Northstar

4 | www.travelweekly-asia.com 18 Winkie Wong. Danielle Yong has lived and worked in four countries but now calls Singapore home. As a freelance writer, her articles have appeared in various print publications including inflight magazines. She is a regular contributor to WIT and Travel Weekly Asia. An avid eater, Danielle believes travel keeps the imagination alive and people are more intriguing than architecture. IS BORDERLESS TRAVEL JUST A PIPE DREAM? While the global economy and the Internet has forged an age where seamless connectivity is a reality, world politics seems to be sliding backwards into protectionism: being open now translates to being vulnerable. In Turkey, the tourism industry has suffered blow after blow following repeated terror attacks since the start of the year. The failed military coup in July is likely to further dissuade visitors from travelling, with some airlines diverting flights as countries issue travel advisories calling for citizens to avoid the country. If Turkey is known primarily as the crossroads between East and West, it is also the symbol for millennia of travel and cultural exchange. The tightening of its borders suggests a new world order, one that is far darker than I would like to imagine. Despite the rhetoric of nations, our natural urge to discover new places, tastes and communities will, hopefully, prevail. It's shaped our past and continues to mould our future. The world today may be moving further away from borderless travel, but as long as we keep an open mind, the possibility can exist in our collective imaginations. We owe it to the next generation to hope. A confluence of events including the Orlando shooting, and the number of refugees displaced by war reaching its highest point yet, has cast a palpable shadow over current affairs. Throw the Brexit aftermath and the increasingly worrisome rhetoric emanating from the Trump presidential campaign into the mix and all signs point to politics polarising and borders fortifying. Europe's Schengen Agreement, it seems, is now facing a murky future. The Bastille Day terror attack in Nice – though committed by a French national – has stirred up anti-Muslim sentiment in a world already inflamed by violence. Sweeping statements about immigrants and refugees swirl in the media and public consciousness, stirring up nationalistic sentiments even as the notion of a borderless world, a topic in vogue not so long ago, now gathers dust. Lest we forget, travel – one of the most fundamental of human urges – has existed since the dawn of the human civilisation. Whether in vast numbers, as seen in the migration of our ancestors two million years ago out of Africa, or to learn more about our world, our kind has traversed oceans and continents for millennia uninhibited. Promenade des Anglais in Nice in happier times. CONTENTS 4 VOICES Is borderless travel just a pipe dream? 5 DATABANK Asia Pacific travel trends and outlook 6 TECH TALKING Seatfrog aims to put you in Business Class 8 DESTINATION: HONG KONG Hopes for a destination revival with old and new attractions 10 CRUISE Hong Kong finds itself in a good place for the cruise boom 16 HOSPITALITY SilverNeedle's odd couple works it out 19 HOSPITALITY Loh Lik Peng lights up London 21 PRODUCT: HONEYMOONS Celebrate your wedding with Maasi warriors 23 UNDER MY SKIN Grand Nikko Bali's general manager Jean-Charles Le Coz speaks to Travel Weekly Asia. 12 20 The Australian Outback. Buddymoon - a new trend emerging. VOICES Credit: Elenathewise/iStock

• Cover