Tag: travel

Knowledge Is Wealth

Hotels In The News is a living, diverse collection and growing archive of hotels that appeared in news articles from around the world. So far, it has touched on hotels as wide ranging as one can find in every corner of the world. Even in its infancy, it is shaping up to be a useful resource. Every hotel featured includes a booking link so you can see the rooms, restaurants, lobby and external view. if available. You can also check rates, availability and book.

The far flung hotels are collectively a goldmine as each news article was also a review of the location. They act as as fantastic read if you like travel, geography and have hunger for knowledge. So much to learn from each location. Surfing the curated news can be enlightening or similar to a vitual “round the world” experience for an armchair traveler, so to speak. Many of the articles were written by experienced and savvy travelers You will benefit from their travel tips and special insights.

I am optimistic and confident many of you, someday, will be able to afford to go to one of those places and you will book the room/s from MyCen Hotels.

Places covered so far, included:

Blackpool, UK, New Plymouth New Zealand. Saint Luicia, Soho London, Los Angeles. New York, Desaru Johor, Old Trafford, Malaga Spain, Washington DC, Birmingham UK, Shangha Chinai, Abu Dhabi, Singapore, Monte Carlo, Monaco, Belgium, Spain, Ecuador, Sunway Malaysia, Taipeh Taiwan, Philadelphia, Samui Thailand. Bangkok, Hoi An Vietnam, Saigon, Siem Reap Cambodia, Luknow India, Sydney Australia, Hat Yai Thailand, Tuscany Italy, Long Beach California, Cayman Islands, Yorkshire UK, Kota Kinabalu Malaysia, Beijing China, Krabi Thailand, Tokyo Bay, Mumbai, Manila, Wyoming and Idaho USA, MalToronto Canaa, USA, Tahiti, Switzerland, Cape Town South Africa, Addis Ababa Ethiopia, Baku Azerbaijan, Jaipur India, Toronto Canada, Glasgow, Antigua & Barbuda, Marrakech Morocco, Long Tengah Malaysia, Paris France, Vienna Austria. Big thank you to all the awesome publications and authors.

To start traveling begin from here http://www.mycen.my/hotels-in-the-news/

Or follow the MyCen Hotels Facebook Page for updates. https://www.facebook.com/mycenhotels/

Mongolia Matters

Cold As Ice.

I was standing near an ashtray in KLCC Park when a very beautiful woman came to ask me for a light. I didn’t have one as I no longer smoke. Asking for lighter in a club years ago was how gay people determine a stranger’s preference or interest by the way you hand over the lighter. I can’t remember the mechanism now.

Anyway, it was an innocent request and I got to know her. She was Boloro Dendev on Fb (@tina_hk on IG). In-spite of her trademark icy demeanor, she turned out to be a very warm person with a great sense of humour. She spoke English with a Hong Kong accent and she looked Chinese.
After a long chat, I found out she is Mongolian but lives in Hong Kong where she is known as Tina. We became Facebook and IG friends and I saw her posting about being afraid to go outside at her home in her country when temperature was -30C one day in February. Wanted to confirm with her and she replied saying it is can be as low as -65 C ! Yikes. How many can remember the song “Cold As Ice” by Foreigner?

Mind you, she is a native of the country and grew up there but yet she found it unbearable when she is home. Maybe it was her years of living abroad.

I was thinking of visiting the capital Ulaanbaatar during summer one of these days. I asked Boloro for a hotel she likes and she mentioned the Shangri-la Ulaanbaatar. There are many Mongolian hotels listed in MyCen Hotels, should you decide to go there.

Picture of the enormous Statue of Genghis Khan in Mongolia and a ravishing selfie by Bolorov Dendev. Located 54 km east of Ulaanbaatar, the Chinggis Khan Statue is currently the biggest and tallest equestrian statue in the world. Visitors can walk inside an exhibition hall inside the horse’s body.

Find a hotel in Mongolia at http://www.mycen.my/

 

See over 150 hotels in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia by clicking here

#mongolia #ulaanbaatar #genghiskhan #chinggiskhan #asian

 

The Ignorant Sakai

Sakai is a local idiom to describe a person who is a country bumpkin or someone who has never seen common things. It is a somewhat derogatory term for the indigenous tribe it was named after.

After receiving two bookings for hotels in Kuningan, Jakarta, I was curious. The first is Ascott Kuningan Jakarta and the second being the Aston at Kuningan Suites Hotel.

Confusingly, there is also a regency and city named Kuningan, east of Jakarta, near Cirebon. To complicate things, Kuningan City Mall turns up in search results.

