www.hovedsteder.blogg.no is a Norway-based blog about the capitals of the world, with a focus on tourism and travel, the environment, diplomatic affairs, lifestyle, culture and entertainment, food and drink. See also our travel blog at www.minbestereise.blogg.no – Contact us at [email protected]
W Hotels Worldwide, part of Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, on 25 October debuted in the Netherlands with the highly anticipated opening of W Amsterdam, www.rustourismnews.com reported.
Owned by Europe Hotels | Private Collection, the hotel brings the W brand’s distinctive New York energy, Whatever/Whenever service mentality and upbeat programming to the Dutch Capital.
Just steps away from the vibrant Dam Square and the Royal Palace, the hotel introduces Wet Deck, the city’s first rooftop pool, and electrifying culinary venues, such as The Duchess and Mr.Porter.
“The long awaited and much anticipated opening of W Amsterdam brings a distinctive new take on hospitality to the heart of the city,” said Anthony Ingham, Global Brand Leader of W Hotels Worldwide.
“Amsterdam has emerged as a world leader in design, music and fashion, all of which have long been passions of W Hotels and our global travelers. As one of Europe’s most popular destinations, we are excited to welcome guests and locals alike to an energetic space full of unexpected moments.”
Located in the epicentre of Amsterdam’s vibrant social scene, the 238-room hotel spans two iconic buildings, one of which used to house the former Telephone Exchange and the other was previously home to KAS Bank.
W Amsterdam was designed by Office WINHOV and Baranowitz Kronenberg Architects, who collaborated with local designers to refresh the historic buildings with contemporary features inspired by their storied past.
www.hovedsteder.blogg.no is a Norway-based blog about the capitals of the world, with a focus on tourism and travel, the environment, diplomatic affairs, lifestyle, culture and entertainment, food and drink. See also our travel blog at www.minbestereise.blogg.no – Contact us at [email protected]
At det forekommer rasistiske hendelser under fotballkamper i Øst-Europa kommer dessverre ikke som noen overraskelse.
UEFA har en rekke ganger de siste årene sett seg nødt til å straffe klubber for stygge hendelser. Likevel ser problemet ut til å fortsette, skriver dagbladet.no
Nå kan Dynamo Kiev innføre et – mildt sagt – oppsiktsvekkende tiltak. Den ukrainske storklubben vurderer nemlig å lage en egen tribuneseksjon for svarte
I hvert fall ifølge, Volodimir Spiltsjenko, direktør for Olympiastadion i Kiev, der Dynamo spiller sine hjemmekamper. Han ønsker nemlig å komme rasismen til livs ved å segregere tribuneseksjonene.
– Vi skal kanskje forsøke å lage en egen seksjon (for svarte fans) for å unngå rasisme, sier han, ifølge Washington Post.
Spiltsjenko kom ikke på ideen selv, men reagerte positivt da en journalist foreslo å segregere tribunen. Han kalte det for en «god idé» og sa at han sannsynligvis «ville lytte til innspillet».
Stadiondirektørens utspill kommer etter de stygge scenene på tribunen da Dynamo Kiev spilte 0-0 mot Chelsea på hjemmebane i Champions League forrige uke.
Da ble fire svarte menn på tribunen angrepet av andre tilskuere. Den eneste grunnen til at de ble slått etter og kjeppjagd fra tribunen var tilsynelatende at de ikke hadde riktig hudfarge.
På torsdag åpnet UEFA en disiplinærsak etter å ha fått tilsendt en video av hendelsen av antidiskrimineringsnettverket Football Against Racism in Europe (FARE).
– Denne forferdelige hendelsen reflekterer den pågående virkeligheten i fotballen sentralt og øst i Europa, sier FARE-direktør Piara Powar til The Guardian.
Det er forventet at UEFA kommer med en avgjørelse i saken tirsdag. Dynamo Kiev ble straffet rasisme seinest i mars, da laget møtte Everton.
www.hovedsteder.blogg.no is a Norway-based blog about the capitals of the world, with a focus on tourism and travel, the environment, diplomatic affairs, lifestyle, culture and entertainment, food and drink. See also our travel blog at www.minbestereise.blogg.no – Contact us at [email protected]
Den nedlagte Berlin-flyplassen Tempelhof skal brukes til flyktningmottak, og to hangarer skal brukes til å huse migranter og flyktninger, skriver VG Nett / NTB.
Soldater, brannfolk og frivillige har satt opp 72 telt i en hangar. Hvert av teltene skal huse ti asylsøkere. Også en annen hanger skal tas i bruk, og den tidligere flyplassen blir dermed midlertidig bolig for 1.200 personer.
