Who's been to Asia or Latin America long ago?

[wanderlust]

If you've been to either of these regions a long time ago, I'd like to hear about how they used to be. Where did you visit, when did you go? What were the girls like back then? Did it look much different from today? Have you been back since then? If so, how was it different?

The further in the past, the more I'd like to hear about it, but especially from the 90's or earlier. The more details you can give, the more interesting it's going to be to me.

[xiongmao]

My dad was on ships bringing beef and stuff back from South America to the UK during the 60's.

From his stories I'd say it hasn't changed one bit, except that countries like Argentina are less wealthy these days.

[Yohan]

I am from Europe, but living in Asia since 1972, most time since 1976 I spent in Japan. My first Asian country was Malaysia, my first Asian language was Malay, but also some Chinese. Now I use almost only Japanese.
I also have been in South Korea, Taiwan, Philippines, Hong Kong, Cambodia, Myanmar and some other Far East and South East Asian countries.
I also have my second home since many years in Thailand.

[chanta76]

Yohan,

I take it you speak German and English but also Japanese. What did you find is the most effective way for you to learn Japanese?

[Yohan]

I speak German as a native, but can also communicate in English and French.

I had never a problem with Japanese, I could read a lot of Chinese characters already before arriving in Japan, and also in Europe I had many Japanese customers as I was working for a major travel agency.

My first Asian language was not Japanese and not Chinese, but Malay.

I am living in Japan since 1976. I have a Japanese language certificate for basic/advanced from a Japanese public university, but I never studied there, just took the exams.

About learning, in Japan it is easy to improve your Japanese, as there is no way to escape the Japanese language. Regardless if traffic signs, answering a phone call, looking up something in a department store... you cannot avoid using Japanese. As a technical staff, I passed all required exams in Japanese.

I cannot give any advice about how to learn Japanese - I can only say, live in Japan and you will use it every day.
Nobody in my neighborhood speaks anything else but Japanese, and in office correspondence is mainly in Japanese too.

After retirement I will consider to learn another language, maybe Korean, which has many similarities with Japanese.
Or Tagalog, which is similar to Malay, it makes sense as I take care of a Filipina fosterdaughter.

It's important to think about that learning languages is fun and not an annoyance.

[celery2010]

I was in Asia in the 80's and 90s. It was a very different place as compared to today. Hong Kong was still a bargain. Bangkok was undeveloped and had no subway. Even Singapore was considered still up and coming or developing. Today even in mainland China, prices are creeping upward. It was a very different time.