Sunday, January 24, 2010

Things you should never forget to take along Part 3 (optional)

I should change the title of this post but I thought it should still fall under the same topic. This time it's not about what you MUST bring along, but some things you may want to consider doing or taking along with you.

1) Travel Insurance
While most of us are insured medically and also for life, some policies may or may not cover for damages while abroad and especially for things that are directly related to your travel like lost or damaged luggage, flight delays and cancellations, missed connections and the unlikely fortune of sitting in on a hijack ^_^;;

The easiest way to get travel insurance is usually through your travel agent or through the website you purchased your flight ticket. Not all airlines offer this and you usually want to stick to a policy that is from your home country.

As my ticket was purchased abroad this time, I have opted for Travel Safe from HSBC. This insurance is especially easy to obtain as you can apply for it online. All you have to do is to log in to your HSBC online banking website and send in a request for a quote. If you are happy, you pay! And voila, you are covered for the whole duration of your stay overseas. I am very sure other banks in Malaysia also offer similar insurances online, so make sure to check.

As a last resort, you could also get your travel insurance at the airport, no worries!

2) Laundry matters
Laundry is probably the last thing on your mind when preparing for a trip abroad for FUN! Who cares about washing right? Yes, that may be true, until you start to stink ;-P

There are 2 ways to deal with this,
i. Bring enough clothes and underwear to last your whole trip so you don't have to worry about laundry, or
ii. Not bring too much clothes as to not burden yourself with a heavy suitcase and be prepared for laundry!

If you are going to go economy, make sure to bring along some hand wash detergent, like above. I prefer to not carry too much liquids in my suitcase so I would go for something like "Handy Detergent" which is a concentrated cream detergent. It won't spill, and that is important.

If you are going to opt for using coin laundries, then I suggest you bring along a net for your delicates, it won't take up space in your suitcase and can in fact act as a laundry bag!

3) Bathroom & Indoor slippers
If you cherish your feet and is icky about going bare feet in a tub or shower that has been used by many others before you, this is not optional, bring your own bathroom slippers!!
When indoors if you like to let your feet breathe after a long day of walking, slippers will help. As you know, in the west most are accustomed to wearing shoes indoors and carpeted rooms are places where you especially do not want to go shoeless.

Until I think of more, it is adios for now!

1 comments:

Lydd said...

Oh yes, slippers!!! Thanks for the reminder. Gosh, I can't imagine stepping into those shared bathrooms barefooted! :P eeeks!