What to bring on a long-term trip abroad

Before I left on my four-month trip, I read a lot of articles and message boards and wrote to a lot of people who had done travel like this before.  There were some really valuable things I gathered from that research, especially about how to pack for so many climates.  But there inevitably were some things that I didn’t realize I needed to pack until it was too late.  Part of the problem was that I never found a list on someone’s website or blog with a real list of “must haves.”  Well, here is my top ten list of things I am so glad I had, plus things I wish I would have brought with me.

1. Mini flashlight: If you are planning on doing any camping, a flashlight will be a no-brainer.  But even if you are staying in guesthouses and hostels, a small flashlight is a must.  We found all kinds of uses for it, like when you’re staying in a hostel dorm with strangers and you need to find your glasses in the dark.  The time we needed it most, however, was when the shaky electricity of Nanjing, China, went out on an entire block, including in our hostel.  There are a lot of countries where you cannot depend on electricity.

2. Playing cards: I had actually read this one before, but I didn’t listen.  But after a week on the road in Southeast Asia, Jon and I had to buy a pack of cards.  Cards are a great thing to have not only for the downtime of traveling from one place to another, but they also come in handy at bars and restaurants.  No matter who you are traveling with, you will not always have things to talk about.  So an instant, portable game is a great addition to a dinner table.  Also, cards don’t speak a language, so teaching and playing games with people you meet on the road can be a great way to make friends.

3. Laptop: One of my biggest questions before my trip was whether or not to take a laptop.  And then the question was if Jon and I should BOTH take a laptop.  I cannot emphasize enough how happy I am that we both took our laptops.  I use a very small netbook that fits in every bag, and Jon has a pretty small laptop as well.  All throughout Asia, especially, we enjoyed free wireless internet.  That means never paying for internet use and always having skype at our fingertips.  Plus, all of our photos could be instantly uploaded to our computers.  It was never a hassle to have them with us; we always found a safe place to keep them when we were out and about.  And sometimes, when we just wanted to chill out and remember something good from America, we turned on some of West Wing (Season 2) on Jon’s laptop.  Without laptops, we would have spent a lot of money sitting in sweaty internet cafes and burning discs of photos.

4. Flip flops for showers: It’s kind of obvious for anyone who shared dorm bathrooms in college.  But seriously, bring shower shoes.  Most of the hostel bathrooms in Europe are yucky.  You will find many other appropriate times to use them, like when visiting temples in Asia.  You have to take off your shoes when entering temples, so pushing off flip flops is much easier than untying shoes every time.

5. Nintendo DS: This one sounds kind of stupid, but trust me, it was awesome.  I always had plenty of stuff to read, and I had a journal to write in, but sometimes you just want to play a game while on a 14-hour flight or an overnight bus ride.

6. Quick-dry towel: Hostels and guesthouses usually provide sheets and rarely provide towels.  My favorite travel item is my quick-dry towel from REI.  It doesn’t take up much room, it soaks up tons of water, and it dries much quicker than a normal towel.

7. Thermometer: We knew we had to bring a thermometer because we are both pretty big hypochondriacs.  It’s an important item because if you do run a fever in certain countries, you should go to a hospital (malaria, dengue, blah blah blah).  And for us, it helped the other way around, too; if we were scared that we were getting sick, the thermometer could tell us we were perfectly fine and to stop being paranoid.

8. Anti-itch and anti-allergy meds: We didn’t want to go overboard with our first aid kits, because chances were that most of the stuff would go unused.  Well, most of it did go unused.  But we didn’t bring two really critical things.  When I broke out in a horrendous rash on my chest, arms and legs, I had no anti-itch cream or anti-allergy pills to ease my suffering.  This happened in a village in Laos, where I was closer to a traditional medicine man than a pharmacy.

9. Rechargable batteries: This also may be a no-brainer for some people, but I was considering just bringing regular batteries on the trip, so I wouldn’t have to buy the fancy pants rechargable ones.  But Jon convinced me to get the rechargable, and I’m so glad I did.  It would have been a big pain to buy new batteries every few days!

