I'm going to be traveling around Asia with a stop in New Zealand this summer. My budget is pretty tight, so I've been trying to shop around for the cheapest possible airfare.

I currently reside in Japan (Okayama specifically, OKJ being the closest airport, but KIX/HIJ/FUK could work). As the budget is really the constraining factor, I haven't nailed down the itinerary until I figure out some basic prices. The countries that are a must are Thailand, Vietnam and New Zealand. If the flights are not expensive, then Korea/China/Singapore are also possibilities. The order doesn't particularly matter, except that NZ has to be last.

Unfortunately finding an English speaking travel agent nearby is proving difficult, would it matter if I just use one from back home (Ottawa)? I'd rather pay in yen, but if it's a good price then Canadian Dollars works too.

I've put together this basic itinerary, since it about maxes out my budget for the flight portion of the trip. I'd love to see more if I can find cheaper flights. Aproximate dates are leaving on the 27th of July 2009 with roughly 10-14 days in Vietnam and Thailand.

Using ITASoftware I've put together the following itinerary. As per the instructions I've put the Would using the Asia pass (or some other website/service/whatever alternative) be cheaper? Also, are these prices the final what-I-will-pay prices? Will prices go down if I wait until closer to the day I leave?

July 27th: FUK -(CI 111) - TPE -(CI 783) - SGN �54365
Aug 5th: HAN - (AF 173) - BKK �14160
Aug 17th: BKK - (EK 418) - SYD - (EK 418) CHC �61110

Total: �129635

I'm sorry if I'm asking a lot of questions, or if this is the wrong place to post this. I'm definitely willing to put the time into research, so even just some pointers would help.

Edit: The title should read 'Flight prices around Asia and New Zealand', unfortunately it seemed to have lost focus while I was typing and I didn't notice until after I posted. Now I can't seem to edit it to correct it.

For HAN-BKK (and most any other legs in South-East Asia), you can save a fair bit by flying low-cost carriers like Air Asia. In fact, I'd go so far as to suggest that you should just get a cheap return fare from Fukuoka to Bangkok, Hong Kong or Taipei, and plan the rest of your trip using low-cost carriers. Eg. Air Asia, Jetstar and Tiger all fly between SEA and Australia, and from there you can hop onward to NZ with Pacific Blue etc.

A starting point: http://wikitravel.org/en/Discount_carriers_in_Asia

Thanks for the tips, I'll look into those carriers. I'm guessing that there's no real centralized site that has the fares to all those?

No - that's one of the problems with low cost carriers - they are each very much standalone. And their pricing is very dynamic - it can vary drmatically from day to day depending on the demand.

Yup. In general, if you see a good deal, grab it -- Tiger (http://tigerairways.com) has a $0 tickets deal going on right now, and while you do have to pay taxes and various bogus surcharges, they're still way cheaper than the majors. Keep an eye on the Budget Travel forum for deals.