How To Navigate Your First Time Through An Airport

Now I'm going to be discussing what to do once you arrive at the airport. Make sure you arrive early. Now, the general rule is, if you are flying domestically within your own country, try to get to the airport 2 hours before your flight.

If you're going to go internationally, please try to arrive 3 hours before your flight. This will ensure that you have enough time to get your luggage tags, get your boarding pass, go through security, and find your gate. It's always better to have time to relax by your gate instead of spending most of your time at home and getting to the airport with not a lot of time.

When you arrive early to your flight, that is never wasted time. Once you arrive at the airport, the first thing you're going to want to do is get your boarding pass and drop off your check-in bag. Sometimes if you check in 24 hours in advance, the airline may give you your boarding pass, but most of the time, you're going to have to go to the kiosk or the counter.

If this is your first flight, I recommend just going straight to the counter so the people can help you if needed. If you do go to a kiosk, what you're going to do is take your passport or put your confirmation number in for your flight. You can either scan it or type it in, and what it's going to do is pull up your name and your flight.

You're just going to verify a few details. It will then print out your boarding pass, which I'll talk about in just a moment, and it's also going to print out a luggage tag. For the luggage tag, what you want to do is put that tag on your check-in bag, and there's usually some instructions on how to do it.

This luggage tag tells the airline where this luggage is supposed to end up. So, let's say I am in Los Angeles and I'm traveling to Japan, and I have a layover in Hawaii. This luggage tag will say, "Don't end up in Hawaii; end up in Japan.

" If you've ever seen Toy Story 2, then you'll see how complicated it is for the luggage to get to the correct plane. So, also, Toy Story 2 is just a good movie; Toy Story 1's kind of scary. After you get your boarding pass and your luggage tag, you're going to then go to the front of the counter and drop off your bag.

You're going to hand it to the nice people, and then they will do their thing. Keep with you your carry-on bag and your personal item. If there is no kiosk option, just stand in line to get to the counter.

The people there are going to check your passport, they're going to make sure your face looks like your passport, they're going to give you your boarding pass, they're also going to weigh your luggage, and then they're going to do the luggage tag for you. Then they'll usually tell you to go this way for security. So, if it is your first flight, just go to the counter.

Once you receive your boarding pass, it's about this big, maybe like the size of a Nintendo Switch. What you're going to see on there is your name, the date, the flight, what time you're supposed to board, what gate you're supposed to go on, and then just other details about the flight. But yeah, keep that with you because you're going to have to show that or give it to the people once you board the plane.

That's why it's called a boarding pass. I also did want to mention that a lot of very seasoned travelers tend to travel light, and it's because they don't want to go through the whole check-in process once they get to the airport. If they already have their boarding pass, what they can do is just skip this step entirely and head straight to security.

Also, if you haven't subscribed yet, it would mean so much to me if you just took your finger and pushed that little subscribe button down there. Here at Build Your Moxy, I cover travel, personal finance, and self-improvement. Let's talk about how to get through airport security.

So after you've checked in and you have your boarding pass and you have dropped off your check-in luggage, you're going to go find the security line. Once you're standing there, just make sure you're trying to get all of your stuff ready. What I like to do is put my laptop and my liquids close to the surface because once you get to the front of the line, things tend to move pretty quickly.

Once you get to the front of the line, the person there is going to ask to see your boarding pass and sometimes your passport or your government-issued ID. Sometimes they make you take off your mask, if you're wearing one, just to make sure your face matches your passport. Then this person is going to direct you on which line to stand in, and you're going to see a line with probably a lot of people and a lot of trays.

What you do once you get to the line of trays is you're going to first take off your shoes and put them in a tray. Then you're going to make sure you take out your laptop, your liquids, and some other electronics like battery packs or iPads if the person is saying to do so, and you're going to put that in a tray. Usually, your electronics are in one tray, and then.

