Seeing the Light
There’s a brilliance about the light in the medieval temples of northern Thailand. It glints off mirrored mosaics, gold buddhas and gilded towers, off gaudy...
Tagged: Family
A Tiger Petting Zoo
A petting zoo — with tigers? Truly, only in Thailand! But few children would pass up the chance to pet, stroke and cuddle a real,...
Western-Thai Dating: A Driver’s Guide
One of the most consistently entertaining aspects of the courting ritual indulged in by ageing Western men and much younger South-East Asian women is the...
Ecotourism? My *rse
Monday morning sees us in Chiang Mai, for centuries capital of an independent state, sometimes Siamese, other times Burmese, now the hub of northern Thailand....
Does the Tooth Fairy Take Lao Kip?
So junior’s molar, which has been threatening to drop for the last few weeks, finally did the deed today. He hasn’t, historically, had the best...
Spirits of the Forest
The sheer complexity of the ecosystem in protected, mature forest, from lichens spinning their symbiotic webs across old bark to the chaos wild pigs wreak...
The Good Life?
This is Sing’s eldest daughter, showing off her handbag outside the house her father built. Her name means “Be Loved”. Be Loved’s younger sister is...
On Books
Back in Udomxay, the construction town in northern Laos where our two-day odyssey from Vietnam reached a natural close, we met a crazy Canadian chap...
A Rainy Season Odyssey
The start of the monsoon season in Vietnam’s northern highlands is a beautiful thing. The rivers turn turbid and golden, rapids smearing the surface like...
Babysitting, Hmong Style
It’s not easy being a woman in the Hmong tribal minority of northern Vietnam. Or a girl, for that matter. This little girl is six,...