10. A good travel partner: Yes, here is the cheese factor.  Some people go on trips like these by themselves, some with family, and some with friends.  I went with Jon, who is a fantastic balance of adventurous, street smart, friendly, and open-minded.  He was a great comfort when things got weird and a constant source of fun when things got dull.  And most importantly, he knew how to be quiet when the sights and the experiences spoke for themselves.

Lonely mountain in Tai An

Before the biggest city of Beijing, we decided to go to a very small city, Tai An, to climb the holy mountain of Tai Shan.  We took an overnight train from Nanjing to Tai An, which was an adventure in itself.  We slept in little rooms with two bunk beds that had three bunks each.  Our cheap tickets got us the top top bunks, so we got super cosy with the ceiling and tried not to fall eight feet down to the ground as the train bumped its way north through China.

China has a lot of interesting public service announcement posters, like this one in Tai An

We arrived early in the morning to Tai An and went straight to a “fancy” hotel, the Tai Shan Grand Hotel.  It was huge and looked like at one point it was grand, but now it’s very worn and VERY empty.  We got our room for half price because March is extreme low-season for them.  The draw of Tai An is the holy mountain of Tai Shan, the most sacred of five Taoist peaks in China.  Twice a year the city fills up with people who climb the mountain, but the rest of the year it’s pretty calm.  I don’t think many non-Chinese tourists ever come to Tai An, though, because we got stared at by every single person in the town.  My favorite moment was when I was walking back from a bakery and I passed by three old women sitting around a little table on the sidewalk.  They stared, and I smiled and said “ni hao” (hello).  One of the women went wide-eyed and exclaimed “NI HAO!” with a huge smile on her face, shocked that I had spoken words she understood.  If there is one thing I will remember most about China it is the constant wonder that we bring to the Chinese, just by being in their country.

Tai Shan, the mountain we did not climb, with the temple below

When we arrived in Tai An, Jon came down with his first case of traveler’s diarrhea, something that we were told would have happened much earlier in our trip.  It wasn’t horrible, but it was bad enough that climbing a mountain was out of the question.  So the lonely mountain stayed lonely as we hung out in the town below, where really the only thing to do was visit the Confucian temple.  We have visited A LOT of temples in Asia, which I guess is equivalent to seeing lots of cathedrals in Europe.  We saw the elaborate wats in Thailand and Laos, and now we are seeing an extremely different style in China, the simple Confucian temples.  My favorite part of the Confucian temples are the giant dragon tortoises, which carry poems on their backs.  The only real difference I can see between a tortoise and a dragon tortoise is that the dragon tortoises have scary faces with big fangs.  But that makes them cool enough for me.

dragon tortoise!!!!!!!!!

Since we had an extra day left over from not climbing Tai Shan, we took a quick bus ride down to the town of Qufu, the birthplace of Confucius and the site of his most important temple.  The city’s wall is completely in tact and surrounded by a moat, and less than 80,000 people live in the entire city, making it the smallest city we would visit in China.  The temple is peaceful and takes up a huge part of the old city, and we spent a long time wandering through its many buildings.  Outside the temple we felt closer to Southeast Asia than we had felt in a long time.  Qufu (pronounced chuh-fuh) has bustling small-town charm and gives the feeling that most of what you see has not changed in a really long time.

The wall to Qufu, leading to Confucius's temple and home

Learning how to pronounce Xiamen

(“Sha-men.”) This morning we flew on Xiamen Airlines to Shanghai, and I slept through the whole thing, except for two minutes when I was eating the breakfast dumplings they served us.  One of the things Jon has learned about me over the past six weeks is that I can and will sleep anywhere.  Shanghai is awesome, but I already miss Xiamen.  Here are some photos to show you why!

Can you tell what this pretty restaurant is? Oh yes, it's the most gourmet Pizza Hut you will ever see! Why don't we get these in America?

This is the puppy (with his mom) who lived at the hostel, who I stalked.

