Packing tips for backpackers- top five things to remember

Now I may be wrong (and correct me if I am) but I think it may have been a little while since I last posted. The truth is I've been a bit domesticated. One of those young layabouts who keeps a steady job, a consistent social life and knows the current plot arcs on all the popular tv shows. Shameful, I know.

But I'm back! And travelling again! Life will have meaning once more! With my UK visa expiring shortly, I'll be doing the long trip back to Australia soon but before I go, I just have to take some time to run off 'round Europe. Who knows when the chance will come again?

So that's September's plan, a jaunt around the continent, skipping across boarders and navigating the train system like a freaking boss. My interrail ticket has arrived, I've stocked up on toiletries and there are about twelve different "useful lists" floating around my living room. Over the next month I should have lots of updates, hopefully some helpful and mildly witty ones. But since I'm currently killing time in St Pancras awaiting my train to gay Paris, I thought I'd try and offer some packing advise. 

The general rule of thumb for packing (that every experienced backpacker everywhere will repeat to you) is to lay out everything you want to take, then halve it. This always holds true but there are always some items you'd never want to do without. 

St Pancras International

And so, triumphantly, I present to you my top five list of things I'd never want to do without on a trip! Enjoy!

1. Moisturizer and deodorant- you'd think these would be things you could pick up anywhere if you left them behind but a lot of deodorants and skincare products you'll purchase overseas include irritants you won't be used to and  offer "whitening" properties. i.e Bleach. So unless a patchy white face and underarms is the look you're going for, best to take your favorite brands from home.

2. An extra padlock- if you don't bring one Murphy's Law says you'll almost certainly will lose yours or acquire a second bag or encounter a locker that your first one doesn't fit on. Particularly useful if you're taking long bus or train trips in slightly dodgy company where you may nod off at some point. You can lock your daypack to the seat or you belt buckle or whatever else. Not going to stop a determined thief but it will stop an opportunist.

3. Posh clothes - unless you're on an actual trek or climbing Everest or some such malarkey, you're almost certainly going to want to go out to bars or a nice dinner or show or even just wander through a city centre. And you're not going to want to do that in your skeezy sneakers and a souvenir beer vest. I'm not saying take your old prom dress or a suit but a nice shirt or cute dress and clean shoes will be invaluable.

Bonus general clothes rule: if you'd be embarrassed to walk down the high street in it back home, you're not going to feel comfortable in it overseas.

4. Umbrella or rain jacket- as a general guide, if you'll be spending most of your time in cities go with the umbrella. If you're more likely to be roughing it, go with the rain jacket. Or both! Easily purchased overseas but the first time you realize you need one (i.e it's chucking it down) they'll either be exorbitantly overpriced or nowhere to be found.

5. A smartphone- hands down the number one thing you don't want to do without. Yes they're expensive, yes it would totally suck to lose it but get some insurance and bring it anyway. It's an all in one phone, train timetable, trashy novel, guidebook, room/ticket booker and translator! If you're spending more than a week in any country where you don't speak the language I highly recommend getting the relevant "lingopal" app, which is a translator tool. The "light" versions don't cost a penny and the full versions are less than a quid. These bad boys have saved my life on multiple occasions. My new favourite app in the world is Tripit, which lets me directly import itineraries, booking numbers, confirmation emails, etc into one easy to manage location. Not only that, it also creates maps to the various locations I have to go and can give me weather updates. Absolutely fab. 

(Note: if you do follow my advise and end up relying on your phone to manage all this, don't forget the charger. You'll look mighty stupid)

Other things to check out: 

• If you're looking for specific advise on packing lists for a "hardcore" backpacker trip, Travel Independent is always a good place to start and this page in particular will help.
• If you're "flashpacking" and are looking for suggestions that are more fashion minded I thought this article was great. 
• If you're starting a student exchange, this site would be a good place to start. 

(Dear people from the future - if any of these links stop functioning, let me know and I'll replace/delete them)

The art of living dangerously (or How to be an idiot)

I met a guy once in Cambodia. Let's call him Liam. Liam was one of those lifetime backpackers- already in his late thirties, never settled down, never stopped travelling, a little bit pitiable but also rather funny and incredibly knowledgable. There are many Liam's in the world.

