I've been collecting cloth shopping bags for years. I never really thought of it as collecting, because I don't seek them out when I'm travelling. However, I often see one I like and add it to my collection. Some were sold in gift shops, while others were sold in grocery shops or food markets, and have the name of the market and the city.

Bonus: You can use one of them to carry extra stuff home.

I have a number of totebags too, now that you mention it, almost all from bookshops. The best one is from Daunt Books in London and the one from San Francisco Bookshop in Paris is the one that goes back & forth to the library. The flimsiest is from Shakespeare & Co. though if I'd been willing to pay more could have had a better one. So I guess it's my fridge magnet of tote bags, useless but I like to look at it.

I think we share the same kind of hormones and memories of our youth, Dogeared! :-)

At that age I had no need for shopping bags, tea towels, or refrigerator magnets. In fact, I didn't have a refrigerator.

I'm a middle-aged woman and I have no idea what a "tea towel" even is. I think it's some kind of lightweight kitchen towel but have no idea why it is called that. I don't know what it is used for.

I like the beer coaster ideas, also. Small, lightweight and free. I don't "collect" those but have some from prior trips.

I think the frig magnets are easy, I like those and even find them useful, but can't see that for a 20 yr old male. The "Pins" is something my older sister does, I think that's an old idea, also.

Somehow I don't think of a 20 yr old male as being a collector. But I'd go with the beer coasters. Otherwise, I know this is kind of silly, but I just like buying nice postcards, they are a lot better than the photos I can take and them I may use them for bookmarks. I also always mail myself one from every major city, that's kind of fun to get--that's how I get them, I don't keep one and mail one.

Otherwise, I also "collect" little business cards from cafes and hotels where I go and they are sometimes in those racks in hotel lobbies from nearby businesses. I use those for bookmarks, also, and they remind me of my trips. Those are free and lightweight.

Kids used to collect and trade badges or pins, guess that's way out of date now. Postcards are even harder to find. My first summer in Europe I musy have mailed 30+ postcards to my parents. My mom saved them all, fun to look through them years later. I also saved ticket stubs, play bills, coasters, match books, menus, etc. and along with photographs made a scrapbook.

How about miniature items such as a tiny Eiffel Tower or London Eye? They're readily available at tourist shops and are really cheap.

Christina,

Yur education is sadly lacking. More than you need to know about tea towels. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/1...n_6135252.html

Maps. The kind with tiny pictures of buildings and monuments. The can be framed, used to cover books and albums and put under glass on table tops.

That's, "Your" education is sadly lacking, Christina, which indicates my proofreading is sadly lacking. :-(

'beer opener'
They come in cheap too ..I picked some from hotels (I swear I didn't even mean it, I've got more than enough at home)

Postcards is what I would take - old one prefereably incontrast to pictures.

I used to collect maps too when I was 20 and I'm throwing those away now when I find them.

Huh, my comment re making suggestions that would appeal to a 20s male vs. a 50's housewife was removed.

Maybe making a collage of young women's phone numbers was considered too risque?

In response to your post I mentioned hormones, Dogeared, so probably my post will be zapped as well. What a bunch of insipidly PC people that have joined the Forum! There was abslutely nothing wrong with your post. They just do not understand tongue in cheek humor. :-(

On another thread it was suggested that I not use the term 'politically correct' but instead should use the term 'respect'. As in, I should not complain that people are too obsessed with every comment having to be politically correct, I should instead respect them.

So instead of writing that people are 'insipidly PC', you should have wrote, 'What a bunch of people I respect have joined the Forum!'

See how much nicer as a person that makes you sound. LOL

"...you should have wrote..."

Another clue.

But while saying I "respect" politically correctness might be "politically correct" it is also a lie. What a conundrum!

postcards
magnets
key chains
ballpoint pens
coasters from bars
matchbooks
dish towels with maps or city names on them

Or do the shot glass idea and mail home a small box every now and then from the post office.

Are you wanting to start a collection (so all postcards, all pens) or souvenirs that will remind you of each place.

I only travel with a wheeled carryon --2 days or 2 months, doesn't matter. I look for stuff I can use on a daily basis and that always reminds me of that trip.

I have book cover and eyeglass case from Provence, a croatian key chain in leather with my initial, kitchen towel from Portugal, xmas ornaments although I try for wood or metal, most are glass. Soaps, jewelry, small Venetian mask, 3 original postcards from an artists shop in Florence that I put in one frame when I got home, 5 foot rubbing from a tomb in Westminster Abbey we call "our guy", a sari from India I use to cover and old trunk, pillow cases (w/o the insert), a wooden pepper mill from the antique market in Nice that I fill with salt ( and probably use too much during the day) and a 2'x2'metal frame from Tangiers that I inserted a small mirror in the middle square.