Tempelhof har en spesiell plass i Berlins turbulente historie. Den store, halvsirkelformede terminalbygningen som ble bygget mellom 1936 og 1941, er typisk for nazitidens gigantiske arkitektur. Flyplassen var også helt sentral under Berlinblokaden, da sovjetiske styrker forsøkte å sulte ut Vest-Berlin.
Fram til blokaden ble opphevet i 1949, landet allierte fly 277.000 ganger for å bringe mat og drivstoff til Berlin, med Tempelhof som en av de aller viktigste flyplassene.
www.hovedsteder.blogg.no is a Norway-based blog about the capitals of the world, with a focus on tourism and travel, the environment, diplomatic affairs, lifestyle, culture and entertainment, food and drink. See also our travel blog at www.minbestereise.blogg.no – Contact us at [email protected]
Israels statsminister Benjamin Netanyahu har gått med på tiltak for å roe ned situasjonen ved al-Aqsa-moskeen i Jerusalem, deriblant døgnkontinuerlig videoovervåking, melder NTB-AP-AFP.
Det opplyser USAs utenriksminister John Kerry, som lørdag var i Jordan der han møtte landets kong Abdullah og den palestinske presidenten Mahmoud Abbas.
Før møtene ga både Kerry og Abbas uttrykk for forsiktig optimisme.
Med seg til møtene hadde Kerry forslag som ble lagt på bordet under et møte med Netanyahu torsdag, og Kerry sier han er tilfreds med at Netanyahu blant annet har lovet å ikke endre på reglene om hvem som skal ha tilgang til området Haram-al-Sharif, der al-Aqsa-moskeen ligger, og som jødene kaller Tempelhøyden.
Dette ble også bekreftet av Netanyahu i en uttalelse sent lørdag kveld.
? Israel bekrefter sitt løfte om å opprettholde dagens status for Tempelhøyden, i ord og i praksis, sa Netanyahu.
Området er hellig for både muslimer og jøder, og noe av det Israel har forpliktet seg til, er at alle muslimer skal få lov til å be på Haram-al-Sharif-området mens ikke-muslimer kun kan besøke området, men ikke be.
www.hovedsteder.blogg.no is a Norway-based blog about the capitals of the world, with a focus on tourism and travel, the environment, diplomatic affairs, lifestyle, culture and entertainment, food and drink. See also our travel blog at www.minbestereise.blogg.no – Contact us at [email protected]
Photo credit: asiantribune.com
Sri Lanka’s Embassy in Washington D.C. moved to its new chancery premises on October 19th marking another milestone in the seven-decade long diplomatic presence in the United States, asiantribune.com reported.
Photo credit: asiantribune.com
The Ambassador and the staff marked the occasion with a simple and solemn ceremony at the new premises on 3025, Whitehaven Street, NW, in the presence of religious dignitaries representing multiple faiths, who invoked their blessings on the new premises and its staff.
Addressing those present, Ambassador Prasad Kariyawasam observed that the occasion happily coincides with the recent exponential progress in the bilateral relationship between the United States and Sri Lanka.
Sri Lanka established diplomatic relations with the United States and opened its first chancery building on Wyoming Avenue soon after gaining independence, in 1948.
The premises on Wyoming Avenue witnessed the ebb and flow of the US-Sri Lanka relationship over the years; a robust relationship that has remained one of the most important for Sri Lanka based on shared democratic and multi ethnic values that bind the two countries and create natural affinities.
The Ambassador on this occasion paid tribute to all those officers who had served Sri Lanka at the previous premises of the Embassy on Wyoming Avenue.
The Ambassador also remarked that the more spacious and elegant new building would help better profile and project Sri Lanka in the United States capital and serve as a user-friendly establishment for all those who seek services of the Embassy, in particular, the Sri Lankan American community in the United States.
www.hovedsteder.blogg.no is a Norway-based blog about the capitals of the world, with a focus on tourism and travel, the environment, diplomatic affairs, lifestyle, culture and entertainment, food and drink. See also our travel blog at www.minbestereise.blogg.no – Contact us at [email protected]
With the holy year celebrations approaching fast in 2016, the city of Rome is taking desperate measures to cope with the huge volume of tourists and pilgrims for the event. One of the dramatic steps taken by the city in this regard is raising the taxes for visitors during the jubilee year, www.tourism-review.com
A coach permit to enter the city for one day to give the tourists access to sites such as the Vatican will now cost 1,000 euros, which is essentially five times higher than the current price, which is 200 euros.
Obviously, travel agents and tour managers who have already booked holidays for their customers have risen up in protest against this step by the city council.
To make things worse for tourists, the taxation on accommodation will also be going up by double the current charge.