. . Your shoes are in another tray, and then you can put your personal item, your carry-on, and any other items, like jackets, in the trays as well.

Just make sure your liquids are also out of the bag. When it comes to liquids, the only liquids you can bring are those that fit in a quart-sized bag. You can get this bag from the 99-cent store.

In this bag, you're able to bring creams, pastes, and aerosols, and it has to be under 3. 4 oz per item. So, let's just say this is my favorite Korean skincare product, Metro Hemp Cleanser.

This is 4 oz, so even though it can fit in here, you cannot bring that because it is 4 oz, not 3. 4 oz. What you want to do is just get a bunch of little travel items and put those inside the quart-sized bag.

There you go! This is actually 3 oz, even though it looks bigger. If you are bringing through a water bottle, a cup, or a coffee cup of some type, make sure there's no liquid inside because you are not allowed to bring liquid, except in that quart-sized bag, through security.

If you do have liquid and I have forgotten once before, they will make you either throw the cup and the liquid away right there or they'll make you drink it. There have been a couple of times where I have forgotten, but I really liked the water bottle, so I was just there in front of the security officer and I was chugging a bunch of water. I think it was almost 48 oz, and it was pretty miserable!

So I had to find a bathroom later. Yes, make sure all of your containers are empty, and you can only bring that quart-sized bag of liquids. Once all your items are on the trays, they are going to be pushed through, and then there’s going to be an x-ray looking at all of your items just to make sure you’re not bringing anything dangerous.

So at this time, you're going to stand in line to go through this imaging machine thing, and it’s just checking for metal. Sometimes you can just walk straight through it; other times, you have to stand in this thing, and it goes “whoosh, whoosh,” and you have to stand like this. Basically, you're going to see a picture of what to do and just follow what everyone else is doing.

If you do have any issues with metal detectors or if you have metal inside your body, just be sure to let the nice people know, because they may just have to do a manual pat-down or just use the wand. If your bag does get taken for investigation, don’t freak out; you didn’t do anything wrong—unless you did do something wrong—but as long as you don’t bring an excess amount of liquids or meat from another country, you're usually pretty good. One time, my carry-on got taken, and they asked, “What is that thing?

It’s like this really dense thing! ” They were like, “What is this girl doing? ” Anyway, they opened it up, and we were coming from Hawaii.

They just said, “Oh my gosh, is this all just Spam musubi? ” I replied, “Yes, that stuff is very dense, because you know spam can last through anything. ” The nice lady just let us go and said, “Well, enjoy your Spam musubi,” and I said, “Yes, I will do that!

” Also, we do like to travel a lot with protein bars, so just make sure to separate those within your carry-on bags, because when those are all together, or when macro bars are all together, those just look really dense. So if you don’t want to be stopped, then just try to separate all your dense stuff. Here are just a few quick tips for security: 1.

Just do what they say; don't be argumentative. Just do what they say because they're just trying to push everyone through so everyone can enjoy their trip. 2.

Don't wear bulky items; take them off, or else expect a possible pat-down. 3. Be ready for a pat-down anyway, especially if you’re wearing anything loose or if you have hair that’s in a bun or a braid.

4. Don’t look overly suspicious. 5.

Be nice, but don’t be overly friendly. 6. Keep the line moving; you got this!

7. Don’t wear complicated shoes, because you need to get them on and off fast. 8.

Try to pack your bag in a way that’s easy to take things in and out of. What I like to do with my personal item is keep the zipper from my laptop facing up so I can then slide my laptop in and out easily. I also keep my liquids on top so I don’t have to rummage through my bag.

Alright, once you're finished with security, it is now time to find your gate. Now, on your boarding pass, you may have your gate number right there. However, I highly recommend just finding this big electronic screen.

There are a bunch of letters and numbers, and it’s going to have all the logos of all the airlines. Take a look at that screen just to cross-reference if it’s the same number as your boarding pass. If it’s not the same number as your boarding pass, just be sure to follow the one that's on the screen, because that gets more updated than your boarding pass.