I asked my Jakarta friend and Jakarta resident Veronica Sitorus (@ve_nat on IG) and she confirmed Kuningan is one of three business districts in Jakarta. When I went to Jakarta, I stayed at the Gran Mahakam Jakarta which was a fine hotel but I hated the metal detectors and explosive sniffing dogs checking my camera bags.

Jahabar Sadiq, who was then working there, visited me at the hotel before taking me on a Jakarta pub crawl. Coming from KL I have seen the undercarriage of cars inspected with mirrors before entering the car park of the KL Hilton in KL Sentral. I suspect the Grand Mahkam hotel had some American connection. This was after the Jakarta Marriott bombing.

Just my luck that I stayed later at the Renaissance New World Makati Hotel in Manila, also managed by Marriot I think. The Philippines capital suffered a wave of bombings by militants at that time. I went through the same hassle with my camera bags at hotel and at mall entrances. Was a bit unnerving seeing. for the first time, a guard with firearms inside a McDonald’s.

Anyway, Jakarta is great for street photography on foot. Although there seems to be growing inter faith intolerance now. It was nice to see multi-religious symbols placed together at a roadside art shop. I went to the Jakarta Cathedral or the Roman Catholic Church of Our Lady of Assumption earlier and saw many male guests attending a wedding dressed in batik and wearing songkoks. The women were in beautiful kebayas. I felt like an ignorant, sheltered sakai from Malaysia. All hotels cited can be booked at MyCen Hotels www.mycen.my

#kuningan #jakarta #indonesia #streetphotography #manila

Travel Is The Only Thing You Buy That Makes You Richer

If you are wondering why I occasionally feature some very exotic and relatively expensive hotels in faraway places, it is like proof of concept. Proof that any hotel, at any price can be found and booked at MyCen Hotels http://www.mycen.my/

Recent features include hotels from the Cayman Islands, Ecuador and Tahiti, some of the places few Malaysians venture to as a holiday destination. It is also to demonstrate that the combined database from my two affiliate partners hold over a million properties, The other simple reason, of course, is to keep the brand visible and active so people remember me when it is time they travel and book rooms.

If you can’t find a specific hotel. there is usually a very simple reason. Spelling mistakes while searching. Happens to me, all the time too. We are all spoiled by the excellent spelling corrections and spelling suggestions of Google that we become sloppy elsewhere. A hotel may also be new or has not come aboard for their own reasons.

I treat every hotel I discovered in a faraway land, as a chance to widen my general knowledge. Hope you do, too. “Travel Is The Only Thing You Buy That Makes You Richer” ~ Anonymous

Pic of Kakslauttanen Arctic Resort, Finland – Glass Igloos and chalets to observe the Northern Lights and to go on reindeer safaris. Pic from Booking dot com.

Happy travels.

Sunset Capital Of The World

Kota Kinabalu is the sunset capital of the world. I don’t mean it in the metaphorical sense as in declining.There was a spectacular or glorious sunset every day I was there. This is a scene from the same balcony I captured the earlier pic of the flickering silver sea with Bernard Khoo. Without warning, it soon developed into a majestic golden sunset,

Whether you are on the balcony of your hotel room or on the beach or on the waterfront, or at the UMS jetty at Sepanggar Bay, at the stilt houses of the water village or at the Bandar Mosque, a stunning sunset awaits you daily unless it is raining heavily. West Malaysians need to know that sunsets in KK are an hour earlier at around 6:20 pm.

Don’t wait for the sun to dip below the horizon although the beauty of an afterglow with rich hues has its merits too. Compose to include reflections on water, wet sand and palm trees if there are. Photographers go to the seaside for sunsets because all these elements make a great backdrop. Not surprisingly, the Shangri-la Tanjung Aru Resort has a bar named Sunset Bar.

The beaches of Tanjung Aru is a great place to photograph sunsets. The coast faces West. If you are planning to go KK to photograph sunsets, book a KK hotel listed in MyCen Hotels (http://www.mycen.my/) Suggestions are Marina Court Resort Condo Hotel (where I photographed this), Tanjung Aru Beach Resort, Manukan Island Resort, the Magellan Sutera at Sutera Harbour and possibly at the resort at big Gaya Island, if you are on he correct side.

You can do it at any beach or high elevation vantage point you have access, Nobody owns the sunsets.

#sunset #dusk #goldenhour #sundown #nature #sea #kk #kotakinabalu #sabah #kk #kotakinabalu #borneo