travel-tips Archives

What to know before you go

Southeast Asia! These are the lands of gods and smiles, with incense-scented alleyways and tiny plastic restaurant seating, where wrinkled ladies in straw hats offer you strange fruit and the wearing of elastic waisted elephant pants won’t get you laughed at. For first-time travellers to the region, you’re in for a treat, and without wanting to spoil the surprise, these are eight things you should prepare yourself for.

Street Sellers

Twenty-something years ago, when I first backpacked in SE Asia, stepping off a bus surrounded by tuk-tuk drivers was akin to entering a zombie flesh-eating festival wearing a pork chop necklace. Now with the advent of online taxi-booking apps it’s not nearly so much fun, however street sellers are still plentiful and very enthusiastic. Whether it’s a tuk-tuk, trinkets, peanuts or an umbrella, these people need to earn a living, but when you’re not interested saying “no thank you” in the native language or sticking a bag on your head doesn’t always do the trick. The best way is to make eye contact, smile, say thank you with a nod, and keep on walking.

The Bum Gun

The handheld bidet shower, known to its friends as the ‘Bum Gun’, is a marvel of personal hygiene. You’ll find it wall-mounted next to the toilet and it’s designed to leave your designated area daisy-fresh after ‘dropping the kids off at the pool’. Caution is advised. Random rogue bum-guns may look friendly but contain the type of excessive water pressure that could strip your driveway paving of a lifetime’s accumulation of moss in milliseconds. A test squirt is advised before proceeding to the delicate zone, but once you’ve gotten the hang of it, you will wonder how you’ve lived without one.

Child Poverty

The sight of child street sellers and beggars is heartbreaking. I worked at a Cambodian NGO called “Let Us Create,” whose goal is to get these kids out of harm’s way and into school, and I will speak volumes on the subject given the opportunity. The money you give to child sellers goes to parents or guardians who will keep sending the child out to beg while they keep coming back with cash. These people live hand-to-mouth, and it’s very hard to help parents see that education and future employment are the way to pull them out of poverty when their child brings in a couple of dollars every day from tourists. Your intentions are heartfelt and admirable, but if you really want to help the kids please donate to a local NGO instead.

Traffic

If ever crossing a road should be accompanied by the soundtrack to ‘Mission Impossible’, it’s Hanoi, and the trick is to keep walking, making your intended route clear, while resisting the urge to cry. Asian driving has evolved over centuries from bicycles and cyclos and is quite different from that in the West. They seamlessly blend into one another at speed, instinctively knowing where to criss-cross, and frequently carry five-on-a-moto with baby as the filling in a ‘family sandwich’ squashed securely in the middle. Here is not the place for your first experience riding a scooter unless it’s in a relaxed and quiet resort with an international driving permit, insurance and a crash helmet, or you have a ‘Go Fund Me’ page ready to post.

Air-conditioning

To counteract the tropical heat, air-con is widely utilised in many establishments and modes of transport. Frequently set to the temperature of an Eskimo’s mittens, walking into a shop from the humidity of the outside can feel as though you’ve been slapped in the face with a bag of frozen shrimp. To adapt to the dramatic ambient shift, simple acclimatisation training can be achieved by walking in and out of any Seven-Eleven Convenience Store in five-minute bursts. Consider carrying a hooded sweatshirt on long bus journeys, which in the case of a more relaxed air-con temperature can always be rolled up and used as a pillow.

Abundant Smiles

“The Land of Smiles” is Thailand’s motto, and they’re not wrong. The heart-warming beam is the basis of Southeast Asian culture as a show of respect, positivity, and social harmony. Another reason for the smile is ‘loss of face’ and the avoidance of conflict. Losing one’s temper in Asian society is seen as lacking self-control and dignity, and the reciprocating smile is out of embarrassment on behalf of the shouty-person and an attempt to diffuse tension. So the next time you read an online review that claims “I calmly complained to the receptionist and he just stood there grinning at me,” you know how that really went down.

The Squirts

The year was 2005, and in a beach bungalow on the island of Koh Chang, an unspeakable horror of colon chaos unfolded. I emerged from the bungalow bathroom after four days, squinting in the brightness of the day, shocked, relieved, and slimmer. I speak from experience my friends, and I’m here to tell you not to be afraid of street food, ice, and salads while in SE Asia. If you choose popular stalls and cafes with a regular turnover of ingredients, don’t eat anything that still has a pulse, or drink Thai whisky straight from a bucket of dubious hygiene at an all-night beach rave, you’ll no doubt be fine. Take diarrhea tablets, activated charcoal tablets, and rehydration powder sachets in your medical kit just in case, and thoroughly enjoy the vast array of the indigenous menu.

