浪漫Check—in

当你在异国他乡步入一家酒店时,打开房门的那一刻无异于拆开圣诞礼物的那个瞬间。2月里有中国人的新年和西方人的情人节,是欢欣和浪漫的月份,因此我们让浪漫自Check-in那一刻开始。每次住宿,都好比和一个人偶遇。就像硬币的正反面一样,这种偶遇极有可能是索然无味的,但它也完全可能令人一见钟情,回味无穷。     

How do changes in human resource management practices influence employee engagement? A longitudinal study in a hotel chain in the Philippines

ABSTRACT

Drawing from social exchange theory, this study investigates how changes in human resource management practices influence and affect employee engagement in a hotel chain. Changes in human resource management practices were identified, and corresponding changes in the level of employee engagement were observed. One hundred forty-five employees from a hotel chain in the Philippines participated in a longitudinal study. Results show that improvements in human resource management practices, particularly in the areas of reward management and training and development, yielded positive and significant change in the level of employee engagement. Implications for human resource management, particularly in the hospitality and tourism context, are discussed.     

Medical travellers’ perspectives in selecting in-patient services at selected private hospitals in Sri Lanka

The Sri Lankan government has clear plans to develop medical tourism as an industry. Availability of high-quality medical professionals and accredited hospitals has encouraged medical travellers to come to Sri Lanka and to expand the medical tourism industry in the country. The purpose of this cross-sectional study was to describe medical travellers’ perspectives in seeking in-patient services at selected four private hospitals in Sri Lanka. Foreign national in-patients (n?=?252) were interviewed using an interviewer-administered questionnaire. The response rate was 93.25%. The majority (68.1%) were Maldivians followed by Indians (20.4%) and 51.1% sought surgical care. Availability of high-quality medical professionals (94.2%) and accredited hospitals (81.3%), easy visa (90.2%) were top reasons to select Sri Lanka. Medical travellers faced difficulties in communication (37.4%), transport (31.9%), accommodation (57%) and finding quality food (41.7%). The study recommends improvement of infrastructure and support services for medical travellers and that private hospitals obtain international accreditation to improve medical tourism potentials.     

Trauel to Shandong in New Year

The new year chime ushered in "Visit China 97". To mark this major event in China's Tourism industry, east China's Shandong Province has prepared colorful tourist programs. While introducing Shandong's tourism to this reporter recently, Li Deming, deputy director of the Shandong Provincial Tourism Bureau said that it is auspicious that the province has many representative tourist products which are related to the word "three", since an old Chinese New Year blessing goes: "With three##属性不符     

The Egyptian Government's Role in Re-Establishing the Hotel Industry in Cairo (1953–1957)

This article analyzes the role of the Egyptian Government in reviving and improving the Egyptian hotel industry in the revolutionary period. It provides a case study of a country with large political problems, but at the same time pursuing a dream—a dream that was expensive and demanding. Tourism was understood to be an important tool in promoting political stability and providing some legitimacy to a political system opposed by the major powers in the world. This study will examine the Egyptian Government's role in re-establishing the hotel industry as an important economic sector in Egypt during the period from 1953 to 1957, which was considered a critical political period. The year 1953 marked the beginning of the official plans to increase the hotel facilities in Cairo with the establishment of the Tourism Department; and 1957 marked the end of Suez Crisis of 1956. The study utilized unpublished U.S. Department of State documents that show that the hotel industry was used as tool to put pressure on the Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser (1952–1970) to accept U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East and was one of the main issues negotiated between the two countries after the Suez Crisis.     

It’s in the air: Aroma marketing and affective response in the hotel world

Smell is considered to be the sense that is most closely attached to emotional reactions. This makes scent in the hotel environment an important atmospheric variable to study, because fragrances are expected to increase the likelihood of producing an emotional reaction from consumers. Capitalizing on smell’s ability to cue memories and conjure up emotions, the purpose of this research is to examine the emotional states evoked by various hotel scents in a hotel business in Hong Kong that uses scent throughout its premises. More specifically, this study intends to make a connection between the emotional states evoked by the hotel scents and how hotel businesses can make use of their guests’ emotional responses. Scent marketing is an overlooked subject in hospitality and tourism research.     

Current Situation of Rural Residents’ Tourism: A Case Study in Zhejiang Province in China

China is a large agricultural country. At the end of 2011, rural residents accounted for 48.7% of the total population. Without the participation of rural residents, the development of China's tourism would be incomplete. The outset of rural residents’ tourism will be crucial to 50% of China's tourism market. This article, through two years’ questionnaire surveys, interviewed 600 rural residents from 38 villages in Zhejiang province, analyzed the current situation of rural residents’ tourism market and rural residents’ tourism consumption behavior. This survey provided theoretical researches for developing the tourism market of rural residents, and had some significance on stimulating domestic demand, promoting economic growth and improving the standard of rural residents' life.     