The biggest attraction in Xiamen is Nanputuo Temple, a large complex that houses many Buddhist monks.  We showed up thinking it was going to be a peaceful experience, much like the rest of the temples we’ve seen in Asia.  Not so!  There were literally hundreds of people there, all Chinese, carrying flowers and incense like I’ve never seen.  Many of them had bags full of papers and other gifts to the gods.  (Papers represent gifts for the gods in the next life, and they are burned so that they can reach the gods.)  It turns out that one of the gods of the temple had a feast day, so many people came to pray and give gifts.  We were very lucky to be there on such a busy day!

one of the buildings at Nanputuo Temple

Just one of the many piles of bags filled with gifts for the gods

What we loved the most about Xiamen was the slower pace of life compared with what we expected from China.  This was especially apparent on the small island of Gulang Yu, which is just a short (free) boat ride away from Xiamen Island.  There are no cars allowed on Gulang Yu, and it is mostly filled with gardens and green space, along with the required restaurants and tourist shops.

On the edge of Gulang Yu stands Koxinga, a national hero who conquered Taiwan and is now the biggest sculpture of a historical figure in China

Without cars, Gulang Yu is a great place to wander around the narrow streets. Doesn't look like what you'd picture as China, eh?

Our friend who worked at the hostel told us that Xiamen is consistently ranked as one of the top three happiest cities in China.  It’s easy to see why: beaches, islands, adorable puppies, gourmet Pizza Huts, bubble tea for fifty cents, and a huge university with multiple soccer fields.  (We found a soccer ball and played a bit before most of the students woke up!)

A month in Southeast Asia

I cannot believe our trip is one-fourth over with.  We are off to China now, and the Middle East and Europe are to follow.  While this past month has been spread out among four different countries, my experiences here have been connected, flowing from smiling northern Thailand, through peaceful Laos, around the contradictions of Cambodia, and into the chaos of Vietnam.  Although I am no where near an expert in any city or town, there are a few observations I picked up along the way that I will always remember and wanted to share.

1. Beeping. If there is one thing I will not miss, especially about Cambodia and Vietnam, it is the beeping.  Instead of staying in driving lanes, cars and motorbikes whiz around each other as they please.  To let others know that they are passing, they honk.  On a twelve-hour overnight ride from Hue to Hanoi, for example, anytime our bus passed another car, the driver was layin’ on the horn.  Lovely.

2. Welcome mats. In America, a welcome mat can look like anything.  But all across Southeast Asia, a welcome mat is one thing: a solid color rectangle with the word WELCOME in white block letters.  From restaurants to hotels, everyone has these mats.  Some guy must have taken the idea very literally and marketed it across the entire region!

3. Pajamas. PJs aren’t just for sleeping!  Apparently any matching outfit is good enough for a day out on the town.  Women, especially in Cambodia, can be seen donning teddy bears and smiley faces while riding their motorbikes through the busy downtown.  More than once we have seen signs for museums stating that pajamas aren’t appropriate attire for entry.

4. Counterfeit books. I knew that we would see lots of fake DVDs and CDs, but I never expected books.  The most popular is Lonely Planet guidebooks, but you can find all the latest fiction at low prices here…because it’s all fake.  Open up a book, and the pages are blurry and slightly off-center.  We actually got a book for a really low price by arguing to the woman “It’s not even a real book!”

5. Man bellies. It’s hot here.  Really really hot.  We dealt with it by drinking tons of water and running from shade tree to shade tree.  While locals do the same, the men also have a strange habit: they fold up their shirts so that their bellies are showing.  I have never seen so many man stomachs!

6. Greetings from kids. In every country, kids had a way of letting us know that we are foreigners.  In Thailand, they would shout at us “farang!” while in Laos the word for us is “falang!”  In Cambodia and Vietnam, we got huge “Hello!!!”s, often from kids riding with their parents on motorbikes.  The cutest greeting came from a little girl in Na Taer, Laos, who would hide behind trees while she followed us around the village, and whenever we saw her, she would burst into giggles and run away yelling “falang!!!”

7. Hilarious clothing. The clothing line that struck me the most was Playboy Bunny Kids.  Another funny sight was shirts that said Adidas with a big Nike swoop underneath.  Some of the clothing sold in Hanoi was so out of control, I had to take pictures of it to remember:

"Nice" dresses that line the streets of the shopping districts. Prom, anyone?

