In 20 years, the kids on gap year will probably doing the same old backpacker loop around Myanmar, just as they do in Thailand, Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia today. Tourism has been alive in Thailand for quite some time now and I am by no means experienced on the subject.

I have lived in Phnom Penh Cambodia, after spending 30 days in Cambodia, Thailand, and Laos back around the turn of 2013. I fell in love with a Khmer woman and Cambodia in generally. I think it was the 3 days I planned for Siem Reap that became 12 or 13 after meeting a stream of awesome people at Happy Guest House ( shameless plug for a place dear to my memories). Great times there. Last year I met up with the English couple I befriended there the year previous. I will probably meet them here again in a few months when they return for their 12th year to Cambodia.

To the point, I look around and can't help feel like I sometimes really wish I could have checked out Bangkok or Phnom Penh in the 1950s and early 1960s, which is the time I would pick as my S.E Asian "golden era" or at least in my mind from what I could imagine, since I don't know much about that time. I can just imagine that with a nice mix of technology but still back when people had conversations at the dinner table.

I just read a Stickman Weekly article stating that 2014 was confirmed by owners as the worst year for business, obviously with Thailand's political situation really putting a hurt on 2014's tourism season profits and visitor #s.

What time do you want to go to? Would Saigon , right after Vietnam being interesting, or would you like it in the 1920s or 1930s?

Everyone has a golden era where they think that someplace they are or what to be in the world was somehow better. I am sure that if I went back to Bangkok in the early 1960s, I would hear the much smaller expat community bitching about how things were great back in the late 1940s.

Sorry for the stream of consciousness writing. I have always found time and the way cities and cultures change interesting. Sometimes when I am with my missus and we are out places, I can't help but ask myself what this country could have been like. I was being driven around Phnom Penh today and I noticed how different I got to view the city when I didn't have to drive myself on my moto.

For the sake of streamlining, where in S.E Asia would you want to go and what time would be your "golden era"?

Right here, Right NOW

phuketrichard wrote:https://cambodiaexpatsonline.com/post381 ... ars#p38182

Having been in and out of SE Asia since 1975 ( an pretty much lived here since 1982)
its always

"oh man, u should have been here yesterday"

It is good hearing it from one of our experienced S.E. Asia expats that this is the case. You kind of know that everyone always feels like they just missed it. There is some truth to this, no? Even if things are a giant cycle, some times are better in the smaller scope of things.

What did the community of expats in Thailand say in the 1970s? I wish this were the early 60s?

Bugger all that.

Best time to visit Cambodia was around 1100-1200. Amazing culture and topless apsara dancers.

Best time for adventure would have been in the 1500's with a Portuguese expedition. I'd give my right testicle to be a cook/quartermaster on one of those trips. Could have carved out a small kingdom.

No passport or visa hassles back then.

Sir_Quality_U_Feel wrote:... I think it was the 3 days I planned for Siem Reap that became 12 or 13 after meeting a stream of awesome people at Happy Guest House ( shameless plug for a place dear to my memories). Great times there....

I second that. Was there for about a month in 2011. Excellent guesthouse and Chhorpoan was lovely.

100% agree with Dara and Richard ( at least, I think that was Richards point). Right here an right fukn NOW! The present is what you make it, nothing you do will change the past or alter the future.Live it up as if each day is your first or your last!
Someone asked me the other day how old I was, easy answer - old enough to know better, young enough not to give a fuk.

MoodyMonkey wrote: Best time for adventure would have been in the 1500's with a Portuguese expedition. I'd give my right testicle to be a cook/quartermaster on one of those trips. Could have carved out a small kingdom.

No passport or visa hassles back then.

That's also often been my "golden era". Sail away on a Portuguese or Dutch ship, or maybe even join a team of missionaries in the 1700s. Go somewhere insanely remote, learn the language, immerse yourself... then tell them you're leaving the mission and check out the local girls/marry some chick. Being part of the first "colonialists" would also have been awesome. But I mean the first guys, the ones who lived with the locals and had local wives, not the bureaucrats who later followed. They usually didn't understand the world around them and looked down on the locals. But those first colonials (in any country) usually didn't look down on the locals. They spoke the language, often lived with the locals and many intermarried. Now that must have been a cool period. The dates range depending on the country of course.

The 20s and 30s must also have been interesting in their own way, with a lot of tourists, but many places inaccessible to the common visitor. Having the means to live/travel freely in those days must have been interesting though. Not only in Cambodia, but everywhere.

The 60s and 70s would also have been nice, as a lot of places remained untapped, but it was the beginnings of mass travel, with huge amounts of westerners going around the globe.

For me, I think I would have loved Cambodia in the mid-late 90s... No latte shops, no softies, just a bunch of interesting characters. But the here and now is also good I guess. As others have said, one always hears "yesterday was better". Just today while sitting in a restaurant in Kampot I overheard two older guys saying: "I think this is the last of the quiet Kampot". I'd never seen their faces before, but from their demeanor I suspect they hadn't been in the country or Kampot for more than a year. Quiet Kampot for me ended years ago (maybe 2010-2011), and for other people, it probably ended 10 years ago...

As others have said: the here and the now is the best! Your life is now. Still, one can't help but wonder...

walkjivefly wrote:

Sir_Quality_U_Feel wrote:... I think it was the 3 days I planned for Siem Reap that became 12 or 13 after meeting a stream of awesome people at Happy Guest House ( shameless plug for a place dear to my memories). Great times there....

I second that. Was there for about a month in 2011. Excellent guesthouse and Chhorpoan was lovely.

Chhorpoan is now the owner. She is heavily involved in international tourism boards and things. She is a bright young girl. We always stay there. It will always be the place that set Cambodia off for me.

you guys can have the 1700s and medical problems of that time. And the life span. I'd take Thailand when the baht was 45+ to the dollar. Cambodia? eh, maybe a few years ago. Keep yer "adventure" I want the internet. Cambodia with mud roads, iffy power, etc. No. It's tolerable now. The hoards of patters slime'n in? no, the "adventure" kiddies? no. But if you avoid the few hotspots, avoidable. I guess mostly my golden era woulda been maybe ten yrs ago. Before prices started getting stupid because of so many free spending tourists (and the locals assumptions that there will be more and more and they're all rich). Might actually be a golden era for short time hedonist tourists. I know of a flashpacker place near the river that has an upper floor outside bar and a jacuzzi in house.

thanks for the heads up on Happy House, gotta check out SR at some point. Pretty much been avoiding it for the last 6 yrs.