Random Notes on the Temples in Beijing

How many temples are there in the capital Beijing?No exact figure can be given,but one poeric line seens appropriate:"four hunbred and eighty temples existed in the Southern Dynasties,and many more towers were shrouded in smoke and rain."Only the time has changed and no perennial rain prevails in Beijig.     

Tourist accommodation in Spain 1971–1981

This article presents an analysis of the spatial distribution and structure of the tourist accommodation supply in Spain throughout the 1970s. The analysis demonstrates substantial growth in tourist accommodation on a national scale with little change in the pattern of spatial differentiation. There was also found to be more variety in accommodation provision than is indicated by Spain's package-holiday image. Further diversification should stimulate market demand, and with this aim the Spanish government is promoting inland destinations in an effort to change the “sun-sand-sea” market image.     

Climate Variability in the Origin Countries as a “Push” Factor on Tourist Arrivals in the Philippines

The objective of this paper is to test the impact of climate variability in origin countries as a “push factor” on tourist arrivals, specifically in the Philippines, and to select a suitable proxy to measure climate variability. This paper uses the Southern Oscillation Index (SOI) constructed by the Australian Bureau of Meteorology. Climate variability is strongly linked to the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and this link is used by meteorologists to forecast changes in weather globally. SOI is a widely used indicator of the ENSO and its best known extremes are the El Niño (warm phase) and La Niña (cold phase) effects. The study proves to some extent that there is a significant increase in US tourist arrivals in the Philippines when La Niña-like weather conditions prevail in the USA. More importantly, the SOI proved to be a good measure of climate variability.     

Prague’s community gardening in liquid times: challenges in the creation of spaces for social connection

ABSTRACT

Building on the concept of liquid leisure, this paper examines the current potential of community gardening in Prague to create collaborative place-bound communities. By looking closely at the fluctuation of members of selected gardens and the reasons for withdrawal from this activity, we try to see if changes in the member base have any consequences for the functioning of the gardens and the social groups created around them. The results are based on an analysis of interviews held with representatives of community gardens in Prague. Our results document that community projects such as community gardens can be sustained as gardeners come and go and can still fulfil important social, educational and environmental needs of gardens’ immediate neighbourhoods. Moreover, the perception of community around the garden is negotiated and re-negotiated by individual gardeners. The community can play a different role throughout different stages of people’s lives and other changing contexts. Experiences of nuclear families, tribal groupings, collaborative and interest communities often intersect in the space of community gardens. Gardening as a leisure activity, as well as community creation and belonging can, thus, be approached from very different perspectives in the context of liquid modernity.     

Evaluation of the Economic Effectiveness of Public Tourism Coupons in China in 2009 – A Corrected DEA Approach

Initiation of tourism coupon programs in various destinations in China in 2009 was an innovative policy response to the general nationwide economic downturn brought about by the world financial crisis. Given the size of the Chinese tourism market and the unique role of authorities in China's tourism development, studies on tourism coupons have profound theoretical and practical implications. This paper utilized a Data Envelopment Analysis approach to evaluate comprehensively the economic effectiveness of tourism coupons in eight representative Chinese destinations. In particular, correction coefficients were incorporated to adjust relevant output indicators to a consistent and comparable level. The results showed that the integrated efficiencies of the tourism coupons in all examined destinations had been quite high, thereby validating the policy success of the tourism coupon programs. Practical suggestions are also provided on the technical and operational aspects of the tourism coupon programs.     

Chinese international students’ psychological adaptation process in Korea: the role of tourism experience in the host country

This study aims to shed light on the effect of international students’ lifelong learning and dining experience during the trip in a host country on their psychological adaptation, place attachment, and sharing of tourism experience. Employing responses from 247 Chinese students in South Korea, a SEM (Structural Equation Modeling) technique was used for the analysis. The study found that lifelong learning positively influences dining-out flow experience, which in turn placed positive effects on psychological adaptation, place attachment, and sharing of tourism experience, whereas place attachment mediates the relationship between flow experience and both sharing of tourism experience and psychological adaptation.     

