Hi Traveler,
Is it your first time traveling? Brilliant! First thing is first.
Pack light and smart.
No matter if you are going for a short time period or a long time period, there is nothing more regrettable than bringing too much luggage. I’ll set you up with a story before I try to convince you to only bring one 25 kilo/50 lb luggage and a small messenger/carry-on.
Luggage FAIL in Romania
It was the summer of 2009 in which I had a teaching job in Pitesti, Romania for a mere 2 months. Never have I left my country let alone my hometown for more than a week on my own, no mother to make sure I have all my tasks lists together, no mother to rely on logistically or emotionally, so I was nervous. Before I embarked on this plane to this Dracula and mystical place, I packed two luggage, both 50 lb each, a large duffel bag as my carry on, another bag to hold my laptop, and my personal purse to hold my wallet, notebook, and non-useful things. I packed more than a month worth of clothes, all the shoes that I thought I would need, many gifts (gifts are very important btw), loads of underwear, books!? (only read one out of many), and lots of those whimsical knickknacks, enough to fill two 50lb luggage.
Now here is the part of the story where I had enough bad experience to learn to pack lightly. After I had finished teaching in Pitesti, I repacked everything and found that I didn’t even use the other luggage that I had brought, most of the stuff in my first luggage I didn’t use, and those books…those books I didn’t even touch because I was too busy soaking up the life that was in the city I was traveling in! Going from Bucharesti to the airport was the most awful and frustrating experience I had to go through. If you can imagine, one 50 lb rolling luggage in each hand, a duffel bag as big as a sports bag on top of one of the luggage, a laptop bag on the other, and a shoulder messenger slipping off every 10 seconds. It was 5 am in the city of Bucharesti, so the dogs are looking for food during that time in packs. I had to walk down to their train station and there were no elevators, so I had to carry one luggage at a time all the way down to the bottom while watching my bags up on top to make sure no one snatches one of them. Then I had to run back upstairs to fetch the other luggage while keeping an eye out for the luggage at the bottom. That wasn’t the worst part, I was in the wrong train stop, so I had to repeat this process of going up and down the stairs twice more fearing that I would miss my plane or eaten by dogs all at the same time!
In the end, I made it to on-time to catch my flight because some nice Romanians helped me with my luggage and brought me all the way to the airport even though we didn’t have a common language.
Why Pack Lightly?
The point that I hope you take away from this dramatic story is that you pack lightly, comfortable enough that if you run into a flight a stairs like me you don’t have to fear for your luggage’s life that’s waiting for you at the top. Having as little as possible just makes traveling so much more pleasant and free.When you pack, pack:
- Check the weather
- Pack a bag within a bag. Just in case you buy souvenirs or what you packed originally just doesn’t fit somehow.
- Pack one week’s worth of clothing. Depending on the weather, jeans can be worn more than once with several different shirts or blouses (no one will notice that you wore the same jeans two days out of 7), seven different shirts is more than enough. What I do is I bring many tank tops, blouses that can be mix-matched with tank tops, tops that can match with my jacket. I bring one or two jackets if it’s cold weather. If it’s cold weather, people won’t see what you wear underneath half the time anyway.
- Wash your clothes; people tend to not put in the thought that you can wash your clothes when packing. If you are worried about the limited variety of clothes to wear, keep in mind that you are traveling around and meeting new people constantly, no one will remember your outfit. If you think must bring all your favorite clothes which could mean your while closet, also keep in mind that you can purchase clothes everywhere you go. There is nothing you can’t buy when you get to your destination.
You will have less to worry about, free hands to roam around the city without worrying about where to store your excessive luggage, and it will definitely keep you away from paying those ridiculous overweight luggage fees.
Don’t worry about it if you didn’t get the hang of it the first time. Overtime, the experiences you have with packing will help you learn and improve. Rolling my clothes tend to help me pack better to save more space, I found a blogger who teaches just that.
How do you pack? I have a problem packing when I come back on my trips, I get so lazy and I just don’t have the motivation or drive to pack to go home.
Hope this is good use for you,
Dandelion Traveler
dandeliontraveler 