Sam Korsmoe

……is an American from the state of Montana. He lived and worked in Asia from 1985 to 2004 (2.5 years as a Peace Corps Volunteer in the Philippines, 4.5 years in Taiwan as an English teacher, teacher trainer, and writer and then 11.5 years in Vietnam as a business journalist and entrepreneur) and then again from 2014 to the present day (four years in Shanghai and eight years in HCM City as a writer, teacher, and education consultant).

Sam is the author of five published books. Saigon Stories, an oral history of Vietnam (2006), A World Gone Mad for Marathons, a nonfiction book on marathons and other sporting events (2019), Vietnam – Asia’s Rising Star, a book about the future of Vietnam (October 2023 in English and August 2024 in Vietnamese), and Never Say No, a memoir that he helped to write for the author Ken Atkinson (2025). He is currently publishing one more book, 40 Years of Innovators, profiling 25 key leaders of the Doi Moi (economic reform) era of Vietnam. It will be published by Alpha Books in January 2026 in English and Vietnamese. Sam is the founder and lead instructor of the Saigon Writers Club which hosts private and in-person creative writing classes for people who have always wanted to write and publish fiction. It has hosted 19 creative writing classes and published five short story anthologies. He writes and publishes two newsletters, a weekly newsletter on Vietnam’s economic developments and a bi-weekly newsletter on sports. The newsletters have an average open rate of more than 50 percent. 

Sam is also the founder and race director of the Greater Yellowstone Adventure Series, a seven-event, 10-race series in the Yellowstone region of America. Every year the races attract several hundred athletes from around the United States and several foreign countries. In 2014, he launched the Yellowstone English/Environmental Studies Program International (YESPI). This was an American university accredited outdoor education program for high school students. It is based in the Yellowstone region of America and hosted six sessions from 2015 to 2019 before COVID 19 forced a pause in operations.  

Sam has written extensively on business, culture, education, and sports for several publications. He has published numerous market and industrial research reports about Vietnam and Cambodia for various companies and foreign governments while managing Mekong Research, a market research consultancy that he founded in Vietnam in 1997. He has been interviewed numerous times by international media including the New York Times, CNN, BBC, Financial Times, Reuters, VTV’s Talk Vietnam, Vietnam Today’s Vietnam 360, numerous Vietnamese publications, and other regional publications. He has traveled to nearly every country in Asia for extended trips. He has studied and can speak Vietnamese (fluent), Mandarin Chinese (survival), and the Philippine dialect of Chavacano (near fluency).  

Sam has a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from Montana State University, a Master of Arts in International Studies from the University of Washington, and a TEFL certificate for teaching ESL. His Master’s thesis was on the renovation reforms (Doi Moi) of Vietnam. He has been engaged with Vietnam since 1990 and has been living and working in Vietnam for more than half this time. He currently lives in the Thao Dien District of Ho Chi Minh City.