Personnel management in hotels — some empirical observations

This article details the results of two, recently-conducted surveys into the performance of personnel management within hotels. One survey used a postal questionnaire distributed to a stratified sample of hotels throughout the U.K. The aim of this research was to examine how the role of the personnel function was viewed by managers in the industry as a whole. In the second survey structured interviews were conducted with those managers responsible for personnel activities, within all hotels of 50 bedrooms or more, in one city centre locality. The aim here was to examine, in some detail, how the managers attempted to discharge their responsibilities. By combining these two contrasting approaches a comprehensive view of the conduct of personnel management within hotels can be achieved. For although these surveys were conducted independently and differ in their aims, structure, size and scope they have generated very similar observations of personnel work in this particular context. Furthermore, these empirical findings are in marked contrast to the view of hotel personnel work constructed by a recent literature survey. Theory and practice appear discordant.     

Seeking the real spain? Authenticity in Motivation

Following a focus group discussion, a questionnaire was compiled consisting of a series of four holiday scenarios which varied in the authenticity of the experience of the host country. Participants also completed an adaptation of a tourist motivation scale. Both student and general public samples rated the four scenarios consistently for authenticity, and their predicted enjoyment of each scenario was positively correlated with their perception of its authenticity. People scoring highly predicted higher enjoyment for all scenarios, and, in the general public sample, showed a more marked effect of authenticity on enjoyment. Older and higher social class participants also showed more effect of authenticity on enjoyment. RésuméÀ la recherche de la vraie Espagne: lauthenticité dans la motivation touristique. Après la réunion dun groupe de discussion, on a élaboré un questionnaire qui comprenait quatre scénarios de vacances qui variaient dans lauthenticité de lexpérience du pays daccueil. Les participants ont rempli également une adaptation dune échelle de motivation touristique. Pour les deux échantillons, étudiants et grand public, laccord était général sur lauthenticité relative des scénarios, et le plaisir anticipé correspondait affirmativement à la perception du niveau dauthenticité. Les participants ayant les résultats plus élevés sur léchelle de motivation touristique pensaient obtenir plus de plaisir de chaque scénario. Léchantillon du grand public montrait un effet plus marqué de lauthenticité sur le plaisir, tout comme les participants plus âgés ou de classe sociale plus élevée.     

Paradoxes in planning Tourism Elitism or Brutalism?

While the rhetorics of environment, sustainability and ethics are prominent in academic discussions on tourism planning, they remained somewhat remote in the case of Eritrea. The debate about how the poorest countries should proceed with tourism remains polarized and confused. To help analyze this, a continuum is proposed upon which various types of planning advice may be placed. The two poles are represented by Tourism First (in which developing the industry is the focus of planning) and Development First (where planning is framed by national development needs) The terms of reference which are the key planning guide for tourism consulting firms conducting planning, are identified as being particularly inadequate.     

Good governance in protected areas: an evaluation of stakeholders’ perceptions in British Columbia and Ontario Provincial Parks

As government funding is reduced and tourism-based fees are increasingly used to fund protected area operations, two options are often used for management: transfer of tourism services to the private sector or operation of tourism services by a government agency that functions like a corporation. This paper reports stakeholders’ views concerning governance for two prominent, but different, management models for protected areas’ tourism services in Canada. British Columbia Provincial Parks uses profit-making companies to deliver park services; Ontario Provincial Parks uses the parastatal approach, where park staff members provide most services directly. Surveys of five key stakeholder groups (park staff, visitors, contractors working in park, nearby residents and NGOs with an interest in parks) provided higher rankings of perceptions of governance criteria closer to good governance for the Ontario approach, with important differences found between some groups and amongst some criteria in both park systems. This research suggests that the parastatal model is perceived as superior by important stakeholder groups, using the lens of standard governance criteria, compared to the outsourcing model that uses profit-making companies to provide park tourism services. This finding has implications globally where governments seek to shift park funding from government towards tourism fees and charges.     

Tourist hotels in Israel — modern classification scheme

Hotels have been given star-ratings in Israel since 1970. Changes in tourist expectations have made it necessary to update the system whereby stars were awarded. Adi Niv, an independent consultant on tourism development and former Director General of the Israeli Government Tourism Corporation, describes a new system of classification devised by a public committee appointed by the Israeli Minister of Tourism. The new classification scheme aimed to be fully operational by the end of 1987.     

What determines international tourist arrivals in India?

Using data for 18 major tourist originating countries to India from 2001 to 2015, this study examines the major determinants of international tourist arrivals in India. The results indicate that past experiences of the tourists, per capita income in the tourist originating country, relative costs of living between India and the country of origin, and the level of infrastructure development in India are key determinants of international tourist arrivals in India. Furthermore, both transportation and communication infrastructure are important in attracting tourists to India. In particular, evidence suggests that availability of road and air network and telephone connections has favourable impacts on international tourist arrivals in India. These results are robust to the inclusion of additional variables. These results have important policy implications.