 

I met Liam in a bar, where he was convincing bunches of people to sponsor his drinking and making plans to get across to Laos the following morning in some guy's truck. His stories were the kind of stories I hoped to one day tell. The kind of improbable, hair-raising, smile inducing, incredible memories that all travellers are jealous of, including me. Or at least I was until I witnessed how he picked them up.

 

Liam left us quite late into the night and I expected that was to be the last I saw of him. He wandered nonchalantly back into the bar about twenty minutes later and we soon learnt there were about thirty locals waiting for him outside. It turns out that moments before this, Liam made a business transaction with them (i.e. he got himself some coke) and had sampled what he was given and decided it wasn't strong enough... and refused to pay. If you're ever reading this, Liam, this is why I didn't add you on facebook.

 

Long, slightly threatening story short: Liam was forced by the bartenders to go pay for his goods (a full $10 I believe... outrageous!) and then went on his merry way. Now, one day, he's going to tell that story to other folks and they're going to think it's amazing. But it's not. In fact, it's an easy way to end up getting curb stomped by twelve year old asian drug dealers. Never fun.

 

Now I'm aware that I'm supposed to say that the moral to Liam's story is "Don't Do Drugs, Kids" but instead I'm going to go with "Don't Be A Stupid Moron, You Moron". Have a blast, do stupid things, make an idiot of yourself... but try and live to tell the tale. Dumb luck runs out for everyone eventually.

Marketable Oddities

Snapped this photo on Sunday at the markets in San Telmo, Buenos Aires. These happen weekly and seem to be Argentina's answer to what to get the person who has everything.

These markets are all over the place, but the San Telmo ones are perhaps some of the greatest. They run all the way along Defensa avenue, taking over Plaza Dorrego and about ten or more buildings, courtyards and alleyways along the way. Along with unusable items like the above, they also have stalls selling food, jewellery, touristy trinkets and hundreds selling antique silverware. 

Universal Hostel Soundtrack

One thing you notice very quickly when travelling is that there seems to be a single mix tape that gets passed around all the hostels. I thought I was imagining things at first but apparently; there really is one! Three of the hostels I've stayed in in Argentina (my current country of residence) have been associated with Hostel Inn. It was whilst I was staying at the second one that I began to notice that breakfast was always accompanied by the same backing music. Showers were the same. Don't get me started on the “party mix” that played after 10pm. Once I reached the third one, I was curious enough to ask the staff. And that's when I was let in on the big conspiracy.

They really are playing the same mixes! They have an easy listening mix, a local mix, a pop mix, and their mix mix for every day use. I knew it!

So here are some tracks to get used to if you're planning on travelling anytime soon. I heard each of these a minimum of nine or ten times in each hostel and I'm still not sick of them! I'm not sure if that says something about the music or me.

Santeria - Sublime

San Francisco - Scott McKenzie (hated it to start with, but it's become a bit of an anthem)

Feel Good Inc. - Gorillaz

Your Woman - White Town

In This World - Moby

Home - Edward Sharpe (this one's getting iffy- might not be able to handle another dozen plays)

And as an extra special bonus, here are some of the songs I am sick of:

E.T - Katy Perry

Born this Way - Lady Gaga

Party Anthem - LMFAO

Back to Black - Amy Winehouse

Pursuit of Happiness - Kid Cudi (and I really used to like this song)

Stranger Danger

It almost goes without saying, but I'll say it anyway:
You meet the strangest individuals inside backpacker hostels that you'll ever encounter in your life. Seriously. 


Some of the freakiest and scariest events of my life have occurred in hostels, as have some of the funniest and most incredible. It's a balance. All these events create fantastic stories to travel home with, but the highlight of these tales are always the wacky characters everyone believes you must be exaggerating. These people may drive you crazy at the time, but they usually hold the starring role in what will likely be your favourite memories of the trip.

I once encountered a family who were so worried about me travelling alone that they tried to send their eldest son along after me to accompany wherever I was going each day. Annoying? Yes. It was cringeworthy to try and convince them (politely) that I was safe. But going out to dinner with this family and watching them try to hold entire conversations with the waiter in a language they didn't speak was hysterical.

In a hostel, people like this are just part of the deal. I've encountered a guy who came sprinting into the hostel after midnight with angry local thieves giving chase. I met a girl who spent well over an hour trying to convince me it was daylight outside at 1am. One crazy old couple carried their mountain bikes everywhere (including inside) and just yesterday I played Drinking Monopoly (after we gave up on Drinking Risk) with a guy who threw the most impressive loser's tantrum I've ever seen and then managed to fall out of bed whilst attempting to convince us he was sober enough to go clubbing. That's a story I'll be telling for a while. (sorry mate)

These people and their counterparts in hostels all over the globe are a large part of what makes travel fun. They're also what makes travel scary and awkward, but like I said: it's a balance.