The ETOA (European Tourism Association) has already expressed its concern regarding this decision stating that imposing a fivefold hike on current charges for the daily permit defies all logic. They went further to add that it would pose a threat to prepaid contracts for 2016 and future tourist contracts as well, translating eventually to Rome becoming a destination that is too expensive and unpredictable for most people.
The ETOA gave a breakdown of the cost for the average traveler to Rome in the holy year celebrations. Apparently, an individual in a group comprised of 40 would end up paying 33 euros for a package that includes a night in a four-star hotel and a night on the coach.
Tom Jenkins, CEO of ETOA termed the behavior “vicious and irrational” and that it lacked any sense of practical planning.
The Holy year in Rome was announced as a year of mercy by Pope Francis, and this is bound to attract thousands of pilgrims into the city. Keeping this in perspective, the step to hike the visitor taxations might actually bring a bit of relief to take off some pressure from the already highly congested streets.
Last year the city streets were clogged up with more than 90,000 coaches and in 2016, it is expected to go up to an impossible 170,000 coaches even with the steep hike in charges. The current plan is far from adequate to handle the situation in any measure. According to experts, there needs to be a practical strategy to deal with what will invariably be a catastrophe in terms of tourist management.
Although there are more than adequate parking sites out of the center, there is no practical system to bring tourists from these sites to the center where the tourist destinations are situated. There is also no link from the main train stations to the smaller St. Peter’s station. The funding to implement anything worthwhile is inadequate and has arrived too late.
All said and done, if Rome is serious about their bid for the 2024 Olympics, they need to demonstrate through the Holy Year celebrations in 2016 that they are indeed capable of handling an event of this magnitude.
www.hovedsteder.blogg.no is a Norway-based blog about the capitals of the world, with a focus on tourism and travel, the environment, diplomatic affairs, lifestyle, culture and entertainment, food and drink. See also our travel blog at www.minbestereise.blogg.no – Contact us at [email protected]
Mongolia, China and Russia have signed a string of cross-border tourism cooperation agreements as part of the efforts to push the construction of the economic corridor among the three countries, the Xinhua news agency reported.
The ten cooperation projects, worth 1.4 billion yuan (220 million U.S. dollars), were signed by government authorities and enterprises during the first China-Mongolia Expo which opened in Hohhot, capital of north China’s Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, on Friday.
They include cross-border tourism route development, tourism personnel training as well as hotel and resort zone construction. The trilateral cooperation involves a tourism route which links Hohhot, Ulaan Baatar, Ulan-Ude and Irkutsk.
“Cross-border tourism is an important part and platform of the China-Mongolia-Russia economic corridor,” said Wei Guonan, head of the Inner Mongolia Tourism Administration.
In 2014, Inner Mongolia received 810,000 tourists from Mongolia and 630,000 from Russia, statistics with the administration show.
www.hovedsteder.blogg.no is a Norway-based blog about the capitals of the world, with a focus on tourism and travel, the environment, diplomatic affairs, lifestyle, culture and entertainment, food and drink. See also our travel blog at www.minbestereise.blogg.no – Contact us at [email protected]
London’s tourism boom has continued during the second quarter of 2015, with the city welcoming a record 5.1 million international visitors between April and June this year, six per cent more than the same period last year, according to the Office for National Statistics International Passenger Survey (IPS), express.co.uk reported.
Tourist spending over the same period was £3.2 billion, an eight per cent increase compared with the second quarter of 2014. Over the past five years (2009-2014), the number of overseas visitors coming to London has risen by 22.5 per cent.
The national picture is also positive with 9.9 million international visitors coming to the UK between April and June 2015, five per cent more than the same period last year. Over half of theseinternational visits to the UK were to London.
Tourist spending across the UK over this period was £5.8 billion, a seven per cent increase compared with the second quarter of 2014.
The latest figures follow on from a record-breaking 2014 when 17.4 million overseas visitors travelled to London, spending £11.8 billion across the city’s restaurants, hotels and attractions.
Earlier this year the capital was named the most popular tourist destination in the world for the second year running by MasterCard in the Global Cities Index report.
According to the report, London is forecast to host 18.82 million international visitors in 2015 putting the city ahead of Bangkok and Paris.
www.hovedsteder.blogg.no is a Norway-based blog about the capitals of the world, with a focus on tourism and travel, the environment, diplomatic affairs, lifestyle, culture and entertainment, food and drink. See also our travel blog at www.minbestereise.blogg.no – Contact us at [email protected]
Somalia has reopened its embassy in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad after it was shut down 25 years ago.
Somalia’s minister of Foreign Affairs Abdisalam Hadliye (in the middle, cutting the ribbon), the new ambassador of Somalia Ms.Khadija Mohamed (far right), officials from the Iraqi ministry of Foreign Affairs and Parliament and foreign diplomats attended the flag-hoisting ceremony in Baghdad on Thursday, horseedmedia.net reported.