Customary Courtesy

We don’t wish to offend our hosts, and little research into the local customs of the area you’re visiting makes for responsible and courteous tourism. For example, menstruating ladies or people in mourning should not enter a place of worship in Bali, and offering something in your left hand anywhere in Asia is not the done thing. The left hand traditionally is in charge of ‘personal hygiene’ if you get my drift. The giving and receiving of money should be done with the right hand, or when in Cambodia, with both hands, or the left hand supporting the elbow of the right. It might seem odd, but do this in supermarkets and watch the cashier smile. The rule that you shouldn’t wear yellow in Malaysia isn’t strictly true, that was related to an uprising some years ago and won’t get you arrested, unless you’re wearing yellow Crocs with matching socks and it’s the Fashion Police.

From the diverse natural landscape and ancient monuments, to the low cost of a good meal and accommodation, the generosity and serenity of those living with next to nothing, to the amount of times and places you hear Ed Sheeran being played, prepare to be amazed while travelling Southeast Asia. What you can’t prepare yourself for is how different you feel when you arrive back home.

And how much you miss the bum gun.

I stared at the humongous pile of stuff on my bed and then at the new rucksack slumped up against the wall, then back at the pile. I’m sure out of the side of my eye, I saw the rucksack tremble. I went and got myself a coffee to prepare for the task ahead and gave the rucksack an invigorating team talk. The last time I backpacked was 17 years ago to Thailand, Vietnam, and Cambodia, so I’m not new to this, but deciding what was coming with me on this grand adventure had to be considered, especially since we didn’t know when, or even if, we’d be coming back.

I have included an exact list at the end. It isn’t difficult of course, you take the stuff you want, but these are a few helpful notes for the budget backpacking virgins out there regarding the stuff you’ll likely need. I should mention that while I took much time to pack and re-pack, my better half, who’d not backpacked before, accomplished the task at the speed it takes Usain Bolt to get the lid off his fruit juice.

BAG OR SUITCASE?

Cases are cumbersome and take up hands when you could be holding a cheeky travel sandwich. With a rucksack on the back, and a backpack on the front, you’re still hands-free to wave your tickets at people and not have to bend down to drag a wheelie case over broken pavements and random dog poo. Rucksacks are also more comfy to rest your head on while waiting for trains and less likely to bounce off the other side when some dude launches it on the roof rack of a minibus. Incidentally, if there are two of you travelling, your bags can be combined as one 25kg baggage allowance on some airlines like Air Asia.

SO IT’S A BAG THEN

I have a 50-litre rucksack and it weighs 12kg fully loaded. It sports padded adjustable straps, handy outside pockets for the items I don’t want buried, and a rain cover. I’ve seen that packing cubes are the thing now, I separate my stuff in bags which can later be used as a shopping or beach bag. Leave yourself some space to fit in purchases and souvenirs.

If you’ve never worn a rucksack before, I suggest filling it and having a practise, specifically to gauge your new girth while wearing it to save injuring small children and the elderly every time you turn around. A small cross-body bag that fits in the front backpack is your faithful companion for money and cards, phone, charger, power bank, passport, glasses and shades, which will be glued to you during your travels.

CLOTHES

Unlike my native Europe, where summer and winter seasons are reasonably defined, Southeast Asia is surprisingly varied. It’s dry season in Cambodia when it’s bucketing down in Bali, and northern Vietnam is cold. Layers are essential since where you’re going is hot and sticky, but you’ll also be spending time on a plane or bus whose air-con is set to ‘Svalbard’s fridge’, and encountering monsoon raindrops that soak to the bone in seconds.

Temples, holy sites, and Asian cultures require respectful dress, and you should cover your knees and shoulders in some areas. In general, bikinis aren’t appropriate for waterfalls or walking around the street, and Muslim countries prefer tourists to dress modestly, particularly during holy festivals like Ramadan. You will see people dressed inappropriately as some don’t realise, and sadly some don’t care, but to not offend the locals, it’s best to keep your magnificent flesh under wraps when required.

A pair of trusty trainers you’ve already broken in, some comfy trekking-type sandals and flip-flops are the core footwear requirements. Aside from the flip-flops, it’s best to get these before you go rather than having to shop for them here. The multi-purpose items are a hoodie, which rolled up, makes a decent pillow, and sarongs. The latter can be a towel, picnic blanket, scarf, curtain, shoulder cover for holy site visits, skirt, and impromptu bed linen when you discover dubious sheet cleanliness in your sleeping quarters.

