the not-so-OC's guide to traveling - part 4

just in case you're already fed up with this "series", allow me one final post -- the random stuff.

♥ bring a photcopy of your passport with you and store it in another place, like inside your luggage. while no one wants their passport lost or stolen, having a photocopy makes it easier should you need to present proof that you were actually issued a passport by your home country.

♥ US$50 and US$100 is converted at the same rate, while US$20 below is converted at a much lower rate. therefore, if you must change your dollars at the airport (just so you'll have the local currency already), bring a US$50 at least. that way, you don't lose on the exchange rate either way -- you get the best rate, but you can save the rest for a money changer in the city which gives a much better rate than the airport banks.

♥ however, if the currency is already available in manila, well you might get a better deal buying the currency of the country of destination from manila rather than buying dollars here, then buying the local currency when you get to your destination.

♥ check online (yes, the internet is my friend -- most of the information i used are available online) for the exchange rate. that way, you'll more or less have an idea if the rates you're getting are accpetable.

♥ bring a small calculator with you. while i know my cellphone has a calculator, it's so much easier to press just an on button rather than several buttons to get to the calculator application. also, a calculator is much easier to hand to the salesperson who doesn't speak english rather than an expensive phone.

♥ have a separate wallet for foreign currency and leave your regular wallet in the hotel safe (just make sure to retrieve it before going home!). if you're like me, then your regular wallet will have your credit cards, identification cards, driver's license, and a whole lot of stuff -- none of which you'll need when you're out of the country. storing your foreign currency in another purse means that you can leave the "real" one at the hotel, safely out of reach from pickpockets, and you'll be able to monitor your remaining foreign currency better.

♥ bring a pen with you -- you'll be asked to fill out a number of forms from the time you check-in so while there are pens readily available at the check-in counter and immigration, having your own makes it more convenient as you can fill out the forms somewhere else. (in our case, at yellow cab while eating dinner)

♥ pre-departure expenses: P1,620 for travel tax (which you don't have to pay anymore if it's already included in your ticket) and P750 for terminal fee. there are certain individuals who are exempt from paying travel tax and you may check it out here and here.

♥ if no one's picking you up from the airport:

☺ don't forget to set aside money for the taxi fare

☺ depending on where you live, you'll have to decide between taking a coupon taxi or an airport metered taxi. in my case, the airport metered taxi is much cheaper.

☺ if you're kuripot, then go down the ramp and take an ordinary taxi. much cheaper than any of the airport taxis.

so i've covered the technical stuff, and given that i've been writing about this for four days already, i do hope i'm done. and if i haven't covered everything, well, that's why there's google.

enjoy your flight! bon voyage.

the not-so-OC's guide to traveling* - part 3

so i don't pack light. in fact, i'm the girl who relies on "group check-in" most of the time. what can i say, i hate not having something i might need on a trip.

i know that you'll save Php200 on a cebupac flight if you choose not to check-in any luggage. to my mind, though, P200 (a little more than what a frap from starbucks would cost) is a small price to pay for extra fifteen kilos on a trip.

and so, without further adieu, more tips:

♥ if you're really got nothing to check-in, then avail of the discount. it's there for a reason.

♥ but if you're going someplace where shopping is bound to be amazing (hello, vietnam!), then don't hesitate to pay an extra hundred bucks each way so that you'll get an additional fifteen kilos of baggage.

♥ group check-in is available only for those people whose names appear on the same ticket. we made the mistake of booking two individuals at a time when we went to vietnam, so we wasted a kilo here, and a couple of kilos there which would amount to several more kilos of check-in baggage had we all booked our flights under one confirmation number.

♥ the type of luggage helps. when i was packing for bohol early this year, i wanted to take a bigger suitcase so that i wouldn't have a difficult time fitting everything in my three-day suitcase. however, when i weighed the entire thing, it was around 17 kilos, meaning i'd have to pay extra, so i transferred everything to my small suitcase which, for some magical reason, was 14.9 kilos according to the official airport weighing scale.

♥ if your baggage is already overweight, be prepared that they will also weigh your hand carry. real life story: the girl in front of us in the low cost carrier terminal in kuala lumpur was told by the counter guy that her baggage was overweight by two kilos. rather than paying, she said she'll just transfer her things to her carry on baggage. uh-oh -- the guy then asked to see her carry-on baggage and weighed the entire thing (2 kilos above the 7-kilo limit) which meant that she did not only have to repack, but actually had to leave some of her things in malaysia.

