I started to write up our visit to Danang yesterday, thinking it would be a short ‘n’ sweet kind of post, like the visit, but then I remembered a bunch of funny stories and things we did (some of them might not be that funny but they are at least stories) and pretty soon I was drafting several paragraphs and selecting many photographs and I think it’s going to take me a while to write up two months of travelling. There is so much to tell you. Like the pet pig I saw in a Chiang Mai food market. The time I nearly fell down a toilet in Laos. When I went to a church in Hanoi and realised why people like churches (don’t worry, I’m still a salty atheist with a complex).
I can’t quite believe it, but we go home in eight days. In fact I am writing this during the early evening, so in a week’s time I will probably be packing. Or I’ll be in one of Bangkok’s markets, bartering for a new summer wardrobe and all the souvenirs I’ve denied myself since January. I want a nice set of chopsticks, because I have finally mastered chopsticks (I can feed myself with them, anyway), another pair of elephant trousers because I will look cool and well-traveled if I wear them in Southend high street, a silk scarf or five and possibly an elephant plushie. I have even checked my airline’s hand luggage allowance to see if I can squeeze more stuff in. Our checked luggage can go up to about 30kg, and I don’t think I hit 20 on the way out, but our backpacks are only about 45 litres, so I may have to go all Marie Kondo and roll my bras into my sandals.
Then again, if living out of one bag for three months (with a fair bit of bra rolling) has taught me anything, it’s that you don’t need a lot of objects to get by. In Chiang Mai I kept nearly tripping over a couple of guests’ bags, because they left them open on the floor and holy bats they had a lot of stuff. I refused to scrimp on facial products and underwear, and my bulkiest items have been electrical (which, if I wanted to backpack like a purist, I would have left at home) but otherwise I’ve been pretty bare bones. Aside from clothes and my sleeping bag, most of my items have been things like contact lenses, notebooks (I’ve finished three and started two) and prescription sunglasses. Technically they’re all luxuries, and Maxim thought I had way too much stuff when we started – but he doesn’t need glasses and doesn’t write. He also doesn’t menstruate, and I absolutely refused to leave the UK without a supply of sanitary products, just in case South East Asia did not have pharmacies (spoiler alert: it does). I have a feeling I’m going to walk into my bedroom at home and, after crying with delight upon reunion with my bed, look at my stuff and think ‘what the fuck was I thinking when I bought this?’
To be honest, I’ve thought that a few times already… and yet I still seem to own 7865 pieces of overpriced MCR merchandise, 387 handbags when I use the same rucksack every day until it breaks and I buy a new one and 2567 dresses, most of which don’t fit because my clothing size fluctuates with my IBS.
I’ve just remembered that I have not worn a dress, jeans or a pair of boots for three months. I’m looking forward to putting on my Doc Martens almost as much as I am looking forward to the dogs. And I’m going to get a haircut, and cash a voucher I won in a raffle last October for a mani/pedi and a Thai massage (yes, really). I’ve had two massages in Thailand so far just so I can go in and say ‘Oh, a Thai massage? I was just in Thailand!’
Bahahaaa.
The cafe I’m in legit just handed me my bill, because I’ve been ignoring the fact it’s been closing around me for fifteen minutes. Oops.
Francesca's Thoughts 