In countries where I have "based" myself, anything more than 4 weeks; the laptop has been a good useful distraction. When you're shocked by a local culture which you have to deal with for extended survival (anything more substantial than a western-style hotel and continental breakfast) you will end up missing speaking your familiar language, eating familiar foods, or just walking outside without a guide at hand (printed or in-flesh.) Also there is that strong sense of alienation when everybody around you is looking at you, even you have been with them for weeks. In these times, firing up your slackware box and seeing what you used to work on in more homely times is a good psychological aid.
Cameras I didn't like. I hated being looked at and treated as a "foreigner", and I feel like I am doing the same when I point a lens at a "local" person, building or artifact. It felt like I was capturing their soul to take back home with me as a novelty. I have no photos of my travels, but I have friends. Hundreds of good friends from all walks of life; fishermen, priests, pimps, students, political activists, drug traffickers, aid workers, moms, bicycle repairmen, white-house staffers, journalists you name them.
Coming back was hard. I have lost 80lbs and came back with more street-sense than I could imagine. When I landed at Dulles Airport I had $60 to my name and I had the photo of a new girlfriend in my wallet. None of my family or friends had the time to give me a ride home, so I took the bus, for the first time in the U.S. Before then I have taken the bus a few times on nights-out when I knew I wouldn't be fit to drive. This time it was just what I was used to do. My instincts where different; I took a window seat in the way back that was close to an exit door. Something that you do when traveling in dangerous places (you don't sit in the front, or police and bandits will pull over the bus and shake you up for bribes; and you don't sit sandwitched between two locals, unable to escape.)
I also came back with 2pack a day cigarette habit. Hi alcohol tolerance. A very unprofessional appearance. An appetite for anything served to me on a plate. A habit of carrying a bag with basic survival necessities. Indifference to crashing anywhere. Hitching rides with total strangers. And finally, a weird ability to connect with people in the underworld.
My first few gigs have been freelancing gigs doing anything and everything. It took my girlfriend the last few months polishing up back to shape; I don't think I would have come back if it wasn't for her, actually. I have seen many long-time Western expats dying in local hospitals of controllable diseases; the ex-military Americans are most prone to this. Diabetes, high-blood pressure, liver problems; I have pitch in $5 donations to so many expats in hospitals I didn't want to be one of them.
Allot of stuff, most of it unfit to print.