♥ bring your own -- water and snacks, that is. when i first traveled with my aunt to singapore, she told me to bring my own water and snacks since our luggage would (logically) be less full leaving manila than coming back. so, in order to make full use of the extra space, i stuffed it with water and food (crackers, biscuits, chips, cup noodles), all well within the limit, of course. going to KL, we actually had one baggage with nothing but food and water inside which was particularly useful when we arrived at the hotel in the middle of the night slightly starving after a long trip. plus, it always feels great when you save your much-needed foreign currency for shopping rather than buying water.

♥ they're not particularly strict in manila regarding the bringing of liquids on the plane but be ready to throw your carry on water when you get to customs in an airport abroad.

*note: the past two posts i spelled this word with a double "l". today, i'm using a single "l". both are acceptable ☺

the not-so-OC's guide to travelling - part 2

if you read yesterday's post, then you'll know why certain people agree with the observation that i'm bossy -- i like things planned, organized, and not-so-free flowing. now don't mistake that for being overly rigid. as a matter of fact, i don't mind change of plans at all. what matters to me, though, is that there's a plan to begin with. change that as you will over the course of an entire trip, i'm okay with that, but i'd rather much leave manila with a thick sheaf of papers outlining a plan of action for the entire vacation than not knowing what to do when i get there.

thanks to the internet, it's now not only easy to book a flight, it's also quite easy to figure out what to do when you get to a place. as a matter of fact, hong kong and malaysia have amazing sites (here and here) run by their tourism authorities which proved to be helpful. from the websites, i got connected to a bazillion other links which allowed me to not only figure out where i wanted to go but, more importantly, how to get there.

♥ email! - months before i went to hong kong with my family and to KL with my friends, i was already scouring the internet for information and emailing the links to my travel mates. whether or not they wanted to be involved with the planning stages, at least they knew what was going on and could put in their two cents' worth should they wish to do so.

♥ don't just email, email a plan. not everyone will be exciting over seeing a bunch of links, so it will help a lot of if you draft a plan and tell them that you want to go to certain places. prior to my hong kong trip with my mom and brother, i had figured out what we were going to do on each of the four days that we were going to be there, subject to their approval. now, since they were family, i was easily able to indicate that failure to reply within an appropriate time will be deemed as a waiver on their part to comment, but this might not necessarily be a good idea if you're traveling with friends.

♥ be flexible! while i had a plan of attack for hong kong, i didn't mind it when we didn't push through with some of the things i wanted to do during the sheer exhaustion (goodbye, victoria harbor) or lack of time (goodbye, ocean park). i just filed them away for future trips to these places -- after all, given their proximity to manila and the cheap flights now available, i'm sure that i'll get to do these things next time i visit.

♥ figure out your non-negotiables. on our last day in KL, we had counted on getting morning tickets to the skybridge at petronas towers, only to get a 2:45 p.m. slot. some of the people ahead of us left after the schedule they wanted was filled up, but our group decided to get whatever slot would be available and give up instead a planned trip to batu caves. we figured that kuala lumpur = petronas towers, and told ourselves that since we had waken up early just to get in line, then this was something we had to do. batu caves can wait for a succeeding trip (see tip above).

♥ public transportation & walking = a tour on its own. while i was basically stuck in city tours and what nots on my first few trips abroad with family, my trips these year all involved taking public transport. again, information is readily available online. and, if you have more questions, don't hesitate to ask hotel staff who are, more often than not, locals who take public transportation themselves. in hongkong, we availed of the tourist day pass which ended up being really cheap since we were staying at HK disneyland. in vietnam, we walked around and discovered hidden treasures within the city which were not on any of the tour guides and maps that we got. and in kuala lumpur, we were virtually able to take all available forms of transportation except, surprisingly, a cab.

♥ have a mini-planning session. see the picture above? that was taken by one of my travel companions to KL. while i had already sent a number of emails, and we had all exchanged a number of emails between the four of us, it still helped that we sat down, discussed everything (including the maximum budget), and agreed on a number of things. that meant less time wasted abroad discussing where to go and what to do.

♥ figure out how everything costs and plan accordingly. before going to hong kong, i already informed my mom how much the admission fees were, as well as how much we should set aside for food and travel. that allowed us to determine exactly how much money to bring with some left over for something really important -- shopping! when we went to KL, we agreed to pool a fixed amount and have a designated "treasurer" pay for everything (bus, train, transfers, meals, etc) so that we weren't all digging into our pockets for change, or worrying whether or not we'll have enough money left for the rest of the trip after making a purchase.

tomorrow: part 3 - packing light? not me.

the not-so-OC's guide to travelling - part 1

first things first: i am by no means an expert. as a matter of fact, up until recently, i haven't traveled out of the country in years. that said, i'd like to think that by the time i took my KL trip last week, i had my routine down pat, and thought that it might be helpful to list them all down here, if not for the three people who actually read this blog, then for my own personal reference should more trips present themselves in the future.

on booking flights and hotels

♥ if you're a budget traveler such as myself, booking flights way in advance are super helpful. not only are you able to file your leave early, after paying off the credit card charges, you still have sufficient time to save up for your pocket money.

