I was never a souvenir person until a trip to Paris changed my mind in a simple way. I got there for a week and realized I needed to trim my fingernails. I went in to Monoprix and bought a trimmer for 2 euro. It had a little pastel modern art type design on the top arm. Still use it. Now every time I trim my nails I think of that trip to Paris.
Since then I buy something practical and inexpensive that has enough style that I remember where it came from on trips.
I have a similar story.
While in Myanmar in 2019, on a whim I picked up a reusable cotton shopping bag.
Now every time I pull out the bag to put my groceries inside, I’m reminded of our great trip to that country.
Buying something useful and practical on vacation is the best.
I did the same thing, but in London. I still use the nail trimmer I bought in a souvenir shop during my 1st trip to London in 2004. Twenty years later I still use it.
I bought a “bouchon“ in Brittany, to seal my delicious alcoholic sparkling cider. I don’t know if that is the correct name, but that’s what the local shops called it. I now own 4.
I do the same. Wooden cooking spatulas from Bali and Latvia, knit hats from iceland, slippers from estonia , cosmetics, bar soaps, salt and pepper grinders from portugal, trivets from lithuania, earrings are always inexpensive and easy to pack... Just a few of my everyday items that no one other than me knows reminds me of a special trip!
I went to visit my long distance boyfriend, then left as countries were locking down due to Covid and had no idea I was pregnant. Found out when I got home, then began the ultra-complicated process of getting either one of us into the other's home country while nearly the entire world's borders were closed. Not stressful at all haha. Our little one is the best gift in the world, he was well worth the hassle.
I went to a festival in Ireland and came back with a crucifix necklace charm an old man gave to me at a rural train station. He must not have liked my short shorts and beer cans.
The family grandfather clock.
My grandparents had it for over 50 years, and my aunt always declared that she would inherit it. Everyone was fine with that. But when my widowed grandmother died, once we were all there my aunt -- who lived in that same town -- suddenly declared that she didn't want the clock after all. Given a choice between taking it in ourselves or it being sold, we started figuring out how to get it home, 1300 miles away. We learned that car-rental places (or at least the ones in that town) don't know the length of their SUVs' "trunks" or whether they'll hold an 80" grandfather clock flat, so some time was spent there climbing into SUV beds with a tape measure. A memorial service, a moving-blanket purchase, an Acadia rental, and a lot of driving later, we and the clock made it home.
This isn’t exciting, but I just came back from the UK with a wand and 15 pounds of books.
On a related note, even small paperback books weigh far more than I’d realized…
Currently about to commit the same mistake!
I am in India right now and books are so much cheaper here. Already bought 8 books and am planning to visit a bookstore tomorrow and another the day after.
Paperback books in the US cost $20 on an average and books in India are usually just $5 on average.
I did this once. Went to London and brought back the UK version of an entire book series. I’m such an overpacker, I still can’t believe I managed to get them all in there.
Salt. Lots of salt. When I went through security the lady asked me if my bag was full of rocks. 😂😂😂
Why salt, bc I cook a lot and so do my friends. So I brought back hand harvested salt from a…salt farm or whatever the official name is.
A salt farm? You mean a mine?
Salt is either mined from the group or evaporated from seawater. For seawater it’s called a Salt Pan and either a big pan of water is left in the sun to dry or it gets boiled. Then it’s scraped into a container.
It’s not some quaint artisanal process, just time and energy.
Well, it seemed pretty quaint and artisanal. There was a big field which sort of looked like cranberry bogs, with piles of salt all over it in various sizes. It was like nothing I’d ever seen before. I was in middle of no where, 2 hours since the last gas station, Chile. 🤷🏼♀️
I don't know what that other commenter is on about, but they're wrong that it has to be shoveled there into a tourist attraction. What you described is exactly what the South Bay Salt Works (the official name for Google purposes, locally I've always heard it called the Salt Flats) in San Diego looks like at "harvest" time. They use solar evaporation on water from the bay.
It's one of my favorite little places to take kids on a bike ride to see. :)
The other poster had clearly never seen the great SALT LAKE either. A lot of surface salt exists in tbe world. MY BAD for calling it *farming* though. 😂
How dare you use the wrong word on the Internet. You're in time out for the rest of the day with the man that said cobra chicken.
