Means I started thinking about my favorite Christmas movies. One of these years i'll spend the season where its cold again!
Thursday, November 29, 2012
Wednesday, November 28, 2012
Sorting Money for the trip
So while in Thailand, as part of the trip, most of my expenses will already be paid and handled prior to my arrival, leaving only money for the weekends and free time, plus any extras I wish to acquire while out (Christmas shopping in Thailand, hello.)
While going through the wonderful and heartfelt exercise that is rolling coins, I began to wonder if the US dollar is excepted in Cambodia. I know from my trip to Peru that I exchanged money and used local currency, though i'm unsure of if it was accepted while in Europe as I actually didn't handle any of the money on that trip. Also, from talking with our coordinator for the Thailand trip, I've learned that in Bangkok I will be using the Thai Baht. (Also discovered the withdrawal fee from the ATMs,which was a handy bit of information. Its $5, btw, if you're with Regions Bank.) Turns out, I can use US dollars, and its not seen as any sort of "black market" or under handed sort of exchange. Also handy to know, surely. This site was pretty useful:
While going through the wonderful and heartfelt exercise that is rolling coins, I began to wonder if the US dollar is excepted in Cambodia. I know from my trip to Peru that I exchanged money and used local currency, though i'm unsure of if it was accepted while in Europe as I actually didn't handle any of the money on that trip. Also, from talking with our coordinator for the Thailand trip, I've learned that in Bangkok I will be using the Thai Baht. (Also discovered the withdrawal fee from the ATMs,which was a handy bit of information. Its $5, btw, if you're with Regions Bank.) Turns out, I can use US dollars, and its not seen as any sort of "black market" or under handed sort of exchange. Also handy to know, surely. This site was pretty useful:
Everything i've been reading about the general cost of things (good research, btw, helps in preventing you from being scammed. Helps, but does not ensure) seems that once i'm actually there, it shouldn't be terribly expensive.
It looks like the US dollar can take you pretty far in both Cambodia and Thailand (though in Thailand, they may be talking about the equivalent of) which is good news for me as I'm counting pennies over here. I booked a hostel on hostelworld.com after reading multiple reviews on there, as well as tripadvisor (both sites are amazing, btw, and I recommend them for reference if looking for places to stay abroad. I used them for Peru and both of the hostels we stayed at were wonderful.) The most expensive part (plane travel aside) will be for my English speaking tour guide and the Angkor Wat tickets. The rest will depend on what I decide to buy or not.
Packing
So packing has been a bit of a mother ducker. And yes, I wrote that, that wasn't auto-correct.
I decided to go with everything for the trip in a carry on bag, which was difficult in ways and then not in others. I can't decide if it was the packing that was difficult or just finding clothing to suit all my needs.
For Cambodia, I packed a bunch of plain t-shirts and loose pants basically, and, while I say "for Cambodia", these items will all double as items for Thailand as well for my free/exploring time. This basically means any time i'm not at placement. I also brought some cover ups for my shoulders for areas like Wats, The Grand Palace, and my placement.
Everything I packed had to be light weight, as both countries are tropical and heavy on the humidity, but I also shoved in a jacket and a hoodie because hey, I thought Peru was going to be warm and cozy too and I can think of quite a few days where I was more than thankful to have long sleeves and a hoodie. Speaking of long sleeves, I packed a few lightweight ones of those as well as my tattoos need to be covered for my placement. I've actually decided to list it out as I found when I was searching for what others brought, it was hard to find and I wished someone else had. So!
(I've also decided to make a Youtube playlist just for this process/trip in general because, once again, I was looking for these and found one and it was a HUGE help. So that can be found here, if you like, or if you hate reading, whatever floats your boat.)
Heres a list of the things I shoved into a Delta regulation sized carry on:
In my book bag
*for my toiletry items:
** Notebook with all my information:
I find it useful when going on trips to have a notebook of all my confirmation numbers and arrangements, directions, addresses and contact information, as well as information about the places i'll be visiting. It basically becomes a little guide book for me while i'm away since I can't afford to buy every LonelyPlanet or Top 10 book that I honestly want. This makes for good reading on the plane ride over, as well as serves as a way to educate myself about the sites prior to arrival. In the end, they're nice little scrap books as well of the journey if you like. I generally arrange them in the order of things that'll be happening, high lighting information for my eyes to go to if I'm quickly scanning for something specific, but that's just my logic and you can do whatever works for you.
For this one I have printed the picture Pimsuda sent of the Home base staff with names and put it in the front cover.
Inside:
I decided to go with everything for the trip in a carry on bag, which was difficult in ways and then not in others. I can't decide if it was the packing that was difficult or just finding clothing to suit all my needs.
For Cambodia, I packed a bunch of plain t-shirts and loose pants basically, and, while I say "for Cambodia", these items will all double as items for Thailand as well for my free/exploring time. This basically means any time i'm not at placement. I also brought some cover ups for my shoulders for areas like Wats, The Grand Palace, and my placement.
Everything I packed had to be light weight, as both countries are tropical and heavy on the humidity, but I also shoved in a jacket and a hoodie because hey, I thought Peru was going to be warm and cozy too and I can think of quite a few days where I was more than thankful to have long sleeves and a hoodie. Speaking of long sleeves, I packed a few lightweight ones of those as well as my tattoos need to be covered for my placement. I've actually decided to list it out as I found when I was searching for what others brought, it was hard to find and I wished someone else had. So!
(I've also decided to make a Youtube playlist just for this process/trip in general because, once again, I was looking for these and found one and it was a HUGE help. So that can be found here, if you like, or if you hate reading, whatever floats your boat.)
