Choosing a Place to Travel based on Cost

Outline                                                                                

  1. Overvalued and undervalued currencies
  2. Ten common countries in the cheapest countries listings
  3. Least expensive destination in the Eastern Hemisphere
  4. Least expensive destination in the Western Hemisphere
  5. Safety Factor
  6. What do you think of the Leffel quote

Overvalued and undervalued currencies

Using the formula in the Big Mac Index interactive site, how much is the Big Mac overvalued in the most expensive country, and how much is it undervalued in the least expensive? Which countries would be the cheapest for travel, and which would be the most expensive based on this index?

The Big Mac helps to find how cheap it could be to live in a country comparing it to the price of a Big Mac meaning that the cheaper the Big Mac, the cheaper it is to travel to a destination. But the more expensive the Big Mac, then the more expensive it is to travel to a country. Countries like Egypt, Malaysia, Ukraine, Russia, Indonesia, Taiwan, Turkey are examples of countries that are cheaper to travel to while Switzerland, Sweden, Norway, Canada are the most expensive places to travel to.

On the other hand, talking of overvalued undervalued currency, we can see that the Switzerland currency is overvalued with a $ 6.54 for a Big Mac while Egypt is undervalued with a $ 1.75 for a Big Mac.

Ten common countries in the cheapest countries listings

Read the Leffel chapter and the other links provided to derive a list of the 10 cheapest countries for travel.

-          Egypt

-          South Korea

-          Ukraine

-          South Africa

-          Malaysia

-          Russia

-          Taiwan

-          Moldova

-          Argentina

-          Guatemala

Least expensive destination in the Eastern Hemisphere

From this list, the Big Mac Index and the most inexpensive airfares, find the least expensive destination in the eastern hemisphere for a three-week trip. What criteria did you use to select the country? Insert airfare graphic that shows how you would get to the country. Insert a graphic of an inexpensive lodging. What would be the total cost of the 3-week trip? (The idea here is that cheap lodging over three weeks will counter a more expensive airfare. So, look for the cheapest lodging and find a moderate airfare to that location.) Estimate daily food costs.

While Greece, Ukraine, Vietnam were some example listed in the reading as cheapest places to travel to, comparing prices and countries to which I could have traveled at a low cost, I finally opted for Madrid after conducting personal or additional research since it wasn’t listed in neither the big mac nor the reading Cheapest destination/Cheap places to Travel. And using Kayak I was able to get a low trip price to that destination. Plus I like Spain and hope will go there.

Living expenses in Madrid

-          Food, beverages, drinks $ 53.34 

-          https://www.expatistan.com/cost-of-living/madrid?currency=USD

-          Monthly ticket transport public $ 57

-          Hostel  https://www.hotels.com/ho739170496/?q-check-out=2019-03-26&FPQ=1&q-check-in=2019-03-04&WOE=2&WOD=1&q-room-0-children=0&pa=1&tab=description&JHR=5&q-room-0-adults=1&YGF=7&MGT=7&ZSX=0&SYE=3

Total: $ 1109.42

 

Least expensive destination in the Western Hemisphere

From this list, the Big Mac Index and the most inexpensive airfares, find the least expensive destination in the eastern hemisphere for a three-week trip. What criteria did you use to select the country? Insert airfare graphic that shows how you would get to the country. Insert a graphic of an inexpensive lodging. What would be the total cost of the 3-week trip? (The idea here is that cheap lodging over three weeks will counter a more expensive airfare. So, look for the cheapest lodging and find a moderate airfare to that location.) Estimate daily food costs.

To select a place I usually google it and see if it might interest me and I had selected El Salvador Brazil to look up Brazil was my first choice because I always wanted to visit but also because on the BigMac ranking even though it wasn’t the cheapest it wasn’t the most expensive either so I thought I could get a low price as for El Salvador since it wasn’t listed on that ranking neither was it in the Leffel chapter nor in the BigMac ranking. Therefore, I looked it up online to see if I could like it and it is a very beautiful places surrounding with beautiful sites. I also used the flights comparators such as Kayak and other travel sites to be able to find a cheap itinerary and the reading provided for this assignment also helped.