My favorite shirts in Hanoi, these colorful vests hang off of t-shirts with confusing English words. And these are just the tame ones!

This one takes first prize. Please please tell me if you can decipher: "You to me sture live with as it's frat is don't wif to atay I movie away."

Many things surprised me about Southeast Asia, one being that it’s a lot more comfortable here than I had imagined.  I could definitely see the attraction of living here, especially in Thailand and Laos.  I think if I had to pick one place to live, it would be Vientiane.  The biggest surprise in this entire month was the mosquitoes.  No, not the huge amount of them swarming me: the complete opposite!  I was mentally prepared to have dozens of bug bites every day.  But no.  Guess how many bites I got during this past month.  Got the number?  Ok, if you guessed more than one, you’re way off.  I got one measly bite the entire month. Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy I only got one bite, because I didn’t take malaria medication while I was here.  But I am shocked about how much mosquito-borne illness is talked about, and how little it mattered once I was here.  Yes, it is the dry season, but still.  Where are all the bugs???

There are things I will definitely miss about Southeast Asia, like dogs running around by themselves, the scent of incense when passing temples, and the colorful music videos with karaoke on TV.  I will never forget how much fun badminton now looks, or how brilliant a handle on a large water bottle is.  But the great thing about all that is that I know I will be back in Southeast Asia someday.  That’s the coolest part about travel; for every place you go, your dreams add on a dozen more places for the future!

Chiang Mai charms my socks off

Well, not my socks really.  More like my shoes, because I’m taking them off ten times a day to walk into the billion temples we’ve gone to.  (See, I can still be cheesy far away from home.)  I will write more about Chiang Mai and post more pictures later, but for now here’s the main feeling: LOVE!  This was the perfect place to start our trip.  Here, you’re allowed to be a tourist.  It really helps us get comfortable in Asia.  Thais come up and talk to us just to find out where we are from and to give us advice on where to go in Chiang Mai.  They seem genuinely happy that we are visiting their city.

Outside one of the many temples (wats) that we stumble upon in Chiang Mai

The funny thing is, we have run into some of the same Thai people twice.  I guess the city is small compared to places I’ve lived, but running into the same dudes, and them recognizing us, is crazy to me!  The funniest dude is a teacher at a school near our guesthouse.  After I was interviewed by a high school girl for her English class, he came up to tell us where to buy silk (I guess we look like people who want silk?).  After circling a lot of things on our map, he told us all about this flower festival.  We hadn’t heard about any festival, so we just smiled and said thanks.  As we left he shouted out to us: “Flower festival tomorrow!”

The next day, we were walking around the giant Buddhist university, and we see teacher man again.  This time, he tells us to come watch his boy scouts (?!), and when we politely said no thanks, he shouted: “Flower festival tomorrow!”  For the rest of the day, other Thais told us about this flower festival.  So we looked it up in the guide book, and turns out we are here in Chiang Mai for one of their biggest festivals of the year!  Maybe that’s why all the guesthouses filled up this weekend.

Chiang Mai is known as the city of temples

So today we finally got to see this flower festival.  Seriously, what a treat.  There are a bunch of contests for flower clubs and enthusiasts.  Like, serious flowers.  Orchids galore.  You can buy some flowers, but most of them are like showdogs.  They win ribbons.  Although I only saw first and second place… Anyway, they also have a Miss Flower pageant.  And tons of food and stalls selling the usual cheap clothes, jewelry and knick nacks.  But the best part was people watching.  For a long time we sat on top of the wall to the old city just watching the people stroll through the festival.  Back in the day of war (haha) the people in Chiang Mai built the wall to keep out the scary Burmese.  The wall still stands, mostly, but is crumbling in some areas.  We found a dog print in one of the bricks of the wall.  A midieval dog!?

Tomorrow night we leave Chiang Mai for a city in the northeast region of Thailand called Nong Khai. I could hang out here so much longer…

Part of the wall of the old city. The Thai flag is the striped one, and we think the yellow flag is for Chiang Mai.