Heres a list of the things I shoved into a Delta regulation sized carry on:
- Dress
- Black Leggings
- Black pants
- Fancy shirt
- 7 shirts
- One lightweight button down
- CCS shirt for arrival
- Loose over shirt
- 3 pairs of pants
- 7 underwear
- 5 bras
- 7 pairs of socks
- two small bags of toiletries*
- Power converter
- Extra bag for weekend
- smaller bag for phone/camera/money
- money pouch
- Bug wipes
In my book bag
- small 2x4 photo album for placement
- Water bottle
- 3 books for the plane
- Notebook with all information**
- CCS handbook
- snacks ( food bars and cranberries)
- Passport and Visa
- Sketch Book and pens
- Shampoo
- Conditioner
- Body wash
- face wash
- tooth paste
- body spray
- deodorant
- Sun screen for body
- Sun screen for face
- Bug wipes
- Tylenol
- Cotton swabs
- Neosporin and band-aids
** Notebook with all my information:
I find it useful when going on trips to have a notebook of all my confirmation numbers and arrangements, directions, addresses and contact information, as well as information about the places i'll be visiting. It basically becomes a little guide book for me while i'm away since I can't afford to buy every LonelyPlanet or Top 10 book that I honestly want. This makes for good reading on the plane ride over, as well as serves as a way to educate myself about the sites prior to arrival. In the end, they're nice little scrap books as well of the journey if you like. I generally arrange them in the order of things that'll be happening, high lighting information for my eyes to go to if I'm quickly scanning for something specific, but that's just my logic and you can do whatever works for you.
For this one I have printed the picture Pimsuda sent of the Home base staff with names and put it in the front cover.
Inside:
- Delta flight itinerary
- Divider for "Pre-departure"
- Last minute tips for Thailand packing
- Information booklet for placement
- Divider for "Cambodia"
- Confirmation from hostel of airport pickup and instructions
- Confirmation for arranged tours and prices**
- Confirmation for hostel and final payment **
- Information on each of the locations I will be visiting on my tour
- Divider for "Thailand"
- Contact information for CCS
- Arrival instructions
- Divider for "Placement"
- Printed PDF information of my placement
- 'Tips for new volunteers' sheet
- 'How you can help' sheet
- Game ideas and activities that I looked up
- Divider for "Extra"
- Phrases in Thai that I might find useful
- Places of interest for my free time
** Everything in my notebook is in page protectors, and behind areas where payment is required, I place an envelope with the amount of money needed between the sheets and paperclip/secure the top of the page protector to prevent it from falling out. I find that dividing my money for exact change when possible is helpful as then I can simply hand that over instead of pulling out all of my travel money and counting it out in public. I also split up where I hide my money on my person when abroad anyway in case someone is extra free with their fingers. Put it where you like but keeping emergency cash in the boobs is useful ladies, and unlikely to go missing (at least without your notice, and if someone has managed to relieve you of this emergency stash then...well frankly, bravo. Dats talent.)
It begins!
So, just a few days out and I've been trying to get everything in order...
This includes:
This includes:
- packing
- money
- whoa, what did I forget
- Notebook with all my arrangements
- Information on the places i'll be going
- Books to read on plane
- Journal
- sketch book and pens
- Language practice
Packing has been interesting as I've decided to try and take everything I need in a single carry on suitcase.
Not necessarily as hard as you might think, as my placement in Thailand will have a washing machine, which allows me to pack considerably less for my stay. I could elaborate more on this, but I figured i'd make my packing list and process a whole other post. You can find that here.
No...No, this post will be more about my (prepare yourself) feelings. I've been going back and forth from feeling like I've still got a fair amount of time to prepare to feeling like its right around the corner and i'm not even sure what to do with myself. It's like having so much to do that you just get overwhelmed and end up not doing anything at all, which I might add is basically how I spent the first few days of this week. Now that i'm four days out however, I've managed to kick it into high gear and get a few things accomplished each day.
No...No, this post will be more about my (prepare yourself) feelings. I've been going back and forth from feeling like I've still got a fair amount of time to prepare to feeling like its right around the corner and i'm not even sure what to do with myself. It's like having so much to do that you just get overwhelmed and end up not doing anything at all, which I might add is basically how I spent the first few days of this week. Now that i'm four days out however, I've managed to kick it into high gear and get a few things accomplished each day.
It's odd to have something that you've been preparing for for so long right around the corner. You go from having more time than you need to get things done to suddenly not having any at all, and realizing how little you actually managed to get done in "all that extra time" is really awe-inspiring in its own little way.
As I mentioned before, i'm both excited, and incredibly nervous when I really think about it. Not so much nervous about my placement in Thailand, as there i'll be with a group, and surely one or two of them will know what is going on. There, i'll be in an organized group, with someone in charge, pointing in what direction to go and assigning me a baby to chase after. In Cambodia however, its all me and my arrangements, all of which I've taken care of prior to leaving of course, however, as anyone who has traveled can tell you, just because you have plans and arrangements does not in any way mean that that is what you will be doing. Going solo isn't really something that has kept me up late into the night or anything, but i'm not naive enough to think that, although this'll be a grand adventure for sure, it does not come without some risks.
I am all of five foot two (and a half, something I will cling to dearly) and a woman. While I am not looking for evil-doers around every corner, I am aware that they are out there, and despite my beloved cartoons and fantasy stories, aren't always hunched over with warts on their face and a giant neon flashing sign over them. It would be handy to have taken more classes on personal protection I think, and might be something to invest in once I get home again.
Now, logic aside, Woo hoo! I can't freakin' wait! I've debated going into everything i'll see in Cambodia and Thailand here, but I think i'll break that up into another post. While in Cambodia, I doubt i'll be online too much as I don't plan on taking my laptop, but I will be packing a personal journal to make updates once i've hit Thailand if nothing else.
Anyway, wary but ready!
Adventure is out there!
Christi
Christi
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