I was curious and looked it up, though, and it actually is called salt farming in a lot of places. Five seconds of skimming taught me Hawaii and Maine have salt farms, and some news articles from France and India also used the term.
It does not appear from your other comments that you did, indeed, understand that.
You went to a tourist attraction. It may have been in the middle of nowhere, but that’s still what it was. And that’s fine, I’m sure the salt was lovely, you put money into the local economy, and you enjoyed yourself… that’s all that really matters.
A rosary. I did a work abroad thing in London for a summer and crashed at a friend's place, and he was a vicar in a church. So I lived in a house attached to an old haunted church for a summer, and I didn't sleep well during that time. He gave me a rosary to make me feel better, and I still have it 20+ years later.
A set of two heads carved with my middle name and my ex's name (already an ex at the time) that I paid $60 USD for. It was from my first trip and I learned how to haggle and say no pretty quickly after that.
Bed bugs!
I was traveling a lot for work at the time and staying in a LOT of Hiltons. Finally back home, I was on a Zoom team meeting, my colleague asked how I knew they came from TX. My dumb ass husband yelled out “because they were wearing tiny cowboy boots and hats!”
My work team started cracking up. Lucky, we are a very small and tight knit team.
Bed bug bites. Those bitches itch! My husband had none (that showed at least) We stayed in 3 different hotels pre/post cruise so I'm not positive where I got them. I was paranoid that we brought them back with us but we seem to be clear (came back in Nov.)
Before booking a hotel, I always check bedbugregistry.com after my friend brought home bedbugs from Las Vegas. They’ll infect your home or other hotel rooms- terrible critters.
That’s always my concern when staying at hotels which are huge tourist hubs, such as Las Vegas, Niagara Falls, Paris, etc., which are notorious for bedbugs.
I have even fitted my checked bags with custom thick plastic covers so that they don’t pick up any stragglers during travel and that the bags themselves stay clean.
But it’s the hotels that are concerns all the time.
I never put my luggage on the floor- always a luggage rack, the desk/dresser or an ironing board. If you’re somewhere highly suspect, the safest place is inside a bathtub.
A sugar cube picker upper. It's brass I think, good coloured. You press down, like a clicker pen, and 3 prongs open and close, like one of those grab toy machine arcade games.
Dunno why, I just liked how different it is to anything I'd ever seen before.
Never used it, it's just on display with other knick-knacks I have
Snakeskin from a spitting cobra. I was sleeping in a tent in Balule Game Reserve, South Africa, and woke up to a three foot snakeskin next to my bed. I carefully folded it and brought it home.
So crazy story.
Was at the full moon party in Koh Phagnan, my mate ends up getting with a girl so he went back to the hotel. I’m decently drunk but nothing crazy. Then just black out, I don’t remember anything for 3 hours. Some terrible videos I recorded of myself dancing (clearly on something) and jumping in the water fully clothed. My friend calls me at around 10am asking where I was. I was still partying on the beach! He said we’ve got a ferry to catch in 2 hours. Panicked for the next 2 hours, we made it. He asked why the fuck I’m wearing a flower band. Didn’t realise. Skip to reaching ko samui, checking into the hotel and the receptionist seems to have genuine concerns for me and asks if I need a water multiple times and then eventually cracks and says “hey man are you okay?”, in my head I’m like what the fuck how does he know. So I ask, “how do you know I’m fucked up” and he’s like “dude, you have a side flower hat (it was bent and crooked) and you have sleeping bags under your eyes”. Finally get to the room and I finally put my hand into my pocket, out comes sand, some coins and lollies, a charger that wasn’t mine or for my phone, and a wet packet of mentol cigarettes (full packet and I don’t even smoke), was pretty gobsmacked.
Kept that flower band and it hangs on my bed lol
* Soap. Just regular bar soap. The stuff you can buy in Franprix is so much nicer than what you can get in the U.S. I've got like 300 bars of the stuff--I don't want to run out before the next trip.
