Passport
00:00:00.000 | Hello everybody, it's Sam and Cindy from the Financial Samurai podcast.
00:00:04.440 | And in this episode, we want to do a catch up and talk about your trip to Japan, when
00:00:09.880 | things go wrong, what do we do, where you're at now.
00:00:13.400 | And also I do want to talk about what people expect to have to need in retirement versus
00:00:20.560 | actually what they have, because this conundrum is huge and the gap between what they have
00:00:26.480 | and what they expect to have and what they have at various ages has not really changed.
00:00:32.160 | The gap has continued to remain really wide.
00:00:35.640 | So first of all, Cindy, how are you feeling about your trip to Japan?
00:00:39.800 | I haven't gone yet.
00:00:41.120 | It's just getting closer.
00:00:42.640 | I wrote a post a couple of months ago that we published earlier in the month, this month,
00:00:49.480 | about this big passport debacle that I had.
00:00:54.920 | Just to summarize, my mom is trying to work through some estate issues with her late sister
00:01:03.440 | that I basically became project manager of because my mom didn't know what to do.
00:01:08.040 | And anyway, we planned a trip to go to Japan after my mom figured out that she wasn't able
00:01:16.440 | to go alone.
00:01:18.000 | And after I booked my flights, I realized that I couldn't find my passport because I
00:01:23.840 | needed to give your passport number and all this stuff.
00:01:27.200 | And I was like, "Wait a minute, where did it go?"
00:01:29.800 | And I was looking for it.
00:01:30.800 | I searched the house and then I started to have a panic attack that I couldn't find it
00:01:34.600 | because I'd recently renewed it over the winter and it just didn't make any sense.
00:01:39.840 | And then I started to have this sinking feeling that I accidentally could have thrown it away
00:01:47.360 | inside those priority mail envelopes that they typically come in.
00:01:51.400 | Why would you do that?
00:01:52.400 | Why would I do that because I've got too many things going on in my head and made a careless
00:01:56.480 | mistake?
00:01:57.480 | Either that or maybe one of the many workers that was coming through our house over the
00:02:01.840 | winter may have seen it when I wasn't in the room.
00:02:06.560 | If they were poking around, we had a lot of people coming in and out doing some repairs.
00:02:12.440 | Maybe it got stolen.
00:02:13.660 | At the end of the day, I don't know what happened to it, but it was gone.
00:02:16.840 | So I had to figure out a replacement plan.
00:02:21.080 | And passport applications and renewals have shot up after COVID kind of died down and
00:02:29.000 | people are ready to travel.
00:02:30.480 | They want to go abroad, get out there and have these adventures.
00:02:34.880 | And so the wait times, the processing time for passports is slow.
00:02:40.800 | And I realized I couldn't get an appointment to get my passport replaced because when you
00:02:45.840 | lose it or it's stolen, basically you have to start all over as if you're getting one
00:02:50.080 | for the first time.
00:02:51.860 | So I was facing all these roadblocks, couldn't get an appointment, had to figure out what
00:02:55.400 | I could do.
00:02:57.400 | In the end, I got it done, but it was one heck of a stressful experience.
00:03:02.840 | And how did you get it done though?
00:03:04.920 | Just give us like three steps.
00:03:06.600 | What did you do to get it in time to make it for this trip?
00:03:10.520 | Well, there weren't any available appointments in San Francisco for the next two months when
00:03:16.280 | I was looking and I needed to get it done ASAP.
00:03:19.600 | The soonest appointment I found was in Marin County somewhere, but that appointment was
00:03:23.880 | still three weeks out from the date I needed to start getting my application in and that
00:03:30.720 | wasn't going to really work either.
00:03:32.700 | So I was calling around, talking to as many people as I could and I found out that the
00:03:36.760 | San Francisco main post office does take walk-in appointments.
00:03:44.000 | But because of demand, they told me people start lining up as early as 5am, if not earlier,
00:03:52.640 | to get one of the few available walk-in appointment slots because they have already scheduled
00:04:00.000 | appointments at that location.
00:04:01.960 | So they're trying to have a few available walk-in slots that they can put in between
00:04:07.560 | all the scheduled ones.
00:04:11.080 | And I don't know, so much was going on and I was like, "How am I going to do this?"
