Panacea

Hi, we are a family of three with a three year old son and we're hoping to relocate to SE Asia some time soon because living in dark miserable Yorkshire is so depressing and I feel like we're wasting our precious life.

I grew up in Saudi so did consider Bahrain or Dubai but I'm not sure it's safe and it feels a bit materialistic for us. We are raising our child in a simple organic way and intend to home educate. We also intend to have another child either this year or next and will be having a homebirth.

So really we would like somewhere that supports our natural way of life but in reality perhaps these questions aren't important.

Is there anywhere in SE Asia where we'd be more at home as 'hippies'?!
Are homebirths supported?
Are there independent midwives/doulas?

Or can anyone recommend a place that's good for families in general?

My husband is a teacher and is currently looking at Brunei as a possibility. Is it true that you can't swim in the sea? If so is that the case everywhere in SE Asia?

What are houses like?

Are swimming pools communal and in compounds?

So many questions!

Thank you,
Bonnie

Kooky.

Hi Bonnie, I think the first step is finding out where you could get a visa to live and so your husband can work.

Unfortunately I can't say places in SEA I've been have struck me as being hippy'ish, organic, home birth lifestyle places. I lived in Singapore for six years and it's certainly not like that there Materialistic to the max, did my head in. (I have been known to have hippy tendencies )

I've never been to Brunei but I can't imagine it being your thing, and parts of Malaysia are becoming increasingly fundamentalist with ever decreasing women's rights.

Bali? Lovely place (away from the main strip) and definitely a few old hippies hanging around, but again there's the visa/income issue. Lombok, Thailand, ditto. Other parts of Indonesia and SEA, maybe not so easy to live.

Yes you can swim in most places, but in a lot of them would you want to? Major shipping lanes and associated pollution.

Houses and swimming pools, obviously depends where you end up. So back to my first comment

nonthaburi

Thailand has many quiet places with great beaches that may be what you are looking for. House are quite cheap too rent too. You may have a problem with homebirths though as most people here have cesaerians on a set date due to 1) it's a "lucky" day or 2) the doctors want to cram in as many women in one day as they can to get more money.

Also, although you may be living a 'hippy' lifestlye , Thailand as a whole is a totally money centred place and most Thais you will come into contact with will probably view you in that context. Utopia is hard to find but it's what you make of it. Come for a long holiday first and see if you like it.