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Burma
We should have been warned. "Myanmar is a destination for travellers rather than tourists and a country best seen in retrospect" was the enigmatic introduction of our guide book. Indeed, our trip from Yangoon to the Golden Rock, Inle Lake, Mandalay, Bagan and Chaungtha Beach wasn't always smooth and pleasant. On the other hand we experienced a country that thrives on its rich buddhist heritage and is still almost untouched from Western influences. And we found a friend in Yangoon.

Laos
A spectacular scenery unfolds in front of us all day as we follow the water down to Luang Prabang. We feel like travelling back in time. The Mekong, still rather small, runs calmly through the green, mountainous and scarcely populated landscape of Northern Laos. We pass a handful of isolated villages with simple bamboo huts and some other boats, but most of the time we seem to be the only human beings. 

Vietnam 
While we drink our first Ha Noi beer in the restaurant adjacent to our hostel we watch a woman selling chickens on the street. As a passer-by stops, she puts her bundle down, selects an animal from the cage, holds it upside down on its feet and lets the potential customer examine it carefully. Then the haggeling process starts... This is the center of Hanoi, capital of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam.  

Beijing/ Hongkong
On almost every street corner pensioners sit together for a chat or a game of mahjong in Beijing's winter sun. Usually they have bird cages with them. The affection of the Chinese for birds also becomes evident at the Saturday market. Hawkers offer an amazing variety of birds at the entrance while further down the market everything from Chinese medicine to household goods is on sale.  

Cambodia
That day only four other Western tourists took the bus with us from Hoh Chi Minh City to the Cambodian border. The Vietnamese, housed in an unfinished concrete building, take their time to examine our passports and luggage thoroughly before they let us proceed across a dusty open field to a handful of primitive stalls that comprise the Cambodian border post. A wacky bus awaits us to bring us to Phnom Penh.