This Is the 1 Thing You Should Always Travel With

There’s one item you should be stashing in your bag before every international flight, and it’s neither expensive nor cumbersome—but it could save you from a huge headache on your next trip. 

Enter the humble ballpoint pen. This handy writing utensil is an absolute must-have, especially on international flights, when you’ll have to go through immigration and customs.

Georgia Fowkes, a travel advisor for tour operator Altezza Travel, experienced this firsthand when she recently visited Tanzania. “I landed in Dar es Salaam after a red-eye, [with the] immigration hall packed and buzzing, all of us funneling off the plane, and by the time I reached the counter every pen was gone—dry, vanished, even the chained-up one,” Fowkes says. “There I was, holding up the line, with the rest of the no-pen folks, waiting for my turn to borrow one. Not my finest travel moment.”

Fowkes’s experience isn’t unique. Many countries still have paper customs and immigration forms that travelers are required to fill out before entry. The hunt for pens can be stressful, especially in larger international airports that see significant numbers of people moving through each day. 

“People assume there will be pens waiting at immigration. Maybe, but with a few hundred passengers hitting the counter at once, those pens disappear fast,” Fowkes says. She adds that late-night arrivals present even more challenges. “Sometimes I land at odd hours, like 2 a.m. or 3 a.m., when even asking to borrow one isn’t really an option.”

Instead of relying on an external supply of pens, Fowkes always has a couple of her own. Plus, she brings along an extra just in case someone else may need to borrow a pen. “Pull a spare pen out of your pocket at 35,000 feet and people look at you like you’ve just invented fire,” Fowkes says. “In that moment, a pen is social currency at 35,000 feet.”

And as for what kind of pen to bring, she says she always goes for basic, nonmetal pens. Fancy metallic pens or fountain pens can sometimes cause issues with airport security. Additionally, you should opt for basic ink colors rather than bright, eye-catching hues.

“I stick to cheap plastic, blue or black only—anything else and you risk being told to rewrite the whole form, if the ink looks doubtful,” says Fowkes. 

However, there are many instances beyond immigration paperwork when a pen could come in handy during your travels. Erin Carey, founder and director of Roam Generation, a public relations agency specializing in travel and lifestyle brand clients, explains that she always brings a pen as backup in case her phone dies. 

“What if your phone goes flat and you need to jot down an address or a phone number, or you meet someone you’d like to reach out to again, and you need to get their email address?” says Carey. “Maybe you need to have something written in a local language to show a taxi driver, or you lose your luggage and want to fill out a form for that.”

There are many surprising things that could happen during a trip—and you’ll be all the more prepared for them with a pen at your side.