00:04:14.720 | There's the kids at home.
00:04:16.040 | The kids at home, you do your work in the morning.
00:04:19.200 | What was the easiest way to make this work with the least amount of disruption to our
00:04:25.000 | daily day-to-day routines and whatnot?
00:04:29.400 | So I got an idea late one night.
00:04:32.160 | I was like, "You know what?
00:04:34.360 | TaskRabbit."
00:04:35.360 | And what is TaskRabbit?
00:04:36.960 | TaskRabbit is a company that people can join as freelancers to do all kinds of things to
00:04:46.840 | earn money themselves through gig work.
00:04:49.760 | And some examples are moving furniture for people, packing people's things, being a personal
00:04:56.960 | assistant, buying groceries, running errands, and waiting in line.
00:05:02.880 | That sounds crazy to a lot of people, but in my situation, hey, I was fortunate to have
00:05:11.240 | the means to be able to hire someone to wait in line outside in the cold early in the morning
00:05:16.880 | when I'm normally not awake.
00:05:20.440 | I'm at home waiting to take care of the kids first thing.
00:05:24.120 | I thought, "Hey, this could be a great idea."
00:05:27.400 | So I ended up hiring an experienced tasker who waits in line for all kinds of things
00:05:33.280 | for various people throughout San Francisco.
00:05:37.000 | And he was able to get there early enough to secure me a spot.
00:05:42.080 | I got there to meet him as soon as we got the kids taken care of in the morning and
00:05:47.360 | took his place in line, got my application in, and it got shipped off to DC that day.
00:05:54.360 | And then my application was in the system.
00:05:56.400 | So I was able to get it processed in time before my trip, which is coming up this week.
00:06:01.440 | Yeah.
00:06:02.440 | Well, I'm glad you got the trip done.
00:06:04.880 | It looks like it cost $134 for two and a half hours.
00:06:08.880 | So that includes tip.
00:06:10.240 | So about, I don't know, it sounds like it's like 40, $45 an hour plus tip.
00:06:15.640 | And in the end, it seemed like it was worth it because it bought you a position in line
00:06:20.760 | and it saved us money and we were able to get things done.
00:06:25.020 | So for those of you who are thinking, well, hmm, time is money.
00:06:29.080 | Well, this is literally time is money and you got to weigh the cost of buying back some
00:06:33.960 | of your time and freedom.
00:06:35.520 | And for those who want to make money on the side, I've been talking about gig work and
00:06:38.960 | side hustles for ever.
00:06:41.400 | I myself gave over 500 Uber rides to try to figure out the system when it was a more profitable
00:06:47.080 | endeavor.
00:06:48.840 | It is a way to earn side income money.
00:06:51.440 | If you need the side income money, there is literally an endless number of things you
00:06:56.380 | can do to make more money.
00:06:59.460 | To recap, Sydney, what would some pieces of advice be for you so that listeners don't
00:07:05.140 | go through what you went through?
00:07:07.300 | Yeah.
00:07:08.300 | I mean, first of all, I felt like a complete idiot about the whole thing.
00:07:12.980 | You know, I, I first of all, shouldn't have booked my flights without checking first to
00:07:17.500 | see if I had my passport.
00:07:19.300 | It was just a very unusual situation where we had to rebook my mom's existing flights
00:07:26.380 | and figure out when my sister and I could both go to accompany her.
00:07:30.060 | So we were all scrambling with little time.
00:07:33.260 | We weren't, you know, I wasn't thinking that clearly.
00:07:35.540 | I was in a rush.
00:07:36.540 | So definitely, if you know you need to travel internationally, get your passport in order
00:07:41.200 | well before you need to book your flights.
00:07:45.980 | And also utilize not only your local area to get passport appointments, but look beyond.
00:07:53.340 | You know, initially I was only thinking about San Francisco and it wasn't until a friend
00:07:57.020 | of mine said, "Hey, you know, when I had to do my passport stuff, I went over to Marin.
00:08:01.300 | It's not that far and they always have appointments."
00:08:04.020 | And even though I couldn't get an appointment as quickly as I wanted, I did have an appointment
00:08:09.460 | there as my plan B.
00:08:12.260 | So think outside the box, be aware that waiting times are long right now.
00:08:18.060 | They do change.
