Staying as a guest of a community can be a highly rewarding experience, adding real meaning to a holiday and creating opportunities for a genuine cultural exchange leaving all parties wiser and more enlightened to cultural differences. Koh Yao Yai...

Trek on foot and by elephant through the mountains and forests to meet some of Thailand's fascinating and colorful ethnic minority hilltribe people. Stay at unique homestay guesthouses, built in traditional styles, and help to preserve a valuable but threatened way of life.

The diverse Lesser Sunda Islands, stretching eastwards from Bali, offer the most amazing landscapes and a glorious cornucopia of weaving for textile lovers.

Learn the Indonesian art of batik painting, study traditional Indonesian dance and theatre, learn to make the highly intricate carved masks worn by Lagong dancers and submerge yourself into two of Indonesia's most powerfully independent identities: the Javanese, the 'rulers' of Indonesia, and the gentle, aesthetic Balinese.