WHAT YOU NEED TO PACK

Nothing.

Particularly if you arrive in Bangkok, you'll be able to buy absolutely everything you need for a fraction of the price you'd pay in the West.

Possible exceptions are hi-tech water filtration devices and other top camping equipment. However, neither is at all necessary for typical backpacking unless you are a mountaineer or serious trekker. The other consideration, if you plan to head way off the traveller circuit, is to bring a few family photos and small but 'typical'gifts from your country.

There's no need to bring many clothes. It's almost always warm so laundry dries quickly (except in the rainy season when you'll be wet anyway!). You can often have washing done for you at backpacker guesthouses and it'll usually be ready within 12 hours for less than $1/kg. If you head for the mountains and are likely to be cold, you can get a cheap blanket in any market and give it away later. You can even buy second-hand boots, back-packs and day packs around Kao San Road, but this is not recommended. While some are sold by their genuinely impecunious traveller-owners before flying home, this trade can be dodgy encouraging theft from dormitories and cheap rooms (see the box on p46 about the key copy scam, and hence the padlock suggestions in guesthouses).

Once in Bangkok you can very easily buy:
EA padlock for your room door in cheap guesthouses.

EA light-weight sarong to double as beachwear, a towel and as a bed sheet (only under sheets are provided in cheap Thai hostels).

E Second-hand guide books and novels are cheaper bought direct from other travellers and cheaper still in Vietnam/Cambodia, though there you'll have less choice.

E Malaria medication costs a fortune in the West but on Kao San Road, Bangkok, an air-conditioned branch of Boots (yes! the reputable British pharmacist) has doxycycline at 3B/pill. You could get nearly a year's supply for the cost of a prescription in the UK.

NB Preventing mosquito bites is preferable to taking pills (which can have side effects) and these days the high-risk areas are few and far between Ethey are worst in rural Cambodia and parts of eastern Indonesia.

EBoots on Kao San Road also has familiar toiletries and any medicaments you'l need (including Western birth-control pills, tampons, etc) at less than the marked British price. In towns throughout the region you'll be able to buy mosquito coils/repellent and a good range of slightly less reliable medicines.

EPersonally I find carrying a mosquito net an unnecessary burden, as most cheap hotels in problem areas have them already. But all you need is one bad malaria-mozzie night to justify the trouble (rural Cambodia, especially Mondulkiri, is that sort of place). Still, don't waste big bucks and shopping hassle getting one at home: in the Kao San Road area of Bangkok you can get DEET-impregnated nets for 90-130B (under $3) or second-hand from 50B (check for holes!).

MONEY
Travellers' cheques are recommended for safety and get a better rate than cash in Thailand, China and Malaysia.

US$ cash is more convenient in Vietnam, Laos, and notably in the Philippines where travellers'cheques are very awkward and pricey to cash. Rates for cash other than US$ are generally somewhat less competitive. Having some US$ cash is important in Cambodia (where the dollar is a de facto second currency) and virtually essential in Burma where travellers' cheques are a nightmare to exchange.

Useful currency exchange websites include www.oanda.com/convert/ classic and www.xe.net/currency/. However, almost all such converters are wrong for Burmese Kyat as they give inter-bank rates which in the case of Burma are some 200 times lower than the real rate for which people should consult: www.irrawaddy.org/.

Debit/credit cards are useful for cash advances and are accepted in many upmarket hotels/restaurants. However, particularly in Thailand, there is a significant risk of fraud. In Burma (where there is no MasterCard agent at present) paying by Visa card is possible in a few places and should be fine if your bill is denominated in US$. However, to pay local currency bills with a credit card would be self-bankrupting lunacy: your bank may well charge you at the 'official rate' some 60 times more than black-market cash value!

How much will I need?
South-East Asia is a bargain. While prices do vary significantly between countries you can survive in Thailand (just) on $3-5/day (cheapest dorm, basic market snacks, cheap bottled water, hitch-hiking). You'll do OK on $10/day (fan-cooled bus travel, entry fees, bicycle rental), and live in some comfort for $20/day (guesthouse room with en suite bathroom, eat decent local meals, travel in air-conditioned buses, drink a beer or two, have occasional local taxi hops).

The main additional expenses are flights (from £350 return LondonEBangkok), visas (average $30 for China, $20 Cambodia, $30-70 Vietnam, $20-50 Laos), national park fees ($5 in Thailand) and other entry fees (under $1 in most of Thailand but $20-40 for Angkor, typically $5 a pop in Vietnam, very variable ($2-8) in Yunnan, cheap or non-existent in Laos. Malaysia and especially Singapore can be considerably more expensive, and a visit to Burma has to factor in the cost of a flight to get there (at least $120) as the land borders are closed. You'll also have to spend $200 while there due to compulsory currency exchange rules. If you stay a month that's not a huge splurge.

