Around and Round We Go

In the government’s and company’s eyes, If you guys are coming here for a little while, that means there’s no need for a long term phone number. It is either too burdensome or costly to them. Nonetheless, you most likely won’t be able to sign up for calling. HOWEVER, that doesn’t mean you can’t make calls on your phone. I will show you some ways.

First step: downloading apps while at home:

When you begin traveling, you will realize that a lot of people don’t use their phone service to make calls, they use apps to make calls. The phone number is connected to an app. It syncs the contact and the contacts with the app can now call or contact each other. All you need to do is set up an account BEFORE you leave the country. Once you don’t have service for verification, you are logged out of the app. Here are a few apps that are commonly used

1. Google Voice – you will get a new number when you create one, but as long you have internet/wifi with good service you can make as many calls to your home country for free because your google account is from there.
2. Whatsapp – that is the next common app amongst Europeans, Africans, and South American countries.
3. Line – Line is more commonly used among Asian countries, but you can find a few from the others.
4. KakaoTalk- If you are going to Korea, save yourself the trouble and download the app. Majority of people in Korea used Kakao in a lot of way. Kakaotalk, KakaoMaps, Kakaopay, etc.
5. Telegram – I heard but I never used, so I can’t attest to that.
6. Facebook Messenger – If you have a Meta of Facebook account, it will probably be the easiest to set up out of the list.

Second step: getting Internet

You download the apps and you are on your way, now what next. You travel using data. Here are the list of ways to get internet

1. Buy data at the airport- Depending on the company, you will get a pocket wifi, data SIM card, data ESIM code, or an actual phone. This is the most expensive option that has a time constraint. If immigration is long or your flight is delay, you might not be able to pick it up. Some give the option to ship to the hotel, but that is far few in between.
2. Wifi ESIM apps
   • Airlo – I still use currently. It is pretty good. Every now and again when I renew my ESIM. I have to delete the ESIM and download again. One of the cheapest option. Buy all the data with expiration date at one time. I typically buy 10GB for 30 days.
   • Holafly -It comes up frequent as a competitor, but I haven’t used it yet. It is supposed to give unlimited data at 6.90/day. It gets slight discount, but I don’t recommend it if you are trying to watch your budget. Longer you stay, the easier it is to go with airlo.
   • Maya – falls under the same category, but cheaper.
3. International Addition to your regular plan- This can work and this will allow you to keep everything on one service. Most like ATT and Verizon for this reason. I don’t recommend because of my bad experience, but others will attest so you your discretion. It can cost $10 – 20 to add that fee or you can get the international pass which can cost you around 100 for 7 days.

Optional step: wifi-calling

If you have data sim and switch it to be cellular primary, you can receive calls and text from people on your regular phone number. However, calling from there is a different ball game. It can be blocked. Text I say work well with data, but wifi is the best way for the calls and text to go through.