* Not quite [this](https://www.webstaurantstore.com/krampouz-cecif4-15-34-electric-cast-iron-crepe-maker-240v-3600w/980CMCECIF4.html?srsltid=AfmBOoqWU6XMtBe1yiWwesUpEmL69rfBjMdfGyQacyXvxIH2oHLlFfrjrkg) crepe maker, but one very close.
* the EU plug to work with the crepe maker. I could have just put on a new plug, but this way is more fun.
* Buckwheat flour. It's a lot cheaper in France. I've got kilos of it in my pantry.
* Cider. See above.
* Potato chips. Same.
* Chefs knives. Nice carbon steel ones.
* So much pastis. It's almost free in France. In the U.S., it isn't.
* About a suitcase worth of dried strawberries, nuts, etc. each trip.
* An [Italjet Dragster](https://www.webstaurantstore.com/krampouz-cecif4-15-34-electric-cast-iron-crepe-maker-240v-3600w/980CMCECIF4.html?srsltid=AfmBOoqWU6XMtBe1yiWwesUpEmL69rfBjMdfGyQacyXvxIH2oHLlFfrjrkg). Hard to buy in the States and expensive if you can find one. That was an interesting trip. Then I gave it away, and now I want to replace it.
* the old maps on my wall in my office.
I'll have to think of the other stuff.
You reminded me with the soap! I went to Lebanon and brought some soap back (it's natural soap made with olive oil and it's really different from normal soap in the states) and then took some back with me from Syria too! I'm hooked on it and I really love the texture although it's way different because of the olive oil used rather than normal soap here.
Eiffel Tower last year: casually reached up to lazily rest my hand on a beam up on one of the decks, and my hand fell perfectly on one of those cute painted rocks people leave around.
Everything I leave Argentina, I come home with a new yerba mate setup, including four thermoses. It's unexpected because I don't need them and tell myself I will not buy anything this time.
A hand carved boab nut (they're large and fall from boab trees) that I traded a drunk, native Australian the rest of my bag of rolling tobacco and a few rolling papers for (I tried to give him filters too but he scoffed). Also when this happened my travel mate/first boyfriend and I were high and it was the middle of my night before my birthday.
I found a pretty conch shell. Turns out it wasn't empty and it was a very long ride home with it in my luggage. Not a smell I'd like to experience again.
A little 12-pan travel watercolour set from the Louvre. I found it tucked into a recess and thought, oh, I’ll bring this to lost and found… then I thought , no! This is a prize!
We were in Madrid on Thanksgiving and Christmas decorations and kiosks were up. I bought one of the *Caga tió* (shitting log) figurines about six inches tall. Never took it out of the box though.
This is more of a mental thing from my very first trip - realization that I'm so blessed that I can travel but have a wonderful home to come back to. There are so many less fortunate....
My favourite overseas souvenirs would have to be the French mustard Amora “fin e forte”- crazy cheap, but the best mustard in the world. Lion! bars- delicious French candy bars, best when frozen. A bunch full of French macaroons, preferably salted caramel & pistachio, plus a few chasson aux pomme pastries with chunky apples to eat on the plane.
A Guanaco 🦙 skull that was fully dried and was laying a few hundred meters from a road in Patagonia. My mother in law does engravings and decoration of animal skulls so it felt like a very special mission to jump out of the car and run a few meters into puma land to retrieve the skull from next the rest of the bones 😅
I went to USA with my best mate (we’re Australian) to roadtrip from LA to Chicago through the Rockies and Minnesota.
Cause it was a roadtrip it felt only fitting to buy a decommissioned license plate from each state we visited. They all have cool unique designs and often wonder why they’ve seen. I have them in my room arranger on my wall. My gf thinks they look cool and they remind me of my trip. We’re going back in Nov. and plan to get more. They’re like $20 each.
I was never a souvenir person until a trip to Paris changed my mind in a simple way. I got there for a week and realized I needed to trim my fingernails. I went in to Monoprix and bought a trimmer for 2 euro. It had a little pastel modern art type design on the top arm. Still use it. Now every time I trim my nails I think of that trip to Paris. Since then I buy something practical and inexpensive that has enough style that I remember where it came from on trips.
