Do you count connecting flights as has been in the country?

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>>1173172
No, with one exception. I have a goal to see how many countries I can fly a kite in, and carry some miniature kites to fly in airport concourses to "add a country." For that limited purpose, I think it counts.

So I have flown a kite in Germany, at the airport in Frankfurt. But I would not day I have traveled to Germany.

>>1173175
Wow that's pretty cool man

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>>1173182
Everybody needs a hobby.

>>1173172
>Do you count connecting flights as has been in the country?
Not typically, no, but I don't care if other people do. Airports do sometimes have local distinguishing features--local foodstuffs, etc.
>If not, where does the limit go for telling people you've been to the country?
I'd usually say staying overnight, but I'd also count anywhere I've gotten out of the airport and had some kind of experience--consuming something, doing something, seeing a sight.

So I would have once said that I'd visited Korea, since I took a half-day tour while on a long layover at Incheon some years back (although I've since been back for real). And I

I had a flight at from Belize City to Miami and the flight was delayed so much that I missed my connecting flight to Toronto. The airline put me up in a hotel for the night and got on my way back home the following morning.

While I left the airport and stayed overnight somewhere else I don't really consider myself to have been in Miami because around most international airports it's pretty much the same: terminals, highways, parking lots, and hotels. If it wasn't for some visible palm trees the outside of the airport looked near identical to Toronto.

So I don't know really where I'd draw the line. Maybe I'd have to spend some time outside of the greater airport area?

>>1173172
Nah.

I mean, the very least is to hear the local language spoken by people outside of international areas, sample some local foods and see a little bit of the culture.

I consider at least 3 days is the bare minimum to say that you've been to a region/city, maybe a country if it's small (like Slovenia).

I went to Miami for a week, I don't say I visited the US, or even Florida, for instance. I just went to Miami.

It reminds me I really need to visit the rest of this fucking country.

>>1173172
I say yes just based on the fact that I was physically there but I cant exactly tell you that i've got an authentic experience from that country though

No. I also don't count just driving through a state as actually being there.

I had never really thought about this until recently, as I wasn't really keeping score on how many places I have visited. I had a friend ask me how many countries had I been to?

Not that easy to answer, I landed on Fiji but never got out of the plane. I have spent about ten hours in the airport in Japan but not left the airport. I went to St. Martin, which is a colony half French and half Dutch. How do you count that?

Anyway, just for the discussion, because it really doesn't matter, I am going to say, if you don't get out of the plane and put boots on the ground, it doesn't count.

If you are on the ground, even in the airport you can count it, (although you are not really experiencing the place). If you died of a heart attack, your death cert would say you died in the that country.

If you go someplace unique, like Virgin Islands, count that separately even if it belongs to a larger country.

I had a college professor who said that if you can get arrested in the country you're in, you can claim to have been there. So airports count.

>>1173395
By that metric, ambassadors have never been anywhere.

It depends on the country, how long your connection is, and what you do with that time.

If your connection is in Zurich over the course of 14 hours, and in that time you visit Lucerne, a museum, check out Uetliberg, or something like that you could say you've visited Switzerland. However if you just sit in the airport, maybe take a tram to get some food in town, of course that's not the same. And with large, varied nations like China, Russia, the US or Brazil there's no chance

I count it if the country says I have been there. So if I get a stamp, and walk out of the airport, even for only a few hours, it counts. Transiting without leaving the airport doesn't.

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>>1173909
This, really.

Are there any airports anywhere that contain must-see landmarks?

>>1173891
Well with the quality of diplomats these days...

>>1173909
I left the airport and walked around Dubai and Singapore, so I say that I've been there even though I only spent a couple of hours in each

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>>1173934
Not that I know of, but some do have some cool stuff. I always go by and salute the Brachiosaur in O'Hare... And there's a sushi place in Narita that I really like.

>>1173172
Did you leave the sterile zone of the airport and set foot outside of airport property? If not then you did not visit.

I purposely took a 23 hours layover in Taiwan so I can see it for a day. So Yea. I'll count it in my book