Author Archives: admin
Betrayal, torture and survival: the tale of a Viet Cong prisoner
(AsiaLIFE, December 2015) Viet Cong fighter Be Tu came of age in barbaric conditions after being captured in 1968. Now a grandmother, she tells Lorcan Lovett her incredible tale of resilience and determination. Photo by Vinh Dao. At an age when young women are finding their place in the world and realising their potential, Be Tu […]
Warming up to Uncle Sam
(AsiaLIFE cover, November 2015) Twenty years ago the US and Vietnam agreed to normalise relations. Lorcan Lovett looks at the extraordinary partnership formed by the two countries since then. Photos by Vinh Dao. There was a time when former US Marine Reginald Carnes, 66, and former Viet Cong fighter Be Tu, 67, were sworn enemies. Both […]
New Money and Richard Branson
(AsiaLIFE, October 2015) Sir Richard Branson’s motivational talk in Saigon brought together an army of young, Vietnamese businesspeople. Lorcan Lovett attends the conference to meet the city’s future tycoons. About 7000 budding entrepreneurs gave a fanatical welcome to Virgin founder Sir Richard Branson at the finale of Saigon’s biggest motivational conference in last month (September 2015). MOVE Vietnam […]
Tinder: Unrequited Lies in Vietnam
(AsiaLIFE, October 2015) The world of dating apps is swamped with dodgy pictures and outrageous claims, so an unfortunate self-summary can be a deal-breaker. Lorcan Lovett talks with daters to see what attracts and what alienates. Photos by Vinh Dao. The pictures are looking good. There’s one next to a motorbike in the jungle – […]
On The Frontiers of Comedy
(AsiaLIFE cover, September 2015) Vietnam has plenty of humour, but stand-up comedy is yet to take off. Lorcan Lovett meets the handful of brave comics hoping to popularise the art and spread the chuckles. “You are at an amateur comedy show: it’s going to be terrible,” Steve Jackson, 32, half jokes to a couple, before […]
Meet Sapa’s Ultimate Guide
(Oi Vietnam, August 2015) A few dozen groggy tourists shuffle off the sleeper train and board a transfer bus to Sapa, one of Vietnam’s top destinations. Inaudible slurs on the bus develop into excited chatter as they beam at guidebook photographs of terraced rice paddies swirling around lush green hills, a trademark image of the […]
Men Under The Knife in Vietnam
(AsiaLIFE, August 2015) A surge in plastic surgery in Vietnam over the past decade has not been exclusive to women. Lorcan Lovett finds out why men are going under the knife and what they’re getting done. A teenager plunged a photograph of a Korean pop star in the face of a plastic surgeon not so […]
Saigon’s hidden resistance
(Oi Vietnam, July 2015) Pho Binh, or Peace Soup, is a modest restaurant churning out pho bo, Vietnam’s traditional beef noodle soup, just like hundreds of others in Ho Chi Minh City. However, hungry customers who venture to the second floor of the three-storey house will witness the room where men and women debated, planned […]
A Walt Disney fantasia of the East
(Oi Vietnam, June 2015.) It’s minutes before noon when a flurry of arrivals stir people from the blistering heat. Monks draped in flowing white robes, along with nuns and priests, stride across the baked asphalt to the airy relief of a vast temple in southwestern Vietnam. Visitors slip off their shoes and enter through a […]
Bradt Travel Guide co-founder shares her globetrotting adventures
(getbucks.co.uk, Buckinghamshire Advertiser and Buckinghamshire Examiner, 2014) Travel writing – the two words spark images of adventure and romance. So it is fitting to imagine a travel writing series beginning, say, with an intrepid couple tapping on a borrowed typewriter as they float on a barge down an Amazon tributary. This was the case for Hilary […]
Lorcan Lovett 
Recent Comments