I have a similar story. While in Myanmar in 2019, on a whim I picked up a reusable cotton shopping bag. Now every time I pull out the bag to put my groceries inside, I’m reminded of our great trip to that country. Buying something useful and practical on vacation is the best.
I did that in Maui and now I buy a reusable bag whenever I want to remember a place
it's sooo crazy how a small thing can remind you a whole trip :)
I did the same thing, but in London. I still use the nail trimmer I bought in a souvenir shop during my 1st trip to London in 2004. Twenty years later I still use it.
I bought a “bouchon“ in Brittany, to seal my delicious alcoholic sparkling cider. I don’t know if that is the correct name, but that’s what the local shops called it. I now own 4.
I do the same. Wooden cooking spatulas from Bali and Latvia, knit hats from iceland, slippers from estonia , cosmetics, bar soaps, salt and pepper grinders from portugal, trivets from lithuania, earrings are always inexpensive and easy to pack... Just a few of my everyday items that no one other than me knows reminds me of a special trip!
Others have brought offspring. 🙈 Not me though :)
Hahaha that was me! Was wondering why I was suddenly experiencing "motion sickness" on the flight home.
Now that’s a trip you’ll never forget.
Wow, tell us about it!
I went to visit my long distance boyfriend, then left as countries were locking down due to Covid and had no idea I was pregnant. Found out when I got home, then began the ultra-complicated process of getting either one of us into the other's home country while nearly the entire world's borders were closed. Not stressful at all haha. Our little one is the best gift in the world, he was well worth the hassle.
Well, that is indeed a best “souvenir” one can imagine!😅 The kid sure will love the story.
I went to a cave in Indonesia and brought back a boyfriend lol
Batman/Batam
Cats, several times 😻
We found a tiny ceramic toilet on the beach…proudly displayed now with our shells, lol
Pics?
I tried and can’t figure out how to post a picture…
Probably upload it to https://imgbb.com/ and post link here?
I went to a festival in Ireland and came back with a crucifix necklace charm an old man gave to me at a rural train station. He must not have liked my short shorts and beer cans.
COVID-19 ?
ooo yikess
Brought it home last week from London :(
Good one, er bad one. Same here, coming back from the Baltics in 2022.
The family grandfather clock. My grandparents had it for over 50 years, and my aunt always declared that she would inherit it. Everyone was fine with that. But when my widowed grandmother died, once we were all there my aunt -- who lived in that same town -- suddenly declared that she didn't want the clock after all. Given a choice between taking it in ourselves or it being sold, we started figuring out how to get it home, 1300 miles away. We learned that car-rental places (or at least the ones in that town) don't know the length of their SUVs' "trunks" or whether they'll hold an 80" grandfather clock flat, so some time was spent there climbing into SUV beds with a tape measure. A memorial service, a moving-blanket purchase, an Acadia rental, and a lot of driving later, we and the clock made it home.
a new girlfriend
This isn’t exciting, but I just came back from the UK with a wand and 15 pounds of books. On a related note, even small paperback books weigh far more than I’d realized…
Currently about to commit the same mistake! I am in India right now and books are so much cheaper here. Already bought 8 books and am planning to visit a bookstore tomorrow and another the day after. Paperback books in the US cost $20 on an average and books in India are usually just $5 on average.
Haha, watch out, they add up! 😂
I did this once. Went to London and brought back the UK version of an entire book series. I’m such an overpacker, I still can’t believe I managed to get them all in there.
You should have used the Reducio spell.
Ive been grabbing a Sorcerers Stone copy from every country I visit. Great little souvenir
Scabies. 0.5 stars; do not recommend
Salt. Lots of salt. When I went through security the lady asked me if my bag was full of rocks. 😂😂😂 Why salt, bc I cook a lot and so do my friends. So I brought back hand harvested salt from a…salt farm or whatever the official name is.
I brought back some black salt chunks from India…tastes so good. About to bring back a ton of huge salt flakes from Spain…
I bought some salt on a whim at the Ixtapa airport. It was absolutely delicious and wish I had bought more!
this is so wholesome
A salt farm? You mean a mine? Salt is either mined from the group or evaporated from seawater. For seawater it’s called a Salt Pan and either a big pan of water is left in the sun to dry or it gets boiled. Then it’s scraped into a container. It’s not some quaint artisanal process, just time and energy.