00:08:20.060 | And you can get all of the latest on the Department of State's website to figure out how their
00:08:25.240 | processing times are and all of the details that you need to get a renewal or to get a
00:08:31.620 | passport for the first time.
00:08:32.900 | And there's another benefit and that is the Navy SEAL saying, "Full benefit."
00:08:38.660 | And what does full benefit mean?
00:08:40.340 | Well, bad things, unfortunate things happen all the time.
00:08:44.980 | And the idea is, it comes from the thought process that every challenge we face is a
00:08:49.260 | chance to get better or to grow as a person.
00:08:52.780 | And not only that, the harder a challenge is, the more value it holds.
00:08:58.060 | So whatever you do in life, whether it is trying to start a family, finding a job, losing
00:09:04.100 | a job, competing in a recreational game or a sports tournament, whatever it is, you're
00:09:09.940 | going to face a lot of challenges.
00:09:12.140 | Starting this podcast or starting Financial Samurai, there are a lot of challenges, a
00:09:15.420 | lot of naysayers or no can do's.
00:09:17.980 | And so when you see adversity, instead of saying, "Oh, you're killing me, adversity.
00:09:21.700 | What bad luck?"
00:09:22.700 | You say, "Ah, full benefit."
00:09:24.660 | What are some of the things we can learn from this unfortunate event?
00:09:28.820 | I remember in college, it was a senior year, it was raining, storming at the College of
00:09:33.660 | William & Mary.
00:09:34.660 | I was in the computer lab at 10 p.m.
00:09:36.620 | I was finishing up my 20-page term paper, 20 pages, folks.
00:09:42.540 | And then the power vanished.
00:09:44.220 | And I said, "Oh my gosh, no."
00:09:47.980 | And then the power came back on.
00:09:49.460 | And I was like, "Okay, did it save?"
00:09:51.020 | And it didn't save one bit.
00:09:54.000 | So what did I do?
00:09:55.000 | Did I quit?
00:09:56.000 | Did I go back and soak?
00:09:57.340 | Did I go drink a milkshake or get a beer?
00:09:59.700 | Nope.
00:10:00.700 | I just sat in that chair for, I think, the next three hours after I had already been
00:10:05.860 | there for three hours to write an even better term paper.
00:10:10.380 | And I told myself, "This stinks, but I'm going to use this opportunity, full benefit,
00:10:16.100 | to get better and write a better paper."
00:10:18.420 | And that is what I did.
00:10:20.460 | What about you?
00:10:21.460 | Any other difficult times in your life where you thought, "Well, this stinks, but full
00:10:26.140 | benefit"?
00:10:27.140 | Yeah, I mean, all different sorts of things from, you know, family issues to getting into
00:10:34.340 | college to, you know, having to do a violin recital and forgetting my song on stage.
00:10:40.740 | You know, whatever it is, at whatever age you are, however big or small it may seem,
00:10:46.300 | if it's intense to you in that moment, do your best to take a step back.
00:10:52.620 | Think about the bigger picture and the opportunities that the challenge will teach you and enable
00:11:00.300 | you to, and ways it'll enable you to get better.
00:11:02.820 | Yeah, because if you're not making mistakes, if you're not failing, I don't know if you're
00:11:07.140 | really trying.
00:11:08.140 | Maybe you're just going through the motions and you wake up 20, 30 years later and wonder,
00:11:13.140 | what else?
00:11:14.140 | What happened?
00:11:15.140 | How come I'm not in a better position?
00:11:17.020 | So every single mistake, every single difficult time is a way to get better.
00:11:22.460 | Now, I know I said in the beginning of this podcast, we were going to talk about retirement
00:11:26.900 | and how much you need and all that, but let's save that for another episode.
00:11:30.060 | I think it'll be really good to get into the details there because a lot of you were really
00:11:35.100 | interested in the post that I wrote and it kind of went semi-viral and went all over
00:11:39.020 | Flipboard and stuff like that.
00:11:40.220 | So let's get into the details later.
00:11:41.940 | If you enjoyed this podcast episode, please share, subscribe, review, and keep in touch
00:11:49.380 | on financialsamurai.com/news.
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00:11:57.460 | Thanks so much.
00:11:58.460 | Bye.
00:11:58.460 | Bye!