You’re leaving for a trip. Your bag is organized and tidy. Your clothes are expertly rolled, not folded like that of an amateur who has never typed ‘travelling hacks’ on the internet. You leave for the airport.
The trip went great.
You’re back now (short trip, wasn’t it?) and have to unpack … a chaotic mess.
You are not alone here. A lot of us go on trips with an immaculate bag but come back with an absolute mess of it. So it is natural that most of us choose to delay our unpacking for days.
In fact, I have never met anyone who actually likes to unpack. It’s dreaded and procrastinating it is a (very) popular choice.
The good news is that unpacking doesn’t have to be so tedious. You can make it easier with these six simple tricks:
1) Get a laundry bag
A laundry bag will be your saviour. Take off your dirty clothes and just put them in the bag every day. All you will have to do when you get home is empty out the bag.
The best part is that a laundry bag does not take up any space. It’s a win-win situation.
2) Sort items according to use
Make use of the different compartments in a suitcase. They are there solely to help organize the small things. Keep snacks in one compartment and socks and shoes in another.
Now when you get home, you don’t have to sort out anything. You will know what exactly goes into the kitchen and what goes into the bedroom.
3) Don’t unpack for small trips
There is no point unpacking for a trip that lasts less than five days. It’ll be over in a jiffy. And you will have to pack your suitcase in the hotel first and then unpack it again when you get home.
If you are staying for longer and empty your suitcase, arrange your belongings in such a way that you can pick or grab and put them in your bag (in their designated places of course). This way you won’t just toss them randomly into the bag in a hurry. Efficient unpacking is only a matter of some extra care.
4) Bag it
Keep anything that can leak in a ziplock. You wouldn’t want to even touch your bag if something gets out of a bottle.
While cosmetics are an obvious choice, don’t forget to ziplock food items that can pop open under the pressure of an aeroplane ride. Don’t be the victim of blueberry yogurt like I was.
5) Pack minimal and practical
Packed things + Souvenirs = Unpacking
The less you pack, the less there will be to unpack. It’s as simple as that.
If you end up not using what was packed, you went through the process of packing and unpacking them for nothing. It’s wasteful, and quite frustrating too. So, keep all the things that you need and maybe only some of the things that you want.
6) Organize the small things
This is both a packing and unpacking hack.
Take a pouch or small bag and put all your essentials in it- the stuff you use every day, whether you are on a vacation or not. Keep the important things like chargers, sanitizer and moisturizer in this bag. Have a separate bag for the non-essentials.
I keep an essentials bag even when I am not travelling. This way if I ever have to change my purse I just pick the essentials bag and put it in the new one. And if I need something important, I know exactly where to look.
Stick to this two pouch technique and even if you don’t unpack or have somewhere urgently to get to right after landing, just pop open the suitcase and take the essentials bag out. You can deal with everything else later.
So there you go, six simple ways to make unpacking less frustrating and more efficient.
