By Andrew Haffner • Aug 24, 2020
Last week the Globe was taking some downtime to celebrate Khmer New Year. But while our screens were dimmed and swivel-chairs empty, we've got a few quirky bits of history to tide us over until we resume normal service this week. We look at the life and legacy of little-known Karen revolutionary leader Saw Ba U Gyi, delve into the memoirs of British photojournalist Jon Swain from his time in Cambodia and Vietnam in the 1970s, as well as cast an eye to the anti-opium movement of the Straits Settlements in the 19th and 20th centuries

By Wanpen Pajai • Aug 21, 2020
While opium addiction emerged as a region-wide scourge in the 19th century, abolitionists in the small British colony of the Straits Settlements took on the imperial government and played an instrumental role in bringing about a worldwide ban

By Andrew Wernette • Aug 20, 2020
With 54 registered minority groups, Vietnam is a land of immense cultural diversity. Photographer Alden Anderson and his Vietnamese partner Trinh Nguyen have set out to capture this heterogeneity, traversing the country to capture portraits of each group

By Alexi Demetriadi • Aug 19, 2020
With Jon Swain’s cult memoir River of Time set to be adapted for the big screen, the author returns to his time in 1970s Indochina, where he witnessed death and destruction in Vietnam, the Fall of Phnom Penh and the rise of the Khmer Rouge