♥ for the KL trip, we also booked the hotel the same day we did our flight. for that, we used agoda, which gave us around 30% in savings plus a cool breakfast buffet to go with our room.

♥ if you're traveling with a big group, opt to avail of the hotel breakfast buffet. i traveled to vietnam with a group of 7 other women, and while i love my friends, i hate the waiting the comes with waiting for everyone to be done getting ready for the day. having breakfast in the hotel at least cuts down on waiting time since those who are up early can have more time to enjoy their breakfast while those who are late will be *forced* to hurry up since the others are done and ready to go.

♥ while we lucked out with our hotel in KL, i will admit that i and commuter were "duped" into picking the one we got because of (what we felt) were already cheap rooms and (seemingly) fluffy pillows on the sample pictures. don't hesitate to scroll through all the hotels and check the locations against a map. we ended up booking a hotel in the suburbs which was, thankfully, right beside the mall, but a good distance from KLCC, which wasn't that great.

♥ both my KL and vietnam trips involved red eye flights from manila and back. in vietnam, the city isn't that far from the airport which makes it relatively easy to pick a hotel within one's budget and taste. on the other hand, the airport in KL is a good hour or more away from the city and the taxi cabs are as crazy (and ganid as the ones we have here in manila) so best to take that into consideration when booking a hotel for your first night. in our case, we booked a cheap but acceptable hotel -- my hotel @ sentral -- which was a five-minute walk from where the airport bus dropped us off in the middle of the night. so, while the hotel wasn't really where you'd want to stay for a long time, it was better than sleeping on a cold airport floor after an uncomfortable flight.

♥ while i generally trust the reviews online, take it with a grain of salt. usually, asians are more forgiving and westeners have more refined tastes. therefore, what might be acceptable for you might not be for an american tourist. also, a "small" room for them might be "average" for you. and although pictures help, they usually pick the nicest rooms to picture, not to mention take it at an angle that will best show off the room. you'll be better off reading the details: does it have a ref? how many beds in the room? what kind of television (if this matters to you) did they furnish the room with?

♥ ask. most websites have a "contact us" button, and agoda has a 24/7 live chat as well. when i couldn't find the answer to my questions online, i emailed the hotel or used agoda to resolve certain issues.

tomorrow: part 2 - planning your itinerary

oh dear henry, we've got a problem

my dear henry,

you know i love you. i mean, parking at your mall alone on a daily basis means that i contribute to your great wealth each and every single day (or at least every single working day). and let's not even discuss the frequent mini shopping sprees i have at your store. if batman can be summoned by the mayor through the bat signal, well, all it takes for me is that bright sign from the letters S & M and i'd come running. as i've said countless times before, i can try, but i can never really break up with you.

you're an addiction. i can probably give up rice, heck, maybe even bacon. but not our sweet love affair.

that said, maybe you can help me with something. see, my friends and i went to kuala lumpur last weekend. from the plane tickets to the booking in agoda.com to an additional booking for a first night hotel, we used a BDO credit card and it was quick, it was reliable, and it was pain free. so, when it was time to finally go on our vacation, the BDO credit card was brought along, there being a separate dollar account with a balance bigger than what we could actually shop and not go broke.

so, imagine our surprise when the card was declined on the very first purchase.

not to be deterred from making a purchase, the item was paid for using another credit card. but, a quick text message was immediately sent to someone in the philippines, asking that the bank be called and the matter be immediately settled. according to the person called, my friend would have to call the bank himself, using a toll-free number, and the matter will be resolved immediately.

that's when we encountered the first problem: the international toll-free number could not be reached. we tried all permutations of the toll-free number until we gave up and called the local number using our cellular phone. at P100 per minute, it was a pretty expensive call to make, but shopping bliss depended on it, so the call was made anyway.

so he called and then almost immediately hit a roadblock: BDO was offline, and could my friend call again later? my friend explained that he was in kuala lumpur and was using his roaming phone so could the agent kindly text him to say when they'd be online so he wouldn't be calling every so often only to be told that the bank was still offline. the agent's reply: no, just keep on calling. horrible right?

solution: ask someone from the philippines to keep on calling until the bank goes online. person from the philippines will text my friend so that he can call when the bank is finally online. problem solved? nope, there was another problem: the call center agent kept giving my friend the wrong information. she kept on insisting that his account's balance for the peso and dollar charges were one and the same, notwithstanding that my friend knows for a fact that they're separate and distinct. after more than five minutes (and P500 on roaming charges, so hateful!) the agent finally understood my friend was saying and concurred that indeed, he has a separate balance for dollar charges.

