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Thomas Bird
SCMP Contributor
Thomas Bird is an East Asia-based writer chiefly concerned with travel, the environment and art. He has contributed to several guidebooks including The Rough Guide To Thailand. He's a regular contributing writer to the South China Morning Post and the author of Harmony Express. He likes train travel, craft beer and the teachings of Zhuangzi.
Locals recommend the Vietnamese capital’s best street food, creative spaces and historical sights.
Aquatic diversions both above and below the surface may be the prime draw to the Philippines’ Puerto Galera, but the roads west and south lead to pleasures only those in the know are familiar with.
The mountains of Yangshuo need no introduction, but the picturesque Guangxi county offers much more – from the Tiger Mountain Waterfall to delicious beer fish.
Sample local delicacy khao soi – recommended by Anthony Bourdain’s Thai food guru, hike to the temples of Doi Suthep-Pui National Park, or catch some Muay Thai or live music.
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Yang runs the Floating Population Club, a community art space for some of Guangzhou’s rootless
Natural disasters and war have destroyed many of the buildings erected in the Philippines under Spanish colonial rule. But in historical areas of the archipelago, impressive examples still stand.
A peripatetic drone photographer has focused his passion on documenting China’s vast rail network from a bird’s-eye perspective.
A favourite among backpackers since the 1990s, Yangshuo has succumbed to mass-market domestic tourism since Covid forced out many of China’s foreigners – though some holdouts remain.
In the 19th and 20th centuries, geopolitical jockeying in China’s northeast saw the ownership of strategic railway lines – and with them regional dominance – change hands time and again.
We island-hop our way by jeep, bus, minivan and ferry to Palawan, a place of pearly white beaches, coral reefs, karst cliffs and rainforest that ecologists call the Philippines’ ‘last frontier’.
Book-ended by banh mi baguette sandwiches, a trip on the Reunification Express from Hanoi via Ninh Binh and Hue to Ho Chi Minh City passes through a millennium of Vietnamese history.
Get away from the crowds in Thailand? It’s still possible – just visit islands such as Koh Kood and Koh Phayam, where you’ll have white-sand beaches almost to yourself.
Experimental musicians in China such as the self-taught Wang Meng and guzheng player Yu Miao are blending the sounds of classical Chinese instruments into their computer-driven soundscapes.
After almost 30 years in Thailand, British teacher and blogger Richard Barrow explains how he tapped into people’s love of trains and what one of his favourite Thai train trips are.
Australian James O’Donnell tells Thomas Bird about settling in Asia, his passion for surfing, and riding the entrepreneurial wave.
Joe Cummings, a travel writer, musician and long-time Thailand resident, talks about his rootless youth, mastering Thai and how he got to write the country’s first Lonely Planet guide.
Hindus, Muslims and Christians share places of worship in northern Lombok, Indonesia - a place of lush volcanic landscapes, rainforest and ‘secret’ islands.
Chiang Mai native Pharadon Phonamnuai picked up the saxophone as a teen and busked around the world. He’s written a book about his travels, and owns a jazz club in his home city.
Chanthaburi, about 250km to the southeast of Bangkok, is an ideal short holiday location for those looking to escape the capital, offering plenty to those who like to discover a place on foot.
Lianzhou Foto was halted by the pandemic but cracks had begun to show years earlier, with authorities removing exhibits in an atmosphere of ever-tighter restrictions on self-expression.
The strangeness of being part of the multinational staff of a trading company in Montreal gave Qi Yimin the idea for his first book. The polyglot author and humorist explains why a writer needs such life experiences.
The towers of the Khmer temple in Phetchaburi are a dead ringer for some at Angkor in Cambodia, but much less visited. Cave temples in the jungle house a sleeping Buddha figure.
Chinese photographer Chen Ronghui has won numerous plaudits, awards and fans by training his lens on industrial and offbeat scenes in China, and never shying away from challenges.
Southeast Asia has attracted Chinese travellers for centuries, but now a new generation of mainlanders are abandoning the rat race to set up shop down in ‘Nanyang’, despite Covid presenting unique challenges.
A scooter trip through Thailand’s notorious Golden Triangle is no longer a white-knuckle ride into opium country, with tea now harvested by Chinese communities often just a stone’s throw from Myanmar.
Ever since the first Europeans came to China, outsiders learning the language has come with its own challenges and rewards, right up to the present day.
Mainland China’s most prominent contemporary photography critic tells Thomas Bird about growing up in Beijing during the Cultural Revolution and coming of age in the reform era.
Travel by rail along Thailand’s Northern Line from Bangkok and you can marvel at a series of former capitals, stopping at Ayutthaya and Sukhothai before ending in Chiang Mai.
Getting up close with elephants is an unforgettable experience for Thomas Bird, who gains an understanding of the challenges of caring for them, which the coronavirus pandemic has exacerbated.
Hohhot-born Li Wei left China’s vast Inner Mongolia region for Beijing in the mid-1990s, returning more than a decade later with the honed eye of an experienced photographer.
