Hordes of people descended upon the 2009 Taichung Summer Travel Fair yesterday, looking for bargains among a wide variety of discounted tour packages.
By the time World Trade Center Taichung opened its doors for the show yesterday morning, a long line of people extending all the way to a nearby road had built up, causing serious traffic congestion in the surrounding neighborhood.
Many visitors said they were looking for an interesting but inexpensive tour package suitable for a summer vacation for the whole family.
Huang Lin-huei (黃琳惠), a project manager of Taichung-based Bosstar International Co (博思達) — the fair’s organizer — said that most of the travel agencies participating in the three-day fair that opened on Friday were offering discounted domestic and overseas tour packages to attract buyers.
For example, Huang said, a seven-day tour to Thailand and Hong Kong was being offered for NT$18,000 per adult, with children enjoying a further reduction of NT$4,000 per person.
As to local tours, “paying the same price for a bed and breakfast as in the past, you can now not only have the bed and breakfast, but also a free afternoon tea, a visit to a hot spring and extra tour guide services,” Huang said. “The packages really offer big incentives.”
Affected by the global outbreak of a new strain of swine flu, known as influenza A(H1N1), the overseas travel market declined by 30 percent last month, but the domestic market grew by between 10 percent and 20 percent, Huang said, adding that there were signs showing that overseas travel was slowly recovering.
More than 150 local and foreign travel business operators, including Star Cruises, have set up 250 booths at the annual travel fair.
They are promoting services ranging from stays at hot spring hotels or upscale business hostels and rural tour packages to leisure-oriented and bicycle-related treks and overseas honeymoon packages, Bosstar said.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
US CONSCULTANT: The US Department of Commerce’s Ursula Burns is a rarely seen US government consultant to be put forward to sit on the board, nominated as an independent director Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday nominated 10 candidates for its new board of directors, including Ursula Burns from the US Department of Commerce. It is rare that TSMC has nominated a US government consultant to sit on its board. Burns was nominated as one of seven independent directors. She is vice chair of the department’s Advisory Council on Supply Chain Competitiveness. Burns is to stand for election at TSMC’s annual shareholders’ meeting on June 4 along with the rest of the candidates. TSMC chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) was not on the list after in December last