Travelers' Intercom

While in Copenhagen, Aug. 2, 2007, we noticed in the throwaway monthly guide called What’s Going On a small mention of a walking tour entitled “Jews in Copenhagen.” We called the number and arranged to meet the guide, Gitta Bechshoft (phone [+45] 40 81 12 17 or visit www.copenhagen-walkingtours.dk), in 30 minutes.

Gitta is fluent in English, Hebrew and Danish. She lived for six years in Berkeley, California, and for a number of years in Israel. She is a certified guide but not a travel agent. She gives many tours, and the one we got — an introduction to the history of Jews in...

Rome’s Termini is a rather lovely train station. Really! It once was awful, but now it’s rather fine.

I first visited the station about 10 years ago, on a rainy January day. On the Eurostar Italia, my companion and I arrived at the dirty station, where litter gathered in doorways and on the tracks. I needed a coffee, but there seemed to be no open cafés. Everything was shuttered. Suspicious characters with scruffy beards followed us with their eyes.

I walked along the grimy platform to the ladies’ room, where I opened the toilet stall door to find a hole in the floor rather...

My wife and I visited Argentina in August ’07. Upon our arrival at Buenos Aires’ airport, in nearby Ezeiza, we passed through Immigration into the baggage-claim area and went to a money-exchange kiosk run by Global Exchange (www.globalexchange.es). Since we needed money for transportation to our hotel, we exchanged $300 into pesos and received an exchange rate of 2.77.

After collecting our luggage, we made our way to the arrivals hall taxi kiosk and paid with a 100-peso bill, which was accepted without any problem.

The following morning we attempted a financial transaction...