If you are traveling and Google is trying to send you to a country specific site, you can use this address to tell Google you actually really want to go to Google.com:
http://www.google.com/ncr
I believe the NCR stands for No Country Redirect.
But as the article points out, many websites make it harder than it aught to be use them from other countries. Some Japenese websites sometimes even actively try to prevent foreigners from using them by require text entry in hiragana and disabling copy-paste with javascript.
Never explain with malice what is adequately explained by a decisionmaker who hasn't touched his computer in three weeks and needed the email responded to by his secretary saying "I don't want anyone copying our website!"</painful memories>
But as the article points out, many websites make it harder than it aught to be use them from other countries. Some Japenese websites sometimes even actively try to prevent foreigners from using them by require text entry in hiragana and disabling copy-paste with javascript.