Travelling is awesome. Nothing below would stop me backpacking around the world but let’s be honest here. In amongst the pictures of stunning beaches and incredible waterfalls there’s another, not so glamorous, side to travelling — especially in South East Asia.

1. Fashion (or lack of) 👗

You have about 3 outfits in rotation and you don’t feel particularly sexy in any of them, all your underwear has holes in, and you will re-wear that top you spilled Pad Thai down because it’s the only thing you own loose enough to wear in 38 degree heat.

If you’re like me you will have brought a few dresses with you, but you’ll realise you’re not very good at being a girl, and just wear shorts every day. At least this means you can ride a scooter without flashing anyone. And let’s not get started on the thigh sweat! Speaking of…

2. Sweat 😅

You sweat all the time. From everywhere. Sweat patches are part of life and you quickly stop being embarrassed of them. Do you wear a rucksack? You’re going to have a perfectly shaped rucksack sweat patch — so does everyone else.

3. The sniff test 👃

At the beginning you’d wash everything that got sweaty or dirty but that doesn’t last! Your favourite shorts will undergo the sniff test every now and then and when they still don’t smell you keep on wearing them — they’re only going to get sweaty again if you wash them right?!

4. Shaving 💁

Sorry guys, but shaving happens way less often than you’d think . When other people start noticing your leg hair that means you have at least one more day until you have to shave.

5. Make up 💄

Make up doesn’t happen — at least not for me. You’ll have brought a small selection of bare minimum items but will only use a little concealer occasionally if you’re feeling particularly hungover or tired. You live in sunglasses anyway so eye make up is pointless! And if you’re unlucky… the coconut oil you brought to remove make up will have melted and leaked all over your toiletries 😠.

6. Toilets 💩

You will never fully master the squat toilet. While trying to learn your feet will get wet more than once, and I don’t mean from water.

Additionally, you’ll relieve yourself in questionable places and soon nothing will be surprise — “Oh you don’t have a toilet? Just a hole in the floor in the back of your shop? No problem, show me the way!”.

And sometimes you’ll get diarrhoea and you’ll have no idea why — hopefully you’ve bought enough charcoal from 7-Eleven in Thailand to avoid being house bound.

7. Accommodation 🏠

Your standards for accommodation will fall dramatically. When you’ve been travelling for 12 hours the strange smell, stained bedsheets, and grimy walls won’t seem like a big deal. You’ll also become really efficient at scoping the room out. After a fair few sweaty nights and freezing mornings you now know to check the A/C works and the water is hot!

8. Food 🍜

You’ll take beautiful artistic photos of that super healthy vegan breakfast from the expensive Western place next to your hostel, but most of your meals will be cheap street food. You’ll follow the same process of picking, sniffing, tasting, shrugging, and eating strange bits in your noodle soup, and when you’re finished it doesn’t even bother you the plastic bowl is stained brown.

Enjoyed this? Be awesome if you’d 💛 it!