Paranoia

I've been in Argentina for coming on three weeks now and as of yet, I am yet to go out in public without having a death grip on my bag. Paranoid? Yes. But I haven't had it stolen yet, have I!

Paranoia can be an element of life regardless of what you're doing, but for some reason when we travel; we take it to the extremes. Not everyone is as bad as me, (I freely admit I am a bit of a nutter) but it still plays on your mind. I have encountered travellers who compulsively check their room is locked (one girl went back to check twice after we'd left the hostel) and others who put padlocks on every zipper of their backpacks, or get suspicious of anyone who approaches them because "they could be trying to sell me something".

I think we get this way because those are the warnings we're given before we leave. Before leaving for Argentina, I was warned that I would almost definitely be pickpocketed. When in Cambodia, my fear was that someone would go through my luggage in the hotels, because that's what I'd been told would happen. There's probably a unique fear for almost every travel destination you could think of.

There are some fears, however, that follow us wherever we go. I, for example, cannot get on an unfamiliar bus anywhere in the world without tracing every turn we take on a map and holding my finger poised above the stop button. Why? Because I'm completely terrified of missing my stop. Who knows what could happen if I did! I could be lost for years! This usually gets me laughed at by anyone I'm travelling with.

But you know what? You can mock all you want, because unlike some people, I will never miss my stop. I will never come back to a hostel room and find I've left my locker unlocked and my stuff's been taken, and I will never be ripped off for coffee (because I've memorised the cost in both languages and I'm still holding the original menu I ordered off! Ha!).

And you know something? I've encountered eight or nine fellow backpackers already in Argentina who've had their wallet stolen. And guess who's still holding onto theirs! Coincidence? I think not!

How to be the Uber Backpacker

Many people think they've achieved this. Think that all they had to do was chuck a backpack on their back and walk around in shorts with zippers on them. But in real life, becoming the cliché takes a lot more hard work than anyone truly appreciates. I myself have never been able to fully achieve this, but in an attempt to help those greater than me who may be up for the challenge, I have written the following.

The bag: No suitcases for you! You need a backpack, man! This should have originally cost more than your camera, but if it's value is even close to that now, you're not working hard enough. This backpack will be yours for at least the next fifteen years, so treat it well, but make sure it's still been through a lot. It should demonstrate to anyone who even glances at it that you're a serious traveller. It should have been mended at least twice. It should have traces of mud from South East Asia. Motor oil stains from Russia. It should have things written on it in marker by inconsiderate baggage handlers in Colombia. It should have a flag sewn into it (not from your home country... that would just mark you as another tourist... ugh). And most of all, it should have the sweat marks from your back permanently staining it.

The shoes: Teva sandles, man. Nothing else will do. No sneakers, no heals, no pretty little ballet flats or dress shoes. Just a sturdy pair of sandles and the bold tan lines to match them. Get it? Got it? Good.

The clothes: The shorts with zippers should go without saying. Upon first leaving your home country (otherwise known as “that backward, internalised country with no thought to its international reputation”) you should bring band tshirts or ones with weird artwork on them. Whilst overseas, though, you need to start collecting beer singlets. Not just standard ones from overdeveloped industrial nations, but real local ones that you'll have to explain to everyone you meet (even if they never asked).

The hair: Go with dreads and suddenly you change from Uber Backpacker to Hippie, so avoid that. What you want to do is have one or two colourful braids put in by helpful street kids to whom you'll cheerfully give away your western cash. No hairbands and bobby pins if it gets in your face, but you can get a rainbow coloured scarf or turban to keep it back.

Accessories: “It's called a keffiyeh and I wear it to support Palestine, actually.” 

Conversation topics: Much like the friendly hipster or the suffering uni student, your options for conversation are lacking. However, you may talk about all the unusual and “untainted” places you've travelled to (read: travel wanking), as well as the literature that inspired you to travel as a teenager, the plight of refugees and the amazon, and the tragedy that is the tourist.

Hope this helps you all! Good luck in your quests to become the Uber Backpacker. Remember: There Can Only Be One!