Living expenses in Salvador: https://www.expatistan.com/cost-of-living/country/el-salvador

-          Monthly ticket public transport $23

-          Food and Drink $33.94

-          El Salvador Hostel 8 dollars per night

http://www.hostels.com/hostels/san-salvador/hostal-cumbres-del-volcan-flor-blanca/267327?dateFrom=2019-06-29&dateTo=2019-07-13&guestCount=&groupType=#anchor=availability&

 

 

Total = $ 939.94

Safety Factor

Consider the safety factor in the destination you have chosen. Take a look the Global Peace Index rankings (A ranking of countries based on the Peace Index begins on p. 8.) Which country would be the safest? Where are the United States ranked? Where do your chosen countries rank?

Iceland seems to be the safest country in the world looking at the classification table which is followed by New Zealand while the most dangerous one is ranked as being Syria. I am not surprise of the United ranking. I have heard many people seeing the US as one of the Safest country but personally for the amount of crime committed and unsafe places were we shouldn’t hang to I strongly believe that it is not about a specific country every single country is dangerous the only difference is that those were there is war are exception and definitely more dangerous because of the situation but well those are the raking attributed to each country.

Spain rank 30 score 1.678

El Salvador rank 116 score 2.275

USA rank 121 score 2.3

 

What do you think of the Leffel quote:

"You'll learn far more than you ever did at a university.
Remember the old days when people got a liberal arts education? They went to Oxford or Princeton to learn about history, politics, social studies, geography, religion, foreign languages, and economics. Well you'll learn far more about all those things by traveling than you ever can in college. Ask anyone in their 30's how much they remember about these subjects from their university classes. "Not much" will usually sum it up."

This is in fact a powerful quote because as we might be aware not everyone is educated and not all the rich received an education but as for me as much as much as traveling is my passion, I value my education because I believe that education not only challenges our minds and then develop our brain faculties, it also is the power of the world whoever detain education even without money is actually the wealthiest person. I come from a family where many don’t have the opportunity to further their education and only when you see others deprived from what you are blessed on having is at that right instant that you realize the value of what you have. On the other side, I believe that while pursuing your education at a university develop your brain faculties, I believe that the street and travels develop your brain abilities by challenging you. This is what I love about the street and traveling. I’m from a poor family but I never considered myself poor though but growing up around children in my neighborhood we were creative we would use what the nature had to offer us make soccer ball out of socs or plastic bottle and many other things. Plus, for the couple of time I have traveled I realized something as much as you can claim to know a country just by reading or watching things on news, magazines or TV, being physically there make you realized that there are so much assumptions about countries around the world and you can only know by physically experiencing it. Traveling teaches you about the world, gives you experiences, challenges your ability to fit in different communities, speaking different languages and many more again and for my personal opinion, both are important and teaches you different things and combining the two of them gives you the key to the world. I might not be excellent in finding the cheapest flights, but it ever and never will prevent me of discovering the world.

Plus believe it or not traveling just makes you feel free, happy and everything we learn in a class room as Leffel quote said, history, geography, social studies and more are things that we definitely learn deeper when we travel and because we experience it. We tend to remember it way better than just sitting in a classroom and studying. I am more of an outgoing person than a sitting room person lol but still education is worth sitting in my classroom there is a sacrifice for anything we want or desire.

So, for my personal opinion and personal experience, I have learned a lot from my travels as well as from the university but those two are not comparable because each one has its own perception of things as for me I things both are very important in my personal life and each offers me different experiences that wouldn’t trade for nothing.

Submitted by [Krystel Audrey Sophie Sidiki Bolanga] on [February 23rd, 2019].