World’s 50 Best Restaurants are revealed tonight but should you care?

28/04/201414/08/2018 by Qin Xie | Leave a comment

Published on Yahoo Lifestyle UK & Ireland on 28th April 2014:

Each and every year since the inaugural list was published in Restaurant Magazine in 2002, chefs, journalists and gourmands wait in hot anticipation for the announcement of the World’s 50 Best Restaurants. From a lonely feature in a, perhaps, little known trade magazine in the hospitality industry, the awards have grown to be something well regarded and highly commercialised across the world.

Last year saw the launch of Latin America’s 50 Best Restaurants and the year before that was the first Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants. It’s a beast of a list that has grown and grown and with it drew criticisms.

The first is of course, does anyone outside of the restaurant industry care?

Ten photos from Villa San Paolo

25/04/201426/04/2014 by Qin Xie | Leave a comment

Published on Life in Luxury on 25th April 2014:

Classic Egypt: a cruise down the Nile

20/04/201414/08/2018 by Qin Xie | Leave a comment

Published on Yahoo Lifestyle UK & Ireland on 20th April 2014:

I remember reading about Egypt as a child; it was a place of pyramids and Pharaohs with a history that’s as ancient and as long as the Chinese.

Over the years I read books, watched films and visited museums that featured snippets of ancient Egypt but had no real concept of what Egypt was in modernity. Until the last few years that is, when media coverage gave us an Egypt filled with revolutions and terrorism. So widespread were these reports that I had all but forgotten the Egypt I first encountered.

But there is that duality about Egypt, of the ancient and the modern, as I discovered on a recent trip there.

How to stay safe while travelling in Egypt

29/03/201414/08/2018 by Qin Xie | Leave a comment

Published on Yahoo Lifestyle UK & Ireland on 29th March 2014:

Since the events at Tahrir Square, many tourists have been reluctant to travel to Egypt. Each time a new incident arises, tentative travellers would cancel their plans with renewed concerns. The result has seen the country’s visitor numbers fall by some 90%.

With international press holding a dim view of safety in the country, Egypt’s Minister of Tourism Hisham Zaazou has even spoke of promoting Egypt without Cairo.

But is Egypt too dangerous to travel to? And how can you stay safe whilst there?