GETTING LAUNDERED

You can find laundry services in most places, and where you stay will most likely do it. They range from an actual laundrette, to the landlady scrubbing your grubbies in a large tin bowl and leaving them to dry in the sunshine. If you give them Grandma’s hand-made lace blouse, it may come back the size of a drinks coaster, and white t-shirts tend to lose their dazzle, so if you’re taking special gear, be prepared to hand wash it yourself. I do my smalls and lightweight tops and stick them on the drying rack when there is one. Cotton clothes are always best, as anyone who’s spent a sweaty night stuck to polyester sheets can testify. Cotton is light and breathable and dries fast, and linen is cool unless you’re fussy about creases.

MEDICAL KIT

The medical kit tends to increase with age. Ours contains ibuprofen tablets and gel, paracetamol, antiseptic cream, vitamins, diarrhoea pills, charcoal tablets, antihistamine, rehydration powders, plasters, dressing and tape, safety pins, eye bath, some cotton pads, a teeny bottle of Betadine, cold and flu tablets with decongestant, earplugs, and nail scissors.

You can of course, buy many of these things here. While sun lotion isn’t cheap, you can usually find Factor 30 in traveller size bottles in supermarkets, and unless you’re particular about your ‘deet rating’, Asian mosquito repellents like ‘Soffell’ or ‘Off’ are good enough. Tiger balm-type products are cheap here, and back in the day, I remember the Cambodian locals using it for everything from a pimple to a severed limb. It is effective in easing headaches, nasal congestion, muscle aches and pains, toenail fungus, and itching bites; however, I would suggest taking any severed limbs to the nearest medical facility before applying.

TOILETRIES

I use small refillable bottles. Solid soaps are good when you’re on the move as they weigh less, don’t leak into your gear and avoid the liquid allowance on flights. Make-up tends to melt in the heat, so I just use eye pencil and waterproof mascara to avoid scaring people when I’m out in public. The most useless article you can take to Southeast Asia are hair straighteners, unless of course you’re thinking of using them as a travel iron or to make tiny toasted sandwiches. Take hair accessories to pin-it-up/pull-it-back instead, or like me, just accept that your head may look like a caveman’s armpit on occasion.

THE STUFF

L.E.D torch – from bathroom visits on the overnight train, to traversing broken pavements in the dark. I have one with an attachable head-strap in case I decide to take up coal mining.

Universal sink plug – for hand-laundry and gent’s shaving, and yes, we have stayed in places without a sink plug.

Plug adaptors – for 2-pin/3-pin sockets, a three-way socket extension, and a double USB charger are my weapons of choice.

Lengthy luggage belt – impromptu washing line.

Pegs – for laundry, holding stubborn curtains together, and keeping food bags closed.

Padlocks and a chain – for the bags while travelling, and to make the wardrobe a ‘D-I-Y safe’ when you don’t trust reception with your valuables.

S-shaped hooks – for when there’s nowhere to hang your stuff and keep toiletry bags from dangling in water.

A pack of playing cards.

Yahtzee scorecards and dice.

ELECTRONICS

I have an ancient Kindle loaded with books, a battered iPad with music and games for the plane, a tiny Bluetooth speaker, headphones, a small laptop, a portable hard drive (mostly to load photos as my phone storage is quite useless), a USB stick with films on, an old phone with more music, and a power bank (as now my phone storage is full the battery life is also quite useless).

THE BOTTOM LINE

So now, eight months on from the humongous pile of stuff on my bed, we’re still living out of our bags and currently in Indonesia. Looking back on what I’ve listed here, I can say that we’ve used everything, although we only played Yahtzee once in a power cut and I lost, so that’s gone back in the bag until it behaves.

My newbie backpacking friends, so long as you have your money, passport, diarrhoea treatment, a cap, phone, comfy shoes, and travel insurance, you’re good to go. The rest you’ll learn from and will become part of your adventure and travel tales from Southeast Asia. It’s a wonderful place, you’re going to have a mind-broadening experience, and as I look over at my once trembling rucksack, it’s now asking me quite boldly “where are we going next then?”.

What I packed for budget travelling in Southeast Asia for six months.

Microfibre towel, 4 pairs of shorts, 3 t-shirts, 1 pair of jeans, 4 tops, undies, mix and match bikinis, modest two-piece swimsuit, 2 vest tops, 2 cropped trousers, 1 skirt, 2 sarongs, 2 scarves, socks, caps, 2 dresses, trainers, flip-flops, rain jacket, 1 lightweight long sleeved shirt, 1 sparkly top for special occasions, hoodie, and dungarees for travelling in even though they make me look like a children’s party entertainer.

Tag: travel-tips

Eight Things to Prepare Yourself for in Southeast Asia

Packing for 6 Months Budget Travel in Southeast Asia