, it’s about one of her tweets specifically, when she mentioned she was coming to NEW YORK!:

I clicked on the link, because obviously I wanted to join her. And guess what? The conversation was being held in a venue 9 blocks from my apartment. It felt like it was meant to be.

The theme of the talk was reproductive rights. Not only would Jodi (we’re on a first name basis) be there, but Dr. Willie Parker as well! Jodi’s most recent book is about a shooter inside an abortion clinic, and I was enthralled by the plot on page 1. She based the main character in the book, Dr. Ward, on Dr. Willie Parker.

I love reproductive rights. Really though. I know that sounds weird, but I feel very strongly about a woman’s right to have independence over her own body. In fact, in law school (#RIP that career), I was on the board of Law Students for Reproductive Justice. And yes, sometimes that position involved searching the internet for STD facts for our annual Sex Ed Trivia fundraiser, but it was for a good cause!

I could not wait to be in the same room as Dr. Willie Parker, a world-renown doctor, abortion provider, and author. I have not yet read Dr. Parker’s book, Life’s Work: A Moral Argument for Choice, but it has been on my to-read list for a year. I guess I’ve been too busy reading Jodi’s stuff. I knew they would both have interesting things to say, and I also looked forward to their interaction with each other, since they seem so different.

There were a few tiers of tickets, but I bought the cheapest one because… law school loans. Also, the other tiers all included a copy of Jodi’s book and I already have a signed copy, natch. Even my best friend knows about my love for Jodi Picoult, so she mailed me a signed copy all the way from Seattle a few months ago. The day before the event, I was so excited that I tweeted about my enthusiasm, and Jodi replied! She said she couldn’t wait (to be in my presence, no doubt).

https://twitter.com/LongLegsBigCity/status/1100600221690679296
  • LOOK AT WHO REPLIED!!
  • My signed copy of A Spark of Light

I arrived super early because it was blocks from my house and I got a prime seat. The conversation itself lasted for an hour and was moderated by Lizz Winstead, a hilarious Writer/Producer/Comic, Co-creator of The Daily Show, and fierce advocate of reproductive rights. She founded Lady Parts Justice, an organization dedicated to raising awareness of legislative attempts to block women’s reproductive freedoms (straight from Wikipedia, so it must be true). Between her witty commentary between questions, and both Jodi and Dr. Parker’s thoughtful answers, it was a fantastic experience. Most notably, Jodi talked about her experience shadowing Dr. Parker in his clinics for a few days while researching for her book. I loved her description of Dr. Parker’s calm and meaningful bedside manner. And then, she broke out the best story of the night: She said that they did a lot of driving together while she was shadowing him, because he works at clinics in two different states. Once, he was driving and they were eating M&Ms and he dropped one. He was looking for the missing M&M between the seat and the center console and he said “Man! It’s tighter in here than operating in a woman’s vagina!” The whole audience burst out in laughter while Dr. Parker looked to the sky for God’s forgiveness and then to his wife in the front row to mouth “sorry.” The whole thing was hysterical.

Although the vibe of the conversation was light-hearted, they both tackled tough issues. They spoke about the right for a woman to have autonomy over her body, and about the importance of a common language in speaking about reproductive rights, like the difference between a “baby” and a “fetus.” My favorite thing Jodi said was, “Laws are written in black and white. But women’s lives are lived in hundreds of shades of gray. For that reason, it is important not to let laws control our lives and bodies.”

I didn’t get a chance for a selfie with Jodi or Dr. Parker, but I did get some photos of them and I did get a very happy ending. As I walked out of the venue, there was a table outside for Lady Parts Justice, and I asked how to get involved again in supporting the cause. I leaned down to sign up for their mailing list, and two of the girls tabling complimented my hair. I explained about my side hustle, Braid in Manhattan, and they were both elated. They said they would love for me to help them with events and collaborate. I could think of nothing better than reproductive rights, volunteering, and braiding all in one place. I can’t wait to work with them and make a difference, even if it’s by brightening a woman’s day with a FIERCE hairstyle. I’ll keep you posted!

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