Protecting ourselves and our belonging
by Chris

Personal security:

Before leaving Dubai, we took a 1-day first aid course which taught us the basics of survival and first aid admission.
With that knowledge in our head, the pocket SAS survival guide in our hands and a well filled first-aid pouch in our luggage, we feel confident enough to compete with any ER staff, aspiring mcGyvers or even with Steve the Crocodile Hunter.

Protecting our stuff:
I guess it was important for us to start our adventure with the knowledge and expectation that we will be robbed at least once during the coming year.
Being prepared will allow us to reduce the effect that such an event will have on the trip, and to avoid taking unnecessary risks.

The things we considered are:
- Travel insurance
- Pockets and pouches
- Money and Travelers checks
- Backups
- Luggage security

Travel insurance:
see the medical matters section

Pockets and pouches:
To protect our passports, tickets and money, we have followed the example of million of travelers, and purchased the classical money belt that one wears under his shirt (and generates the typical reaction of "wow, is that a Lonely Planet in your pocket or are you really happy to see me?").
In addition, and to fulfill my appetite for useless gadgetry, I have also secretly purchased similar pouches that fit either on the arm or the leg. I figure they can always be used for spare change or travelers checks.

We have also had our trousers "enhanced " by our tailor in Dubai: we've had "secret" pockets made in the inside (to put credit cards, ATM cards or change on a daily basis), and had the back pockets closed with strong pickpocket-proof Velcro tape.

Finally, and to complete our Indiana Jones image, we've bought the handy discreet leather belts with a secret zipper on the inside which can contain the lifesaving 100 dollars for if/when we get robbed (just in case the gang of big bold tattooed men decide to strip us of everything we own (including our pride) except our little insignificant leather belt before leaving us on the side of a deserted mountain road, just 100k away from east bum fuck... Right!!)

We will protect our money and valuables by always keeping them in either the pouches or the inside pockets, with only daily change loose in our front pocket.
We will however each carry a wallet in our back pocket with old expired credit cards and ATM cards and a tiny little bit of local change (1-2$ equivalent) to give to the first robber or pickpocketer that nicely asks for our wallet...

Money, cards and Travelers checks:
We are taking with us a mixture of credit cards (Visa and Master card), travelers checks and ATM cards.
In most countries, we will be able to simply get money through our ATM cards. Need be, we'll use our travelers checks (particularity in countries such as Cambodia and Laos where ATMs are not that common) or credit cards (only in the rare case that neither ATM cards are accepted by the machine. Credit card companies tend to charge an exorbitant commission for cash withdrawals (1.5% with a minimum of EUR 10))
Prior to departure, we made our bank accounts joint accounts in order to get an additional ATM card and an additional credit card.
We are taking with us the mix of cards that would allow us to extract money from any system worldwide:
2 ATM card from Citibank Dubai
1 ATM card from Postbank Holland
1 Visa Gold card from Citibank Dubai
1 Master card from ABN-AMRO Holland

As a backup in case of theft, loss or damage, we'll keep in Holland other ATM cards that can be sent to us by courier:
- ATM cards from HSBC Dubai
- ATM cards from ABN-AMRO Holland
- Visa Debit cards from HSBC Jersey

All our bank and credit card accounts can be viewed and managed online, so transferring funds from one working account to a backup account should be painless and instantaneous.
By the time the fedex guy delivers the replacement cards sent by Sil's mom in Holland, the funds would already be on the account! (and we would have used the spare cash conveniently hidden in one of our thousand secret pockets, our belt, our hat, our shoe sole or our fake wallet..)

Online backups:
In order to always have access to the information in case of emergency, we have placed scanned copies of all our important documents (legalized passport copies, driving licenses, paddi, birth certificates, travel insurance policy etc.) as well as important receipts in handy places on the web:
- web-based mail accounts
- online travel vaults (ekit.com)
- protected area of our own web site
We figured that having a mixture of .com, .net, .fr, .nl and .org would allow us to access our stuff from anywhere in the world (incl. Cambodia!)
We have also placed the same copies on 2 Smart Media cards which can be read from any computer (see the "updating the web site" section)

Backup of handspring visor:
Given that our Handspring Visor PDA constrains most of our contact, country and personal information, we will be making a final backup prior to departure and placing it on the protected area of the web site just in case the visor gets lost or stolen, and we have to restore the backup on another palm platform (the visor being since short end of lifed!)
On the Palm we will keep the following info:
- A backup of the contacts database in htlm, xls and tinysheet format
- All our personal information (card numbers, pin etc) in the reliable high encryption program secret (linkesoft.com)
- To-do and to-see lists gathered from various web sites
- An accurate exchange rate database from oanda.com
- Our travelogues (written on the palm with the keyboard)
- Conversion tables, games, reminders etc.

Whilst on the road, we will make full-backups of the Palm on regular basis on 2 Smart Media cards, each stored in a back pack.
Important information will be stored on the web site every time possible.

Luggage security:
To protect our backpacks we have:
- combination locks (se that we can never lose the key!)
- cable with motion alarm (same as used to laptops)
- tie raps (in addition to the locks, just to make sure that no one opens your lock, steals stuff and then closes back the lock...)
- super long tie raps to tie the backpacks together when on top of the bus (so that the smart-ass looks really smart when 2 or 3 backpacks turn out attached to the one he wanted to nick)
- strong, thick and big safety pins to lock the outside pockets of our day-pack: easy, cheep and super practical (specially that you can always use the pins for a million other things!)

When on the move and confined to the comfort (yeah, right!) of our train, plane or bus, we will place our back packs in a flight bag, locked with plastic tie-raps (do think about taking something to open the tie raps once at the airport, as pocket knifes are a definite no-no these days. We are taking a super small nail trimmer, without the pointy pit)