The reason why your gate number could change is because sometimes the planes, if they’re just trying to push things along, sometimes have to change the gate they were assigned to. Originally, going to be at, also if you don't know what a gate is, basically that is where you're going to station yourself so you can then board the plane. On the board, it's going to show you your flight number, where the gate is, and what time the flight is leaving, so just make sure you're looking at the right one.

Usually, your gate is going to have a letter and then a number, like G6. Once you figure out what gate number you're at, I highly, highly, highly, highly, highly recommend just going to find your gate right then and there. The reason why you want to find your gate is because even though some places might be like G1, G2, G3, G4, right?

You may think G5, G6 is just a little bit past that; sometimes there are some airports where it's like G1, G2, G3, G4, and then G5 and G6 are at the other side of the airport. So just make sure you check to see that your gate actually does exist. Why be stressed?

Just look for your gate. All right, once you've gone through security and you found your gate and you made sure that it exists, you can then just wait right there and just relax. Or you can go try to fill up your water bottle; that's what we like to do.

Normally, most airports will have a water bottle filling station or a water fountain of some sort. So if you've seen any of my other travel tip videos, you'll know why I love bringing water so much when I am traveling. So yes, fill up your water bottle, go buy some snacks, and go buy some food.

If you are going to buy some food and you're not hungry right then, if your flight is a long flight, I highly recommend buying something that could last maybe 2 or 3 hours into the flight, and you don't have to eat it right then. Try not to get anything too smelly, like, you know, fish or something with those little capers on, because those can be kind of smelly. Also, if you are just waiting by the gate and you want to charge some of your items, just make sure you're not plugging in your USB thingy into their USB thingies.

Nothing against the airports at all, but there are a lot of bad people out there that want to steal your information. This has nothing to do with the airports; it has everything to do with just some bad people that are not well-intentioned. So instead of just sticking this in the USB port, what you want to do is just bring—this is like the iPhone one—just bring a little cube, put it in there, and then plug it into a wall socket instead.

Not only does it charge faster, but you're also not at risk with all your cybersecurity stuff. I wish it wasn't like that, but yeah, just protect yourself and use the cube. If you do decide to go shopping in the airport, you may want to take advantage of some of the duty-free items.

So what that means is, if you're traveling internationally, because there are so many people coming in and out from different countries, it's kind of like bad sportsmanship to collect tax on all those people. There are a lot of stores in airports where it'll say "duty-free," which basically means tax-free, so go ahead and get some things if you want. A lot of times, the cashiers will wrap your item; like if you're bringing liquids, they'll put tape on it to show you can't open it.

So if they tape it, just don't open it until you arrive at your destination, and then maybe just put it in your checked-in bag for when you go back home later. Also, be mindful that if you are going to be buying a lot of things in the airport, some flights don't let you bring that in unless it fits in your carry-on or your personal item. So just keep that in mind.

For us, whenever we want to do any duty-free shopping, we are already thinking before, "Oh, I think we're going to be looking for this or looking for this kind of whiskey or whatever. " Normally, we'll just leave a little bit of space in our carry-on for that item. As time gets closer for you to board the plane, make sure you go potty; that's very important.

Then also make sure you start consolidating your stuff. A lot of airlines won't let you on unless you're just carrying a personal item and your carry-on bag. So if you have all these little mini bags everywhere, just make sure you put that in your personal item or your carry-on.

If you do have a lot of things, one thing you could do is just take out your jacket and put that around your waist just to free up some space in your personal belongings. Make sure you're in line when it's your turn to start boarding, and you don't want to be too late. Because if you're too late, even though the seats are assigned, you may not have any overhead storage for your bag.

Be sure to keep your boarding pass close and your passport. All right, so I just covered how to prepare for your flight and what to do once you arrive at the airport. Now I'm going to be walking you through what to expect when you are in the air.