When you leave for Asia: Travel tips

Pre-Asia Travel tips

When you leave your home country to teach abroad, you will be excited to experience another country. You will be sad to go, nervous to start the job and anticipate the many bites of living in a tropical climate.

Before you leave you will experience random bouts of nausea, butterflies in your stomach, confusion and the sensation of running around in circles. When you depart your flat to love your random junk home, you will be overjoyed to be away from your reclusive housemate who leaves her hair in every plughole, but sorry to leave your home for the last 6 months/year/etc (delete as appropriate).

When you realise that you have one week left in the country and you still haven’t organised vaccinations, packed or bought insurance you will experience feelings of dizziness and recall your senses once three coffees and a glass of red wine have passed your lips. Then you will have more red wine, followed by cheese, in the knowledge that in six days, Stilton and Merlot will be either a very expensive trip to an ex-pat shop or a flight home. It’s o.k, the bikini you just bought to go away with still hasn’t arrived in the post so you don’t have to fit it in to it, yet…

Below are some tips to avoid this chaotic situation for a first time traveler. You can click on the links to go to some useful sites, and read some more of my stories. I am a fan of shameless self-promotion.

Travel Insurance

I once injured myself snowboarding in New Zealand and couldn’t work for a couple of weeks. Going to the doctor in any country other than your own can mean a re-mortgage so it’s worth taking this out. Had I not had insurance I would have had to pay for the hospital bills out of my travel savings, potentially cutting short the trip.

You want a plan that includes personal items, money and repatriation (god forbid) among others. A very good directory to use is the British Insurance Broker’s Association. They will help locate the right company for you to tailor any kind of insurance need you could ever want for some really good prices- highly recommended.

Vaccinations

Of course this all depends on where you are headed, how long for, how long ago you had any previous jabs done and how much you hate needles. They are however required pretty much anywhere bar Europe and your bog standard ones are Typhoid and Hep A. Some countries may also require proof of Yellow Fever before you can even get a visa so it’s best to check with the embassy for the country (s) of destination. You will need to book a travel consultation with the nurse at your surgery and bring any previous documentation (usually a little yellow booklet)- though you an usually get a print out of your vaccination history from your doctor. If you are from an EU country going to Europe make sure you have your E-hic card. If you have an incident on the slopes in France, the authorities will refuse to take you to hospital until you pay an expensive premium, unless you have the card.

Baggage

I mainly use a backpack because it’s easy to move about, you don’t create lots of noise heaving a roller suitcase behind you and you avoid looking like the average punter (although it does come attached with the backpacker stigma)- of course it’s up to you and whatever you are most comfortable with. Most camping shops on the high street will sell backpacks that will also be fitted and strapped on you to the right position. Or you can do what I did and buy it online for a bit cheaper. You will need to make sure you buy the right one for your height and they are generally tailored to male and female fit, which is really helpful.

Flights

I find it’s always handy to have one booked before you get to the airport. SkyScanner is a great site and has a very reliable app so you can book flights last minute from your phone or tablet. Nifty! This is particularly helpful when you want to buy a short haul flight in say Asia, and are not sure of local operators.

Visas

My first rule of thumb is: check with the embassy. You can always get advice from travel agents but I am personally skeptical about this and would never book with them- I was once booted out of Australia over an issue with my visa with a well-known high street travel agent. Some places will allow a stamp on arrival, some require prior organisation. If you are going to work abroad, is your company providing help obtaining the visa? Do you know how much it will cost to obtain? Have you handed over relevant documents? Do you have enough money in your bank to prove to the government you won’t be leaching? The answer to that last one is academic; mostly they just want to know that you will leave when your visa expires.

Bitty-bits

Did you get sunscreen? Do you have a waterproof? Do you have a sewing kit? A pare of shorts you don’t mind ruining in muddy treks? Have you got a store of ant-acids and diarrhoea tablets when you chance a salad from a street vendor? Do you have bite cream for your legs, which will inevitably take on the look of a lepers’?

At the Airport

If you’re a lucky person, a loved one may see you off. If not, hooray! You should congratulate yourself on dodging an emotional goodbye. If you ‘re with your best friend/boyfriend/sibling/imaginary friend you might be petrified and excited about what lies ahead, but remember…

"The only real stumbling block is fear of failing"... Julian Child 

Kaoh Kong, Cambodia, by Tuk-tuk and bike

Happy travels.

Lucy xxx

The night before Crimbo,

December: numinous 

Definition- description of an experience that makes you fearful yet fascinated, - the feeling of being overwhelmed and inspired. I think this definition says it all, and as it’s Christmas, please enjoy my version, or even ode to, ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas or Account of a Visit from St.Nicholas', by Henry Livingston Jr. Pre-travel 'admin' tips will follow soon. Merry Christmas! 

