Packing for a Year Abroad: It Takes More Time then you Think!

With only 4 days left until I leave for New Zealand thankfully my to do list is finally starting to get smaller!

Over the past week I’ve been running around like a crazy person trying to get everything done, not just running errands but also seeing friends and family to say a final goodbye before I leave.  During these goodbyes what has come to my attention is that no matter who I'm talking to, whether its a relative, a close friend or the receptionist at the dentists office the same questions always seem to come up...

“What are you going to do when you get there”   and... 

“Where are you staying”

Well if I’m being completely honest I have no idea what i‘m going to do when I get there, or where I’m staying, where I’ll be working, or even what kind of work I’ll be doing. So how do I deal with these questions? I generally just laugh them off and say that I have no idea what I’m doing but that it will all work out (hopefully). Mind you I do get a few raised eyebrows when I respond like this (mainly from my relatives) but hey, at least I’m telling them the truth.

Anyways these question are bearable. However the question that always gets me... the one that inevitably weasels its way into every conversation is the dreaded question about packing. Each and every time this question is asked a feel my anxiety levels going up...seriously. 

"Have you started packing yet?" ...is what they all ask me.

Hmmm .... well let’s see, up until yesterday the answer to this question would have been a flat out no. I don’t know why but packing just seems to be that one thing on the list that keeps getting pushed further and further to the bottom. My thought process has pretty much been “packing can’t be that hard, I’ll just throw some stuff together the day before if I have to.” Well it has become excruciatingly clear to me after spending 3 hours yesterday attempting to pack and getting virtually nowhere that it isn’t going to be that simple. In fact the process of packing will probably involve multiple packing and repacking’s.

So with this startling discovery that packing is not quite as easy as I had anticipated, I am now off to spend the next few days frantically packing, unpacking then repacking until I finally find a way to fit everything that I need for a year into my one backpack.

Wish me luck!

Rachel