Produced by the iLab at WBUR Boston.

Amory. Yes. I want you to meet Susan, who I just met the other day. Hey, Susan, how are you?

Hey, Bat, I'm good. How are you? Good. Thanks for being willing to do this with us.

You're welcome. Susan went by herself to Japan for a two-week vacation.

Two weeks. Very nice. Where'd she go in Japan? She sort of bounced around a bit.

Yeah, so the main places I went to were Tokyo and Kyoto and I took a few day trips to and spent one night in this place called Hoko-ne, where there's hot springs.

And then just a few days ago, right when she was preparing to leave, something happened.

Can you tell me about the moment that you realized you were in trouble?

So I was wrapping up my trip. It was the morning of the day of my flight and I was going through everything and trying to organize myself.

And I slowly began to realize that my passport was not in my bag.

So I was trying to not panic immediately, but eventually I went through everything and it just wasn't there.

So I really, I panicked. I was like, holy crap. What do I do?

Yes. Susan did the one thing you are never supposed to do while traveling abroad. She lost her passport.

Amory, what anxiety threat level does this put you at?

Like a code red, like 11 out of 10.

I thought maybe. This is not something you would take and stride necessarily.

Maybe not something anyone should take and stride, including Susan.

I had no idea where it was and I realized that really my only option at that point was to call the embassy and see if there was any way I could make my flight without my passport because I had no idea how to track it down.

Hello, you're in the seat you'll kill.

They actually picked up right away and they were really nice, but they said there's nothing they could do until Monday.

Since it was a Saturday and that's when they opened, they said it happens all the time.

Did you have to be at work on Monday?

...