Beware of sex, booze and a loose tongue

"Enjoy this wine back home," said a friend, pressing a well-regarded Lebanese red into my hands before I left Beirut. I put the bottle in my hand luggage and forgot about it.

My next stop was Qatar, a country that doesn't ban alcohol - as stricter Muslim nations do - but has tough rules controlling its importation and use.

Incoming bags are X-rayed at the Doha airport. "What's in that bottle?" asked the customs official, pointing to an on-screen picture of my bag's contents. "Wine," I answered truthfully.

The bottle was confiscated and I was given a form saying I could collect it when I departed. I'd forgotten it's illegal to take alcohol into Qatar.

Breaking laws while on holiday is easy. Fortunately, officials in tourist-oriented destinations generally let off unwitting law-breakers with warnings (as I discovered when customs officers found duty-free cigarettes, a taboo import, in my bag in Sri Lanka).

The naive travellers also has to keep in mind quirky taboos which give great offence but don't contravene laws, such as patting Thai children on the head, using chopsticks as drumsticks in China and Japan, or photographing veiled Muslim women without their permission.

There are urban myths to deal with. I've been told that wearing purple is illegal in Japan and women with erect nipples are routinely hauled off by the police in Singapore. Not so.

I've been with purple-wearers on Tokyo streets and don't recall locals giving them a second glance. Fashion-conscious Singapore women have told me the worst that would happen to anyone with erect nipples would be to be leered at. Other such myths turn out to be real laws but not enforced. For instance, Singapore's insistence toilets be flushed.

A common legal pitfall for travellers is lese majeste (insulting a monarch or other ruler). Thailand has the world's toughest lese majeste laws. The king is widely revered. Insulting him can lead to a prison cell.. Foreigners have also been arrested for drunkenly spray-painting the king's portrait, defacing banknotes with the royal picture and expressing anti-monarchist views on aircraft.

Laws differ from country to country but it's sound policy not to make disparaging remarks about the rulers. It is the custom in many African nations to display a photograph of the president in every home and business. Commenting adversely on such portraits could be against the law.

Criticism can be problematic outside of Africa, too. A man I know loudly called a South American dictator a bandit while standing, the worse for wear, on a bar table. Police arrived on the scene.

Luckily for the perpetrator, the cops burst out laughing - perhaps because the man's trousers were around his ankles - and told him to go to his hotel to sleep it off.

Sex can cause problems too. Oral sex is outlawed in Singapore. Married couples checking into hotels in Ethiopia should have the same surname, or proof of marriage, if they want to share rooms. And public displays don't pay in Muslim countries, as two humiliated Britons discovered a year ago when they were convicted for having sex on a Dubai beach and deported.

Dubai can be misleading because it gives an initial impression of being a liberal society. It employs a large expatriate population and has Western-style shopping malls and hotel bars. But it is still a Muslim country.

Visitors should play it safe and dress conservatively in Muslim countries (and also in some Asian nations) and avoid displays of affection, including hand-holding and kissing. Iranian police crack down on offenders. While in the capital, Tehran, women wear short coats and scarves that show some of their hair, generally it's cover up or be arrested.

Drugs that are legal medicines in some countries are illegal in others. The website of the Australian Embassy in Greece warns codeine is considered a narcotic in Greece and should be covered by a doctor's prescription. "In situations where there is no doctor's prescription, which is likely if it is a long-standing illness or for non-prescription medication, you need to provide a statutory declaration," the website says. Various medicines are also illegal imports into the United Arab Emirates (including Dubai) unless the traveller carries a prescription. Expert advice is to carry prescriptions (plus a few photocopies) and to keep medications in their original packaging with the pharmacy's stick-on label.

Photography of bridges, government buildings, military installations, police officers, soldiers, prisons and airports is illegal in some countries, especially dictatorships or nations rampant with paranoia.

As I prepared to take a photograph of Botswana's Parliament in Gaborone, three soldiers appeared and told me taking a picture would be illegal. I knew they were wrong and politely told them postcards of the same building were on sale at a hotel up the street.

"But you may sell your pictures to enemies of Botswana," one of the soldiers said, ignoring the fact a spy could more easily buy a postcard. "By the way, do you have cigarettes?"

Even though I don't smoke, I carry a pack for precisely such situations. This wasn't an anti-photography crackdown, it was a shakedown for a smoke, and we were soon sitting under a tree and chatting amicably.

Littering may seem a minor offence but not if you're in Asia. Singapore, which banned chewing gum and bubble gum in 1992 as part of reforms to stop littering, also forbids visitors to bring them into the island state. The law was relaxed slightly in 2004 to allow imports of Nicorette gum. Travellers entering Singapore also have to declare cigarettes, for which they will have to pay GST.

And there are new things to look out for all the time. Tourists from mainland China recently were allowed to start visiting Taiwan. But Taipei city councillor Chen Chien-ming called for new city laws to stop mainland visitors violating local custom by littering and spitting. So watch out.

- AAP