Library Support to Study & Research Abroad 

• Center for International Experience (CIE)
• Center for Language Study (CLS)
• Office of International Students and Scholars (OISS)
• Yale Summer Session (YSS)
• Yale University Library (YUL)
• Yale University
• Yale and the World (International Travel)
• Yale Daily News

Cell Phone Service

• Mobile network operators
• GSM frequency bands
• GSM World
• World Time Zone
• China Wholesale Electronics

Cell Phone Purchase, Rentals & SIM Cards

• Ace Telecom
• Call in Europe
• Cellomobile
• Cellular Abroad
• English Club
• International Cellular Services
• Mobal
• Studyabroad

Over the Internet

• Skype
• ooVoo
• Voxox
• Google Talk

• Convert-me.com

• Go Currency

• OANDA

• XE

• World Time Zone
• Time and Date
• World Weather

Laptops will almost always accept voltage input from anywhere in the world (between 110V-240V), so you probably won’t need a transformer to protect your laptop. You will, however, still need a socket adapter.

Wireless and network standards should be identical everywhere in the world, so you won’t need a separate network card for your computer. Bring your computer into any wireless hotspot just like you would in the US!

In most countries, any electrical device brought from the United States will require two separate items: a voltage transformer and a socket adapter.

A voltage transformer turns the 220-volt electricity found in most other countries into the 110-volt feed found in the United States. If most 110V devices were plugged directly into a 220V power supply, they would certainly be destroyed with a high chance of igniting a fire.

To protect your equipment, invest in one or two transformers (generally these run between $10 and $25). Also be careful to check the maximum power output (in watts) of the converter you purchase compared to the devices you’ll plug into it. You don’t want to plug a 400W hair dryer into a 100W transformer!

A socket adapter will allow you to physically plug in your device to the wall sockets of other countries. Do some research on your particular destination and figure out what socket standard (or standards!) it follows so that you can be prepared.

Remember that when you use a cybercafé or hotel guest computer, you’re using someone else’s machine that you have no control over.

For this reason, it’s imperative that you don’t put in any confidential information (e.g. social security numbers, credit card numbers, Yale NetID password) while using it. While it’s not frequent that miscreants install keyloggers or malicious software on public computers, it’s also far from rare. Always assume that whatever you type or view on a public machine will be intercepted!

If a cybercafé or other public computer is going to be your main method of internet access, consider setting up a temporary email account that you can forward your Yale email to for the duration of your stay abroad. This won’t necessarily protect you if the emails you receive contain sensitive information, but it will keep malicious parties from gaining access to your Yale account where they could potentially do a lot more harm.

Mobile phones are tricky in other countries. To be assured that you’ll be able to use yours, check that it supports the Global System for Mobile communications standard, or GSM. If your phone is listed as being tri-band or quad-band, chances are even better that it will work.

However, what about carriers? Your US carrier will charge a small fortune if you use your phone overseas. The best solution to this is to get your phone unlocked (this can be done either in the States or in your destination country) and buy a prepaid SIM (Subscriber Identity Module) card for your phone using a local carrier. This puts you on the local network (which will be much cheaper!) and alleviates the worry of having to pay several dollars per minute of international roaming charges. Calling back to the United States will still generally be expensive, however.

Also, you usually won’t be able to keep your US phone number using this method (this also means you won’t be able to access your US voice mail). Verizon customers won’t be eligible for this solution since Verizon doesn’t distribute phones with removable SIM cards.

As far as issues such as SMS text messaging, how likely your phone is to support this depends on what language you intend to text in. American phones will support most European languages just fine, while more dissimilar languages such as Chinese, Hebrew, or Hindi are trickier.

The current state-of-the-art in the phone industry (the Apple iPhone, HTC G1, Blackberry Storm, and Palm Pre) can all display and input Japanese and Chinese (traditional and simplified), but right-to-left scripts such as Hebrew and Arabic are beyond their capabilities without heavy user modification. Less advanced phones may or may not support entering languages in non-Roman character sets; check your user manual or local phone dealer to find out for certain.

Some countries may have phone rentals available for the duration of your stay. These are often the most convenient solution, and will let you take advantage of all the capabilities of a phone optimized for your destination.

If you want to talk with friends and family back home, investigate Skype or one of its alternatives (ooVoo, VoxOx, Google Talk, etc). This requires a computer or iPhone hooked up to a network, but the calls will be free if each party uses a computer (Skype will also let you call a phone for a small per-minute charge). As a bonus, with most of these solutions you’ll also get video capabilities!

Phone Cards

Even though public phones are disappearing quickly, purchasing a phone card is sometimes your best option for telecommunications abroad. Be careful of the source, though: in some parts of the world there’s a large market for illegal phone cards, and purchasing or using these cards could result in harsh penalties even if you weren’t aware the card was illegal.

In some countries, you may run into filters or censorship that prevent you from accessing certain sites on the internet or receiving certain information through your email (the most famous example of this is the “Great Firewall of China” which for a considerable time even blocked Wikipedia).

While there are ways to get around these annoyances—both free and paid—doing so may provoke the authorities in your destination country and result in any number of penalties, possibly including deportation. Please do some research and know the political climate of your destination country before attempting any manner of censorship circumvention.

• MEDEX
• Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Traveler’s Health

• Students Abroad (U.S. Department of State)
• U.S. Embassies, Consulates, and Diplomatic Missions