Ten Southeast Asian Cities from Mandalay to Makassar

Mandalay was founded in 1857 by King Mindon to fulfill a Buddhist prophecy and was the last royal capital of the Konbaung dynasty before the British annexed it in 1885. It sits on the east bank of the Irrawaddy River about 631 kilometers north of Yangon, and Chinese immigration since the 1980s has made it the economic hub of Upper Myanmar.

Nakhon Ratchasima, often called Korat, is the largest city in Northeastern Thailand and about 250 kilometers northeast of Bangkok. It is the historic gateway between central Thailand and the Isan plateau, a trading hub for the region and a base for visiting nearby Khmer-era temple ruins.

Luang Prabang takes its name, meaning Royal Buddha Image, from the Phra Bang statue that symbolizes Lao sovereignty. It became the capital of the Lan Xang kingdom in 1353, and UNESCO named it a World Heritage Site in 1995 for its blend of Lao architecture, European colonial buildings and more than thirty Buddhist temples.

Siem Reap grew from relative obscurity after the French rediscovery of the nearby Angkor temples and France acquiring Angkor in 1907. Visitor numbers rose from negligible levels in the mid-1990s to more than two million by 2012, and tourism provided more than half of local jobs as of 2010.

Hue was the capital of Vietnam under the Nguyen dynasty from 1802 to 1945, and its complex of imperial palaces, tombs and temples is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The city was also fought over in the 1968 Tet Offensive, in the Battle of Hue.

Palembang spreads along both banks of the Musi River and is believed to have been the capital of the maritime empire of Srivijaya more than a thousand years ago. It is one of Indonesia's oldest cities and is known for its ikat and songket textiles, its pempek fishcake cuisine and the Ampera Bridge across the Musi.

Padang is the capital and largest city of West Sumatra, on the island's western coast. It was chartered as a municipality in 1906 and was long a major trading hub for pepper and gold, and it remains known for Minangkabau culture and cuisine.

Bogor lies about 53 kilometers south of Jakarta and was once the capital of the Sunda Kingdom as Pakuan Pajajaran, then the Dutch colonial retreat of Buitenzorg. Nicknamed the Rainy City, it holds a presidential palace and the Bogor Botanical Gardens, among the oldest and largest in the world.

Yogyakarta is the only Indonesian city still ruled by a monarchy. It briefly served as Indonesia's capital from 1946 to 1948 during the independence struggle, and it remains a center for classical Javanese arts such as batik and wayang puppetry and a university city, home to Gadjah Mada University.

Makassar, formerly Ujung Pandang, is the capital of South Sulawesi and the largest city in Eastern Indonesia, ranking fifth in the country. A historic trading port at the crossroads of routes between Southeast Asia and eastern Indonesia, it remains the commercial gateway to the country's eastern islands.