Call before you travel has become the norm and it's necessary. You can rail against it all you want, but that's simply the way it is. I travel with two Citi cards and an AMEX. I always call them both before I leave, with my itinerary and contact numbers and by doing so I haven't had any problems. It probably takes me 5 minutes to make both calls. A small investment of time to avoid having my cards shut down on me. Remember -- the card companies have algos that scan millions of transactions daily looking for unusual activity. Don't take it personally.
I have a Citi and a couple of Amex cards, plus my bank ATM card, travel internationally 2-3 times a year, and haven't called anyone in advance of travel for many years, and have never had a problem with fraud blockage. Perhaps it makes a difference that I don't travel to countries where they have a lot of fraud problems, or perhaps my patterns have established themselves enough that they don't worry. I don't really know, but I can say that I have zero problems with it.