Visiting indoor ski resorts, enjoying water parks and eating at dim sum restaurants in Shenzhen and other nearby cities have become weekend draws for Hong Kong residents holding foreign passports, who praise a travel permit that has made crossing the border easier and faster. But even two years after the launch of the scheme, some hiccups remain, such as the lack of recognition of the permit by some mainland Chinese immigration staff, representatives of non-Chinese residents and foreign business...
“I cannot come to you,” Katie Williams was told, seconds after her Grab driver had accepted her request for a ride in Canggu. “I cannot come to you. You need to come meet me.” Williams, an Australian tourist in her mid-thirties, explained through the app that her elderly parents struggled to walk very far in the hot Bali sun. The driver’s reply was blunt: “It’s too dangerous. I cannot come.” After two more cancellations, she eventually relented and paid a local driver twice the original...
It is over one year since militants unleashed carnage in Kashmir’s Pahalgam, killing 26 tourists. What followed is a revenge operation dyed in vermillion and an unsettling silence in the ‘Switzerland of India’. Today, the streets of Pahalgam, seem to cajole travellers to come back. Leave fear and prejudice at the border, and sip on some kahwa instead