“We have opened our mission in Iraq and determined to foster the relations of the two countries”, said Abdisalam Hadliye.
In 1991, Somalia closed its embassy in Iraq after the central government was overthrown and ushered in a new era of conflict and anarchy from which the country has never fully recovered.
www.hovedsteder.blogg.no is a Norway-based blog about the capitals of the world, with a focus on tourism and travel, the environment, diplomatic affairs, lifestyle, culture and entertainment, food and drink. See also our travel blog at www.minbestereise.blogg.no – Contact us at [email protected]
Sydney og Melbourne i Australia kaprer første og andreplassen over byene i verden med best rykte, ifølge konsulent- og rådgivningsselskapet Reputation Institute, skriver dagbladet.no
Sydney er hovedstad i delstaten New South Wales, mens Melbourne er hovedstaden i Victoria. Den nasjonale hovedstaden i verden med høyest plassering er Stockholm, tett fulgt av Wien.
Det er første gang siden den første målingen i 2011, at to byer fra samme land tar de to øverste pkassene på lista, skriver selskapet i en pressemelding.
Ifølge det amerikanske selskapet selv, er den årlige «City Reptrak» verdens største måling av byers omdømme.
Undersøkelsen er gjennomført blant 19 000 innbyggere i G8-landene: Frankrike, Tyskland, Italia, Storbritannia, Japan, USA og Canada
Til sammen 101 byer måles på oppfatninger om blant annet tillit, beundring og respekt. Av de 20 øverste byene på omdømmelista, ligger 15 i Europa.
Oslo var inne i det gode selskapet blant topp ti i 2011, 2012 og 2014. Men i år faller den norske hovedstaden fra fjorårets sjetteplass til attendeplass, bak både Stockholm og København, men foran Helsinki på plass 30.
Verken Stockholm eller København var inne på topp ti i fjor, men gjør motsatt av Oslo og kaprer plass tre og ni.
– Jeg er både forundret og spørrende til hva som kan ha skjedd siden vi har falt så mange plasser. Oslo har fått mye positiv omtale det siste året, sier reiselivsdirektør i Innovasjon Norge Per-Arne Tuftin til Dagbladet.
Han påpeker at Oslo har forandret seg mye på kort tid, og at både Bjørvika, Tjuvholmen, Vulcan-området og Grünerløkka får gode tilbakemeldinger av utenlandske besøkende.
– Jeg har ikke fanget opp noen hendelser som skulle tilsi at vi skulle falle så langt ned. Vårt inntrykk er at utlendinger er godt fornøyde, sier han.
Det er mange kåringer gjennom et år, og det er både morsomt og positivt å komme høyt, innrømmer reiselivsdirektøren.
– En kåring alene betyr ikke all verden, men er det en trend at vi skulle falle på flere kåringer er det alvorlig, sier han.
Fernando Prado ved Reputation Institute, sier i pressemeldinga at omdømmet til en by bygger på folks egne opplevelser, massekommunikasjon, opplysninger fra en tredjepart, og allment aksepterte stereotypier.
Prado sier også at et godt rykte korrelerer med blant annet økt turisme og økte investeringer i byen.
At det er samsvar mellom et godt omdømme og økt turisme, er Per-Arne Tufting enig i.
– Når du scorer jevnt høyt i veldig mange kåringer gjør det det, men en kåring alene er ikke avgjørende. Det hadde vært hyggelig å havne høyere, men noen stor innvirkning på turiststrømmen til Oslo tror jeg ikke dette har, sier han.
De ti byene med best rykte
(Høyeste score er 100)
1. Sydney, Australia – 79,1 2. Melbourne, Australia – 78,9 3. Stockholm, Sverige – 78,4 4. Wien, Østerrike – 76,8 5. Vancouver, Canada – 76,1 6. Barcelona, Spania – 75,8 7. Edinburgh, Storbritannia – 75,6 8. Genève, Sveits – 75,5 9. København, Danmark – 75,5 10. Venezia, Italia – 75,4 18. Oslo – 73,7 30. Helsinki, Finland – 71,2
De ti byene med dårligst rykte
101. Bagdad, Irak – 31,4 100. Teheran, Iran – 35,4 99. Moskva, Russland – 47,1 98. Nairobi, Kenya – 47,5 97. Bogota, Colombia – 47,7 96. Mexico City, Mexico – 47,9 95. Kairo, Egypt – 48,1 94. Kiev, Ukraina – 48,9 93. Caracas, Venezuela – 49,7 92. Tel Aviv, Israel – 49,8
