When preparing for a trip, it is inevitable you will either underpack or overpack. Both are terrible. Both are a cause of suffering. One day, perhaps, someone will achieve the glorious golden mean of ‘packed.’ We did not. Part of this is the nature of our trip, which I will sum up very scientifically as follows: Hot-Cold-Dry Tropics-Wet Tropics-Hot-Cold-Hot-Warm-Cold-Cold.

As you may imagine, this makes paring down one’s packing somewhat difficult. But along the way, there are a few items we have learned are essential, the Modern Essentials, to a long trek across the great jungle of human society.

1. Modern Essential: the Chef’s Knife

For long stay AirBnB’s, or hotels with a kitchenette, the traveler is provided a host of amenities. These include garbage trucks that come by every morning at 4:30 in the morning (Auckland), broken kettle / no silverware but a single plastic fork (Spain), no Wifi / power outages and flickering lights while a stone golem of Furby stares menacingly through one’s window…and moves in the night (Thailand. This will be explained in greater detail later).

However, all of our stay experiences have shared a common factor which seems to be endemic to our modern human age. None of them had a knife worth a Good God-Damn, and several of the them functioned south of a soup spoon. In Thailand we finally had enough and went down to the store and bought a $6 chef’s knife. It works great. If I’m ever travelling with a checked bag again, the chef’s knife is coming with me. It is an emergency. You can always eat with your hands, but you can’t bite an onion over and over and spit the scrap into a frying pan.

Believe me.

2. Modern Essential: The Towel.

Douglas Adams was right. Always bring a towel. Sometimes this is necessary for a trip down to the beach, or to the pool, and sometimes it is necessary because you were left without any kind of linens in your accommodation. If your travel plans fall through and you are trapped outside overnight, it provides an excellent blanket; if truly necessary, a roll of toilet paper.

3. Modern Essential: Bring No Essentials

This is a controversial take. For any trip less than 3 weeks, do bring essentials. Save yourself some money. But for any long trip, understand that the universe will provide, maaaaan. Bring no carry-on. In your checked bag, you have your Chef’s Knife and Towel. You’ve got your kit and you have it made. First steps first. Day one: get a toothbrush after you check in wherever you’re staying (and a razor and some shaving cream, you dirty hippy!). Day two: hit the thrift stores, the op-shops, or, if you are in Southeast Asia, just buy a bunch of clothes. It’s cheaper than Goodwill now that Portland Hipster has gone international…Day three: accept the transient life of man, the sunrises and the sunsets, the deplorable meaninglessness of it all through which we find meaning (of course you’ve read Human, all-too human) and expect nothing from the future.

After that, brunoise the hell out of your veggies with the absolutely dope chef’s knife you brought, take a shower and dry off with your towel, and crack a bottle (or 2 or 3) of wine. The sun has set. It will rise. As Emeril Lagasse would say: ‘BAM!’

Obviously, we didn’t know this before setting off. As the Preacher said, 6,000 years ago: ‘Vanity of vanities, all is vanity.’