it doesn't end there, hence problem number 3: for an eleven dollar charge (which, at the time the information was finally retrieved, was actually cheaper than the call already), BDO refused to activate his dollar charging privileges. apparently, since the US$11 was already due, his credit card was suspended, which explained why his credit card was declined when he tried to charge something. since my friend's dollar charging privileges was WAY more than the unpaid charge, he inquired why the bank was so quick to suspend his card. the additional time (and hundreds of pesos on phone charges) spent talking to the agent was virtually useless -- the agent could not furnish any explanation whatsoever, even when my friend asked for his help regarding the matter.

so my friend asked to be connected to the agent's supervisor, and after waiting for longer than the length of our train ride (yes, that long), he finally got to talk to the supervisor, who also couldn't do anything about it, as well as provide any acceptable explanation. it was several minutes into the call before the supervisor said, sir, maybe you can pay the charge.

then my friend exploded (or sort of. he's not the exploding type) sana kanina niyo pa sinabi, which bring the tally to five issues already.

after breathing in and out, and trying to relax himself after a very stressful conversation with the call center agent and the equally inept supervisor, my friend sent a text message to manila, asked that the eleven dollar charge be paid. manila person went to BDO (which is open until seven at night), paid the charge, and then sent a text message: done and done.

or so we thought. guess what happened when we tried charging our lunch: declined again! so once more a call was made to manila where he was informed -- extremely belatedly, if i may say so myself -- that even if the payment was made to BDO, since it was made on a friday, it would take several banking days before the card could be activated once more.

sigh, after almost P2k on phone calls -- more expensive than the original item being bought -- and a bazillion of issues, we ended up having to work with the money we had.

boo, henry, boo.

bdo has a very impressive tagline -- we find ways. unfortunately, on this first test, clearly, none of your people found an acceptable solution. then again, knowing you, i'm willing to bet they're all contractual, so they don't really care about a fuming customer somewhere in malaysia frustrated with their ineptitude and lackadaisical attitude.

but i'm in love with you, henry, and deep inside, i know you're a good man (that gorgeous church in megamall should be proof positive of your deep faith, right?). so please do something about this, and soon. i've a mind to sue for moral damages (extreme embarrassment over card being declined, sleepless nights over stuff unpurchased, anxiety over whether or not lunch bill would declined or not) and actual damages (cost of the phone call from kl to manila), but you know that (for now) i won't. after all, you and i, we've got history, and i'm counting on that to make sure that something will be done about this matter, pronto.

with bated breath,

rosa

*image from http://pinoyshowbiss.blogspot.com/2010/07/forbes-magazines-40-richest-pinoys-of.html

and so here begins the story of my fun weekend

we planned it almost four months ago. it was summer, and it seemed like yet another vacation would pass without us being able to plan to perfect holiday. so we agreed: let's plan something and whoever wanted to go is free to come.

then we agreed -- neither of us had ever been to kuala lumpur yet, hence our destination. we also said, okay, maybe january. so a barrage of text messages was sent, basically asking if they'd be interested to join us on a trip to KL. four -- including myself -- gave a resounding yes.

we were all set for january when i received an email -- KL tickets were going on sale over at cebupac, except that the flying dates would be around the time of ramadan and the malaysia carnival sale. september!!! i panicked a bit -- i had agreed to go to vietnam on august, and my mom was taking us to HK disney on june. could i afford a third out-of-the-country trip by august?

apparently, i could. first airplane tickets and hotel accommodations were booked. then emails with copious links were exchanged. and then all too soon it was the week before our trip and we had to come up with a definite plan for our trip.

and you know what? we did. i had the best weekend with the greatest people.

same place, different country

i'm at that famous coffee place with a two-tailed siren, in a huge mall in the middle of the metro.

translations: i'm at a starbucks in megamall .... except that this one's not in ortigas but midvalley, kuala lumpur, malaysia.

it's almost the end of our trip. we've learned so many things from one another, and we've enjoyed so many experiences together. had my first taste of hainanese chicken rice, and machang soft serve ice cream. i know that ate cathy cannot sleep with the lights on, that kuya ralf has a wicked sense of humor, and that kuya efren will still treat us even if he's down to his last ringgit. me, i'm still OC and bossy as ever ... and thank goodness they still haven't killed me yet.

whoever asked me why the hell we opted to go to kuala lumpur, well, boo to you. this was one of my best trips ever -- the company, the food, the experiences, and, as you must expect by now, the shopping.

more stories to follow, with pictures to boot, but for now, good night. i've a date with the line at petronas tomorrow morning.