‘Twas the night before Christmas, and all through Heathrow,

Not a flight was stirring, not even a check-in row;

The bags not yet packed, mulled wine out on tap,

In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there, 

to bring umbrella'd cocktails to drink, which we'd share.

The children were nestled all snug in their seats,

While visions of vaccinations and insurance, danced in their heads;

And mamma with her G&T, and I with another,

Had just settled down for a long winter’s night-cap,

When out on the runway, there arose such a clatter,

I sprang from the waiting lounge to see the pilot for a natter.

Away to the sunshine I flew like a flash,

Tore open the free nuts and threw up the sass.

The moon on the breast of the new flying plane

Gave the lustre of mid-day to me in the air,

When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,

But a miniature sleigh, and eight tiny reindeer,

With a little old driver, so lively and quick,

I knew in a moment it must be St.Nick.

More rapid than eagles the Sam-Song* would come,

And he whistled and shouted and warned me the same.

“Now, Dasher! Now Dancer! Now, Prancer and Vixen!

On, Comet! On Cupid! On, Donner and Blitzen!

Be wary of dancing on beaches sans shoes, 

You will gain many cuts and henceforth sore toes!

To the top of the palm trees! To the top of the world!

Now dash away! Dash away! Dash away all!”

As dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly,

When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky,

So up to the stratos-top the fliers we flew,

With the 747, the sleigh full of toys, and St.Nicholas too.

*Sam-Song is Thai rum. Cheap, sweet and guaranteed to result in double vision and in extreme cases, waking up on beaches totally sunburnt, in which case the drinker should then expect the dreaded existential hangover. 

London Underground and urban wildlife

An urban fox chills out at East Croydon train station

"When you get there, you'll forget about all of this,"

my friend Gareth states as we walk down Brick Lane. He’s trying to comfort me while I freak out, quite audibly, over the idea of leaving England again.

East London meets the banking district at Shoreditch, just round the corner from this Mecca to curry, a living ghost from the colonial era. Great graffiti murals decorate the grey brick streets. Shrouded in the dark blanket of cloud above our heads, the streetlights awaken in orange glow. The skyscrapers are blinking their scarlet winks early today, a clear warning to any wayfaring aeroplane.

I nod with trepidation. I am in a rut, a comfy cocoon where travel lies ahead waiting either as a chrysalis or Venus fly trap. It’s a rancid dark and misty day, the kind that induces romanticised images of cuddling in warm windows

He's right, of course he's right. How could anyone feel nervous about fleeing the cold for a tropical climate? Cumin and curry smells waft up my nose as we walk down the street and I consider this further over mouthfuls of greasy burger, purchased from the Diner in Spitalfields market. The Australian waitress, in the same position as Gareth and I have been on more than one occasion. Any jobs, anywhere, just not back home.

On my way home from work the next day, it is sleeting, so I navigate the rusty carcass of my bike on to a train. "Throw me a line", sings The Temper Trap in my ear. Later, a BBC show on urban wildlife tells me we need the urban foxes, who rely on our nightly gifts of leftovers, to connect to nature outside the urban sprawl.

Did you know that pigeons strut around with a gang mentality, befitting the Burroughs where they reside? I think that’s a fantastic piece of information. It says so much about pigeons and humans. Everybody and thing eventually adapts to city life. "Don’t go thinking you gotta be tough”, The Shins warble at me.

Through the weaving underground tunnels, we scuttle around like rats in sewers, trains snake in and out, over, through and slither under London, and you couldn’t get any where without them. You spend so much of your time in this city organising where to go- how much of it do you actually spend ‘there’ whenever you get ‘there’. Interaction is becoming a forgotten instinct and corporate Darwinism is taking over. No wonder people leave sausages out for a feral fox. 

Macaque eating mango at Monkey Cave, Krabi, Thailand

I walk around in the few open spaces on weekends and breathe in big-city-life fumes, peppered with the smells of Kingston Jamaica. Like so many inhabitants here I walk all over the place, but always rushing, always going somewhere, always to the tube. I don’t take buses enough, an under appreciated form of transport here. Do you know how nice it is to drive over the Thames at night? Big Ben ever present, twinkling a chime by the hour. How many times a day do most Londoners get to see that on their daily commute, I wonder?

Maybe we should all become tourists to our homes. Adapt like an urban fox and out wit the grey to bring back some greenery. Look around in awe the things you see all the time, you never know when your favourite bagel shop might be gone, or you gone from it. Stop being a headless business-man, don’t Mind the Gap, do give your chips to the homeless. Invite a fox to stare in your window. Those foxes are pretty cold and hungry.  I wonder if they have urban monkeys in Indonesia.

 Lyrics from ‘Trembling Hands’ by The Temper Trap and ‘Simple Song’ by The Shins

My favourite bagel shop is open 24 hours at the bottom of Brick Lane.