How to Pack… Not

Procrastination.. What does that mean? I’ll look it up later…

I am not very good at packing. I envy those people that can make a list, know everything they need, and then pack it al neatly a couple days or even weeks in advance. I start out with good intentions, starting a list of what I need, then I get distracted. Or as university students know this condition as, procrastination.

First step in packing – cleaning out my room, truck, and anything else where I might have belongs. Sounds alot like how I would start writing a lab report in University. But this was a little more productive as during this cleaning process I could take account of what I had, what I forgot I had, and what I needed to get before I could really start packing.

Second step in packing – making pies of stuff I think I need, and then sorting, sorting again, and sorting again until I have reached critical mass (my backpack zips up!). Refer to my attached picture for my initial stages of packing, which by the end the amount I packed was a third of what I originally had piled.

Third step in packing – Make sure to not have everything completely packed the night before. It’s always fun at four thirty in the morning to be packing. Actually I found it really easy to make quick decisions on what could and couldn’t come when I couldn’t get my carry on bag zipped up.

What You Need

Through my packing process and needing to fit 2 months worth of personal items in a backpack for weather ranging from rainy and cold (not cold in Canadian sense but around 15 degrees Celsius) to the hot and humid feels like 45 degrees Celsius temperature of the Amazon and everything in-between I came to a conclusion about things you definitely should not forget.

1.Drugs! No, not your recreational stuff that will really put a damper on your trip when you go through customs, but your prescription drugs. Having traveled to malaria risk areas four times now, I have met travelers that swear by buying the malaria drugs while traveling. After watching a documentary on counterfeit drugs and hearing that there is an astornomical amount of counterfeit malaria drugs in Africa resulting in people getting sick, I highly reccommend to GET YOUR DRUGS AT HOME! Yes, some drugs like the malaria pills are expensive, paying $100 (less if you have a benefit plan) is an astronomical amount to prevent yourself from getting really sick! I’m all for getting bargains, but some things you just don’t cheap out on.

2. Cash – Alot of people these days don’t even see cash. Everything is plastic. Sometimes I’m not even sure if I actually have the cash my bank account says I do… I’ve never seen it! All my income is direct deposit and I use my credit card for most purchases. All I see is little numbers on a screen moving up (preferred) and down. Taking cash is a risk, I’ll be the first to admit it having had $200 stolen on my first trip to Ecuador, but I will tell you a story from today as to why cash is important!

This morning everything went well, got my bag packed, my very nice mother woke up at 5 to drive me to the airport, got through customs, and got on the plane for the first leg of my trip to Houston. Upon arrival with a 4 hour layover until my flight to Quito, I wandered around the airport until I could find some free wifi to tap into. Word of advice when looking for the free wifi – there will be about 6 people standing around on their phones trying to look inconspicuous in front of the exclusive lounges for the first class people. Upon a quick check of my emails, I was ecstatic to find out my credit card had been “compromised.” What does this mean you might ask? Well upon what will most likely be a $10 phone conversation on my phone, I got to find out that someone copied my credit card and they had to cancel it. Lovely, after having this credit card for about 5 years I become a victum of credit card theft the day I am leaving the country for two months! Seriously any thieves out there, why can’t you at least be courteous and ask me when is a good time for me to be robbed! Long story short, it will take four days to ship a credit card to Ecuador, unfortunately at the moment I don’t have a street address for the rural area I will be staying at! But I will be okay for now as I brought cash! And if you are worried about your cash getting stolen, I will tell you alittle secret about a sweet money belt that looks like a real belt I purchased on ebay for 7 dollars (including shipping). Not that getting a new card in America is hard, wandering the air port and two kiosk people have tried to get me to sign up for credit cards. It’s sad how easy it is for people to get further and further into debt. Living the American (and Canadian) dream.

3. Passport – No brainer. One thing they forget to mention and it was a good thing I found out about this is that some countries will not take a passport that is within 6 months of its expirary date! Now what is the point of an expirary date then?

