Lived there for roughly a year. Short term I cant think of anywhere better, the country is within the OPs budget and offers metropolis cities, to tropical beaches. The food is good, and the culture is fascinating - if thats your kind of thing & are prepared to be open minded.
Long term, I share the same sentiments and felt it was time to leave after a hell of a year. On reflection, that year was probably on of the best of my 30+ years on this planet.
I sometimes think of doing it all again, going into an unknown culture and winging it. You learn a lot about yourself that way. Good luck to OP whichever country he chooses!
Right? The Vietnamese were really, really friendly. Constantly had people wanting to talk to me wherever I went, regardless which part of the country. At first I was scared there was an ulterior motive, but not in the slightest. They just wanted to talk.
Contrast: I spent some time in Central America a few years ago, and I found a lot of people who were really unfriendly, or hostile. Mostly because I didn't speak Spanish. Whew did I get yelled at a lot. One guy at a Panamanian IT cafe called me out when I asked for the password in English. He shouted: "You come here with all your money and expect us to do everything for you and you can't even speak our language?" Yikes. Whoops. He was 100% right.
TBH, because of that incident I'm still embarrassed to this day when I have to travel to a country for work and can only speak the few phrases I crammed on the plane, and then have to point or speak English.
Long term, I share the same sentiments and felt it was time to leave after a hell of a year. On reflection, that year was probably on of the best of my 30+ years on this planet.
I sometimes think of doing it all again, going into an unknown culture and winging it. You learn a lot about yourself that way. Good luck to OP whichever country he chooses!