GETTING INFORMATION
This book aims to give you information where it's otherwise awkward to find. Where it's easy to find all you need locally I'll simply indicate the fact and let you get on with it! Good free sources of help include:

Tourist information offices and free guides
Very varied. In Thailand, Singapore and Malaysia it's usually worth heading straight for the tourist information office. Virtually every town has extensive brochures often including long accommodation listings and maps. But you may need to ask very specifically for what you want. Ask for maps of neighbouring towns and districts too! Their free maps aren't always to scale but will show you where to find all the main sights, probably with photos and as much history as a standard guide book - that's why this guide tends to simply note personal favourite places - opinion is harder to find than fact! In Thailand, even when information offices are closed, the 'tourist Police'will often have a map for you.

In Burma , Myanmar Tours and Travels (MTT) has brilliant free maps of the main sites but you'd be advised to grab them in Yangon as supply is limited or non existent elsewhere. The main attractions in Cambodia have free information pamphlets which are way better than even the best researched guide books. In Vietnam cheap maps and bootleg guide books are sold by hawkers in every tourist area. And everywhere except Burma, there's the internet.

Websites
You may be amazed to find just how easy it is to get cheap, convenient web access throughout South-East Asia (with the very pronounced exception of Burma). With powerful search engines such as www.google.com, the web has the potential to revolutionize guide-book publishing. However, of the zillions of travel sites, surprisingly few offer detailed practical help. Indeed, especially in cranky slow-loading rural web-cafés you can easily waste hours to learn very little. Sites that are of real, specific help are included in the relevant chapters and on some maps. Below are the general gems - and they're free.

Ewww.passplanet.com is hard to beat. You'll get an overview of each country covered (most of South-East Asia but not Vietnam). There are traveller 'ratings' on a variety of factors, but also very detailed, personal evaluations of hostels and guesthouses, bus trips (including times, frequencies and prices) etc all aimed squarely at the budget traveller. That a site as good as this can remain uncommercial is almost miraculous - do contribute your updates!

Ewww.itisnet.com/english/e-top.htm is another great site with extensive practical information and photos as well as patchy (but often very useful and extensive) priced budget hotel listings.

Ewww.bootsnall.com has the great idea in putting you in touch with travel 'helper' volunteers, listed by country of expertise. You can email them with specific backpacker questions, though it's a hit and miss, personal service.

EBoth www.lonelyplanet.com and http://travel.roughguides.com/ have an extraordinary wealth of travel information. Naturally as both companies are in the business of selling travel guide books, they don't give you much in the way of raw, practical hotel/transport details (that's the great strength of Passplanet, see p19). However, both have excellent forums on which you can ask (and answer) questions of other travellers: Lonely Planet's (LP's) Thorn Tree seems much more active than Rough Guide's (RG's) Travel Talk - don't forget to search the archives before asking a new question! Both sites also post travellersEreports: RG's Community/Travel Journals tend to be better organized and more fact rich than LP's postcards. Check both though!

Other key starting points include:
EGeorge Moore's www.geocities.com/rectravel/khlavn/khlavn.htm for Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam.

Ehttp://talesofasia.com/ for Cambodia and (in less detail) Vietnam and Burma.

Ewww.asiaphoto.de for great photo-journal trips to Burma, Laos and Cambodia.

Other travellers
Thirty years ago travellers in South-East Asia were so few and far between that meeting another Westerner was quite a thrill. Numbers increased dramatically in the '80s, travellers exchanged tips on information boards at the mushrooming backpacker guesthouses and the banana pancake was born.

Since the '90s the traveller influx has been quite overwhelming. The advantage of major backpacker hangouts is that everything you might need (to escape them!) is generally close at hand - maps, email, bike hire, travel agencies, dull but recognizable food, cheap accommodation and plenty of fellow travellers. Too many, you might well think!

Today, striking up random conversations in tourist area bars is as uncomfortable as it would be at any pub back home. Many 21st-century backpackers seem to sit silently for hours at internet cafés, semi oblivious to the fact that they have left home at all. The internet has all but obviated the use of Poste Restante mail services, and the Thorn Tree (www.lonelyplanet.com) has supplanted the once-useful traveller recommendation books. It's only in dormitory rooms, remote villages, or 'new' destinations that the old sense of backpacker camaraderie blooms anew. Of course, to find out where the 'new place' is you'l have to ask others: they are quite ephemeral.

Alternatively just buy a good phrase book, find a reliable mosquito repellent and strike out on your own.