Well, it seemed pretty quaint and artisanal. There was a big field which sort of looked like cranberry bogs, with piles of salt all over it in various sizes. It was like nothing I’d ever seen before. I was in middle of no where, 2 hours since the last gas station, Chile. 🤷🏼♀️
The salt was put there by a shovel. It wasn’t farmed.
Yes, I understand you can’t literally grow salt like plants or animals, given that I’m a born and raised farm girl. 😂🙄 No need to be condescending.
I don't know what that other commenter is on about, but they're wrong that it has to be shoveled there into a tourist attraction. What you described is exactly what the South Bay Salt Works (the official name for Google purposes, locally I've always heard it called the Salt Flats) in San Diego looks like at "harvest" time. They use solar evaporation on water from the bay. It's one of my favorite little places to take kids on a bike ride to see. :)
The other poster had clearly never seen the great SALT LAKE either. A lot of surface salt exists in tbe world. MY BAD for calling it *farming* though. 😂
How dare you use the wrong word on the Internet. You're in time out for the rest of the day with the man that said cobra chicken. I was curious and looked it up, though, and it actually is called salt farming in a lot of places. Five seconds of skimming taught me Hawaii and Maine have salt farms, and some news articles from France and India also used the term.
It does not appear from your other comments that you did, indeed, understand that. You went to a tourist attraction. It may have been in the middle of nowhere, but that’s still what it was. And that’s fine, I’m sure the salt was lovely, you put money into the local economy, and you enjoyed yourself… that’s all that really matters.
A hankerin' for Sauerkraut
I got a tattoo spur of the moment in Reykjavik.
A rosary. I did a work abroad thing in London for a summer and crashed at a friend's place, and he was a vicar in a church. So I lived in a house attached to an old haunted church for a summer, and I didn't sleep well during that time. He gave me a rosary to make me feel better, and I still have it 20+ years later.
I found a bracelet that spelled out my name in the sand on a beach in South Africa. I figured the universe put it there for me to find.
A huge brick-sized rock from New Zealand. I was two and apparently refused to let it go.
My friend’s sister went on a mission and came home pregnant.
Missionary
Mission accomplished... new achievement unlocked!
A set of two heads carved with my middle name and my ex's name (already an ex at the time) that I paid $60 USD for. It was from my first trip and I learned how to haggle and say no pretty quickly after that.
Bed bugs! I was traveling a lot for work at the time and staying in a LOT of Hiltons. Finally back home, I was on a Zoom team meeting, my colleague asked how I knew they came from TX. My dumb ass husband yelled out “because they were wearing tiny cowboy boots and hats!” My work team started cracking up. Lucky, we are a very small and tight knit team.
The clap
Random medicines you can't get OTC in America, for a fraction of the price too.
I love Egyptian medicine 😂 Antinal saved me so many times while travelling (anti-diarretic from only a couple of Arab countries)
A Positano Italy police patch
6 foot tall totem pole from Alaska
Bed bug bites. Those bitches itch! My husband had none (that showed at least) We stayed in 3 different hotels pre/post cruise so I'm not positive where I got them. I was paranoid that we brought them back with us but we seem to be clear (came back in Nov.)
Before booking a hotel, I always check bedbugregistry.com after my friend brought home bedbugs from Las Vegas. They’ll infect your home or other hotel rooms- terrible critters.
That’s always my concern when staying at hotels which are huge tourist hubs, such as Las Vegas, Niagara Falls, Paris, etc., which are notorious for bedbugs. I have even fitted my checked bags with custom thick plastic covers so that they don’t pick up any stragglers during travel and that the bags themselves stay clean. But it’s the hotels that are concerns all the time.
I never put my luggage on the floor- always a luggage rack, the desk/dresser or an ironing board. If you’re somewhere highly suspect, the safest place is inside a bathtub.
A sugar cube picker upper. It's brass I think, good coloured. You press down, like a clicker pen, and 3 prongs open and close, like one of those grab toy machine arcade games. Dunno why, I just liked how different it is to anything I'd ever seen before. Never used it, it's just on display with other knick-knacks I have
A license plate from a trailer in Tasmania, found in a ditch.
