Q. How did you end up living in Thailand and how did you both meet?

A. After 20 years working in IT and a lifetime of enduring cold British winters I felt like a complete change. My original plan was to visit Thailand for a year and then maybe return to the UK. But almost as soon as I arrived I knew that I would probably never return to live there full-time. Within a month of deciding to the leave the UK, I’d rented out my apartment and arrived in Bangkok. I actually arrived at the tail end of the street protests on 2010, and there was an 8 am to 6 pm curfew on my first few days here. After living here for a year I met Miu through some friends, and we have been together ever since.

Miu & Manfred in Traditional Thai Dress

Bangkok has been Miu’s home for over 20 years, and her career has been in marketing. We both love Bangkok and now use it as our base for traveling. We are just back from over six months traveling around Southeast Asia, and will stay in Bangkok for a few months before taking off again.

Q. Tell me a little more about your recent travels around Southeast Asia.

A. Apart from Thailand, we visited another six countries in the region – Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia, Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia. The countries we like liked the most and the least were almost the opposite of what we were expecting. We had read a lot of negative things about Phnom Penh, including many reports of how dangerous it is. But when we got there we both loved it. We always felt safe, met some very friendly locals, and had a great time. By contrast, many people rave about how great Vietnam is, but it wasn’t really for us. The people didn’t seem as friendly as elsewhere, and there were far too many scams that seemed to be going on. This made us feel a little uncomfortable and we always felt like we had to be on the looked for the next scam. I don’t think it’s someone we’ll be going back to. But Cambodia and Malaysia are two countries that we’d like to spend more time in.

We didn’t get to visit Myanmar or Philippines, but we hope to visit them soon, maybe even early next year.

Manfred at Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur

Q. I take it that you like to travel slowly. Why is that?

A. Yes, you’re right. We find that when we travel slowly we get to know each place much better and it’s a good way to get to know the locals. When we only visit somewhere for a day or two, it almost gets forgotten. And when we look back, our fondest memories are of the places we stayed the longest, partly because the locals got to know us, and this made us feel at home.

Q. What are some of the interesting sights you’ve seen on your travels?

A. Apart from the obvious attractions, such as Angkor Wat, we like the quirky and weird things that we come across. Recently we discovered an abandoned 747 plane in a Bangkok suburb, fish that took over a flooded shopping mall, and a temple made from over 1 million bottles. You can see our posts on these at Weird Thailand. It’s finding these places that makes traveling worthwhile.

An Abandoned 747 in Bang Kapi, Bangkok

Q. How do you fund your travels?

A. Most of the money comes from renting out my apartment in the UK, and this is topped by income from the website. This continues to grow every month, so hopefully we’ll have a little more to spend in Europe next year. Parts of Europe are pretty expensive, so we’re going to need a fair bit more than we needed for traveling around this region. We’re also in the process of creating our media kit, so we’re hoping that that will help us get some free accommodation along the way. We know another travel couple that did this very successfully when they traveled around Europe for a month.

Q. What are you future traveling plans?

A. Our main travel plans for next year are to visit the UK and Europe for 4-6 months, but we would also like to spend a month or so in New York, plus visit a few more countries in Asia. South Korea, China, Taiwan and Japan are top of our list at the moment. We can hopefully fit all of these in somehow, although a few may have to wait until later. The list of countries that we’d like to visit is very long indeed. As we like to travel slowly, it takes longer to get around them all.

About Manfred & Miu

Manfred & Miu are long-term travelers who record the adventures at RenegadeTravels.com. You can also find them on twitter and facebook. Manfred has just published his first book – Travel Southeast Asia For Under $30 A Day.

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