That is about all for make it or break it packing items. People wear clothes in forgein contries too! Don’t freak out if you forget your socks! You can buy more.

What You Don’t Need

A short bit of advice for this part, if you don’t use it on a regular basis at home.. DON’T PACK IT. In my experience I can almost guarentee that you won’t use it. For Canadians, there is one exception to this rule.. Sunscreen.

Advice For Solo Travelers (Like Me!)

I am a very shy person when it comes to strangers and meeting new people (get to know me and this is a whole different ball game), so sometimes when I am traveling solo I have to go out of my comfort zone and initiate the conversation. If you see someone at a hostel, airport, tourist stop etc. don’t be afraid to just start up a conversation. For some reason I always tend to strike up a conversation with people that are traveling in pairs. During a visit to the hotsprings outside of Cuenca, Ecuador I met a older gentleman (50 or so) and a young girl in her twenties from France traveling together. Now their story is that he is her dance coach and they are doing some dance things in Ecuador, but my feeling is they might have been doing alittle more than dancing… You never know the people you might meet, and never know when you might meet again (thank goodness we have Facebook.)

A Bit More Advice

Regarding the previous bit of advice about meeting other people, there is the occasional type of person you should avoid at all costs! On my last trip to Ecuador I had the unfortunate displeasure of meeting one of these people.

For the last week of my previous Ecuador trip I decided to head to the beach to a town called Montanita, that came recommended by the Australian hired man at my uncles (maybe not the most reliable source…) Upon later research, after my arrival I learned that this town is considered the “Amsterdam” of Ecuador. Watch Eurotrip if you are not sure what that entails. Anyways a very nice beach town, with some fun bars that get a wee bit crazy, but the bar is not where my story takes place, it takes place in broad daylight on a public beach.

One day in Montanita I found my self wandering along the beach to a rocky outcropping where numerous people wander around on. During my search for cool rocks and seashells a local guy about my age came up to me;
Guy- “some spanish I don’t quite remember exactly what he said”
Me – “No entiendo” (I don’t understand in spanish)
Guy – “Tu es muy bonito”
Me – Ugh I do know what that means but I do not want to talk to this guy so I summon up a confused look on my face and shrug my shoulder
Guy – Now speaking english “Where are you from? You are very pretty”
Me – Aw crap, now how to I get out of this conversation. Wait! I am canadian. It is perfectly logical that I speak french.. “no comphrenda.. frances?”

This guy continues to try to talk to me despite my best acting skills and my awesome grade 7 french skills. So as I continue on my wanderings I have a follower. LIke any well trained farm girl going into a pen with a animal I find a stick and use it as a “walking stick” (farm terms – emergency beating stick). After a few minutes of wandering and this guys continued attempts at conversation with my french alter ego and my failed attempts to catch one of the little crabs that are running around he catches one for me and as I reach to grab it from his hand I am confronted with full frontal nudity! That is not the type of crabs I want to catch! Instead of using my “walking stick” I just decided to walk away and go find some bleach to wash my eyeballs in to try to burn the image from them.

Advice when you meet someone like this – Tell them to (insert profanity here) off immediately, pretending not to understand and not replying does NOT work. Even having people around doesn’t seem to deter these people as there was another couple of tourists maybe 30 ft away. I don’t think I will ever be getting married if all guys think girls will instantly want to have sex with them if they flash their junk.If I was this guys parent’s I would disown him.

My Destination Awaits

Right now I am writing this post on my iphone on the plane to Ecuador in the hopes I can get it uploaded on the wifi at the hostel I am staying tonight. I apologize for any spelling errors, and pictures or links that are not working or up to date. Tomorrow I head to Guayaquil and will be heading out to rural Ecuador for my volunteer program. Internet may be hard to come by, especially wifi, but I will do my best to keep you up to date on my adventures and hopefully have alot more interesting pictures to share!