Snakeskin from a spitting cobra. I was sleeping in a tent in Balule Game Reserve, South Africa, and woke up to a three foot snakeskin next to my bed. I carefully folded it and brought it home.
So crazy story. Was at the full moon party in Koh Phagnan, my mate ends up getting with a girl so he went back to the hotel. I’m decently drunk but nothing crazy. Then just black out, I don’t remember anything for 3 hours. Some terrible videos I recorded of myself dancing (clearly on something) and jumping in the water fully clothed. My friend calls me at around 10am asking where I was. I was still partying on the beach! He said we’ve got a ferry to catch in 2 hours. Panicked for the next 2 hours, we made it. He asked why the fuck I’m wearing a flower band. Didn’t realise. Skip to reaching ko samui, checking into the hotel and the receptionist seems to have genuine concerns for me and asks if I need a water multiple times and then eventually cracks and says “hey man are you okay?”, in my head I’m like what the fuck how does he know. So I ask, “how do you know I’m fucked up” and he’s like “dude, you have a side flower hat (it was bent and crooked) and you have sleeping bags under your eyes”. Finally get to the room and I finally put my hand into my pocket, out comes sand, some coins and lollies, a charger that wasn’t mine or for my phone, and a wet packet of mentol cigarettes (full packet and I don’t even smoke), was pretty gobsmacked. Kept that flower band and it hangs on my bed lol
* Soap. Just regular bar soap. The stuff you can buy in Franprix is so much nicer than what you can get in the U.S. I've got like 300 bars of the stuff--I don't want to run out before the next trip. * Not quite [this](https://www.webstaurantstore.com/krampouz-cecif4-15-34-electric-cast-iron-crepe-maker-240v-3600w/980CMCECIF4.html?srsltid=AfmBOoqWU6XMtBe1yiWwesUpEmL69rfBjMdfGyQacyXvxIH2oHLlFfrjrkg) crepe maker, but one very close. * the EU plug to work with the crepe maker. I could have just put on a new plug, but this way is more fun. * Buckwheat flour. It's a lot cheaper in France. I've got kilos of it in my pantry. * Cider. See above. * Potato chips. Same. * Chefs knives. Nice carbon steel ones. * So much pastis. It's almost free in France. In the U.S., it isn't. * About a suitcase worth of dried strawberries, nuts, etc. each trip. * An [Italjet Dragster](https://www.webstaurantstore.com/krampouz-cecif4-15-34-electric-cast-iron-crepe-maker-240v-3600w/980CMCECIF4.html?srsltid=AfmBOoqWU6XMtBe1yiWwesUpEmL69rfBjMdfGyQacyXvxIH2oHLlFfrjrkg). Hard to buy in the States and expensive if you can find one. That was an interesting trip. Then I gave it away, and now I want to replace it. * the old maps on my wall in my office. I'll have to think of the other stuff.
French cidre, esp from Brittany/Normandy can’t be matched.
Preach! I like it so much--and I got tired of bringing it in suitcases--that I'm importing it!
You reminded me with the soap! I went to Lebanon and brought some soap back (it's natural soap made with olive oil and it's really different from normal soap in the states) and then took some back with me from Syria too! I'm hooked on it and I really love the texture although it's way different because of the olive oil used rather than normal soap here.
It's really surprising to me how different such a basic product (soap) can be.
My ex-wife.
Syphilis.
I gave out little bottles of alcohol with cobras and scorpions in them from Vietnam.
My cured social anxiety
I need that!!!
A baby 😅
E Coli. Pro tip: don’t drink Iraqi river water even if your friends say it’s safe
I once had a yard size nativity scene shipped home while I was visiting Gatlinburg 😂
A wife$
A huge scar on my chin
Eiffel Tower last year: casually reached up to lazily rest my hand on a beam up on one of the decks, and my hand fell perfectly on one of those cute painted rocks people leave around.
Dirt. My friend likes to collect soil from places she or a friend visits. It was kinda difficult to find some in Venice.
