This Woman Does Not Want to Exchange Sex for Travel
Our travel column may occasionally be about romantic places, but this is the first time we're writing about sex as a travel topic.
It seems a hookup app called Youjia decided to promote itself via a hoax: that an attractive young woman wanted to travel all over China, but prefers homestays to hotels. She would, the come-on went, exchange sex for "generous" wining, dining, and sightseeing in various destinations. Once revealed as fake, China's government found the entire exercise unfunny, and has banned Youjia entirely, along with some other similar applications. And now for real travel news.
Hainan Airlines is expanding its service to Boston during "the holidays," in this case meaning Christmas and Solar New Year, expanding their four-times-per-week service first to daily, then twice daily.
Tension between China and the Philippines has taken a toll on tourism in the archipelago. Officially blamed on a kidnapping in the southern Philippines of an 18-year-old Chinese student, whatever the reason, China's ban on tour groups to the Philippines has been bad for business there, a destination that was just starting to take root with Chinese travelers after political troubles in Thailand led some to look for other Southeast Asian destinations.
On November 6 at 7.30pm, The Bookworm will host a talk on China's tourism industry with Brian Linden of The Linden Centre, about sustainable tourism practices.
That's it for now. More on Tuesday.
More stories by this author here.
Email: stevenschwankert@truerun.com
Twitter: @greatwriteshark
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Photo: Techinasia, InTouch Today, Shanghai Daily