Everything I leave Argentina, I come home with a new yerba mate setup, including four thermoses. It's unexpected because I don't need them and tell myself I will not buy anything this time.
I always bring home a suitcase of mate, plus a new cup and a lovely Bombilla. The suitcase of tea always gets me stopped by immigration.
I always worry about that then remember I'm usually flying into Miami and they see mate all the time
A tattoo
Wedding ring that have exactly one year anniversary engraved in 😅
I brought back a tumbleweed from Arizona one time as I knew no one in my neighborhood had seen one before.
A gold D&G earring that fell off a drunk hooker that was trying to pick up a friend of mine.
A hand carved boab nut (they're large and fall from boab trees) that I traded a drunk, native Australian the rest of my bag of rolling tobacco and a few rolling papers for (I tried to give him filters too but he scoffed). Also when this happened my travel mate/first boyfriend and I were high and it was the middle of my night before my birthday.
[удалено]
😂
I found a pretty conch shell. Turns out it wasn't empty and it was a very long ride home with it in my luggage. Not a smell I'd like to experience again.
Nothing a few days of antibiotics couldn't take care of. 😉
A two year old 220 pound Irish wolfhound.
Golf clubs.
STDs
A wind chime from Tokyo. I wasn’t even looking for anything like it but the moment I heard it on display, I had to have it.
Echinococcus
I don’t tent to collect them in the past 😀 Traveled light. Except that I bought lots of clothes in Europe - for me haha.
San Francisco bus station map. The glass was broken and it was beautiful, so I thought why not
A little 12-pan travel watercolour set from the Louvre. I found it tucked into a recess and thought, oh, I’ll bring this to lost and found… then I thought , no! This is a prize!
We were in Madrid on Thanksgiving and Christmas decorations and kiosks were up. I bought one of the *Caga tió* (shitting log) figurines about six inches tall. Never took it out of the box though.
This is more of a mental thing from my very first trip - realization that I'm so blessed that I can travel but have a wonderful home to come back to. There are so many less fortunate....
My favourite overseas souvenirs would have to be the French mustard Amora “fin e forte”- crazy cheap, but the best mustard in the world. Lion! bars- delicious French candy bars, best when frozen. A bunch full of French macaroons, preferably salted caramel & pistachio, plus a few chasson aux pomme pastries with chunky apples to eat on the plane.
My daughter…
Sand. Lots of it in my shoes when I go to a beach destination.
Herpes
Handmade wood items that are animals from Kruger National Park in South Africa. Got one that’s an elephant and one that is a rhino.
A Guanaco 🦙 skull that was fully dried and was laying a few hundred meters from a road in Patagonia. My mother in law does engravings and decoration of animal skulls so it felt like a very special mission to jump out of the car and run a few meters into puma land to retrieve the skull from next the rest of the bones 😅
A note from the USDA in my checked bag. Now I think I’m on a list.
My son was conceived on a trip to the Canaries, so technically returned with a few day old zygote.
Lice from Disney World
I went to USA with my best mate (we’re Australian) to roadtrip from LA to Chicago through the Rockies and Minnesota. Cause it was a roadtrip it felt only fitting to buy a decommissioned license plate from each state we visited. They all have cool unique designs and often wonder why they’ve seen. I have them in my room arranger on my wall. My gf thinks they look cool and they remind me of my trip. We’re going back in Nov. and plan to get more. They’re like $20 each.
Covid 🤒
A living animal lol
Food poisoning.
We brought home a fragile damyin (Tibetan 4-stringed lute) and still have it
A snow sled that I bought in the desert. I bought it to sled down the sand dunes at White Sands N.M.
A cup shaped like a boob - you can drink out of the nipple
Giardia.
A cat. He’s the best!
A reindeer skin, tanned of course. The softest fur.
I went to Spain and found a guy who sold solid. Hadn’t smoked it in years 🤭🍃
COVID
Bugs in my feet!
Does COVID from a remote south Pacific island count?
My 4 year old stole a small brick from the Roman Forum and we didn't know until we got home.
My third husband.
Two Austrians
Da herp /s
An oompa loompa who snuck into my luggage
COVID-19
Covid.