A traveler by heart??? Now become a writer too…

Being a traveler is the most exciting thing one can do.. believe me and thats the truth, where else do you get to meetup with new people, know new cultures, know things which is not known by other people and many more??

Every traveler I know, loves to talk about the countries he/she has gone to, how excting or disappointing the overall experience was.. How they met few interseting people, and how they know things which they wouldn’t have known otherwise, if they wouldn’t have travelled to that particular destination.  Sharing our escapades with an eager audience is a fabulous bonus to travel.

So, with all this talk, the point I am trying to bring in here is, yes you talk about your excitemen and your disappointments with all your friend, so why not with everyone else? And what better than writing down your own travelogue? So, I feel every traveler should often write about their travel, and share the experience. So that even a fellow traveler can take a hint and few tips from your experience. To make things simple for all of us, I am trying to write few points which should be taken care while writing a travelogue.

Travelogue writing tips

Think of an interesting heading first

A heading means, something which will relate to your enitre travelogue. Think of some experience which you had while travelling. Another important thing while thinking of a heading is that you will like to your travelogue to be read by people, so making it interesting will mean more people reading your travelogue.

Organize your thoughts

Organizing your thoughts around the heading will help you revive a lot of good and bad memories.

Use plenty of pictures

Pictures are the most effective way to bring back the memory and it also adds to the over all experince from the point of view of a reader. So use picture as much as you can while writing a travelogue. And yeah, don’t forget to mention the details of the picture.

Apart from the above dont forget to proof read the entire travelogue for grammatical and spelling mistakes.

It will probably take sometime before you become a master in travelogue writing. But once you do, it can be an exciting career opportunity. There are magazinnes and websites which pays you for writing a travelogue.  My recommendation would be to start from online travelogue website like www.travelobuddies.com .

 

Is India ready for International Tourism?

India has open to the fact finally and decided to open tourism office in Beijing. According to official sources India is set to launch an aggressive campaign in the neighboring country to showcase its historical and cultural sites.

The mandate of the office will be to tap the Chinese tourists. Last year, about 80,000 Chinese tourists visited India and the Government here feels there is potential for raising this number. The number of Chinese tourists to India witnessed a growth of 38 per cent in 2006 over 2005 and there is tremendous potential. But having said that we are still far far behind other nations in Asia Pacific region.

Total Tourist arrival in India – 2006

India – 4.4 million
China – 49.2 million
Malaysia – 17.5 million
Hong Kong – 15.8 million
Thailand – 13.9 million
Maccau – 10.7 million*source: Planning Commission

We all agree to this fact that tourism everywhere in the world, and is a strong source of income generation. But if we are targeting international tourists we must be ready with all the infrastructure to handle them too. Our Hotel Rooms are still low when we compare it to any other country.  Infact, Bangkok alone has 60000 luxury hotel rooms which is almost 50% more than what Delhi and Mumbai (20,000 + 25,000) put together has.

And that’s not all, We would be running short of almost 1.5 Lakh hotel rooms by 2010 when New Delhi is hosting Common Wealth Games.

“India’s incopetitiveness for holding international meetings and conferences has been seriously affected and many of them whose first preference was to hold them in India moved to South East Asia on cost consideration.”

Are you a woman and traveling to India?

Israeli tourist found dead in Goa hotel March 19^th 2008

Scarlet Keeling Found Dead on February 18^th 2008

So, you have just booked your holidays and traveling to India? You must be an excited then. But the recent reports of women travelers being harassed, raped and murdered has been a dent and you should be careful.

Some Tips for Women Travelers to India

Even after the modern influence of western countries, India still remains a conservative country. Some western habits are perceived as inappropriate and degrading if practiced by women here. Here are some travel tips for women in India:

• Don’t wear revealing clothes while in India. They do not appeal to Indian sensibilities. You will attract unwanted attraction and advances if you are wearing skimpy outfits.
• Apart from the big cities, touching between people of the opposite sex in public is very unusual. Even married couples avoid any display of affection publicly. It will be better if you do not shake hands with a person of the opposite sex unless the other person extends his/her hand first. Among Hindus, the way to greet is by bring your palms together in front of your chest, or simply saying ‘Namaste’. You can say Hello or Hi also. But some old people may not appreciate it.
• Smoking by a woman is not acceptable anywhere in India, except for the metro cities. A woman who smokes/drinks is thought to be having a loose moral character, especially amongst the middle class.
• Discos, dance clubs, pubs, 5-star hotels are areas with a modern touch. You can easily head there for some entertainment or for drinks. However, having a male companion or at least another female with you is quite a good idea.
• Even at beaches, the people here are fully clothed. First find out what kind of attire is appropriate for the beach you are heading to. In some places like Goa, the visitors to beach mainly consist of foreigners. There, you may wear swimsuits on the beach. However, even there it is inappropriate to roam about dressed in swim wear away from the beach.
• In local trains, some cars reserved only for women. It is advised for you to travel in those.
• It is better not to venture outside in a street party. Street parties on holidays generally don’t consist of women. Inebriated men are seen partying at such occasions. Women, in these parties, can be subjected to groping and sexually aggressive behavior from the inebriated males. It is very unsafe for women to attend these festivities alone.
• Avoid talking in a friendly manner with men you meet in buses, trains, restaurants, shopping places, etc. It may be viewed as a flirtation. It may also lead to unwanted and unexpected sexual advances. However, befriending Indian women can be a wonderful experience for female travelers. But, you may have to start the conversation.
• A way to get more respect from Indians is to wear traditional Indian clothes, such as salwaar kameez or sari.
• Do not venture in isolated places alone. It is also advised not to go outside alone after it is very late and dark.

 

Understanding Travel 3.0

We keep on reading or hearing a lot about Travel 3.0. So what exactly is it? I tried looking for an answer in books, travel blogs and anywhere I could get some information on this topic. Finally what I could grasp and understand after going through all the information. I decided to write and help audience understand travel 3.0 in a simple and effective way.

we talk about travel 3.0, it will be a tool, where the user can get the holistic experience. Any traveler goes to 3 different phases:

1. Planning: A stage where he is looking for information, researching a destination and the fares etc. Which most of the website have been able to do. There are millions of websites which offers destination guides.

2. Bookings: So what do you exactly do after you have researched a destination? You try and reach there. So, the next logical step is to book a ticket, a hotel room, a taxi and perhaps look for a local guide? Though most of the websites offer first three booking, they still lack in finding a local guide.

3.Post Travel Experience: When you go for a holiday with friends, families, girl friend, you obviously shoot pictures, videos with your loved ones. So now the requirement comes of where to store them?

While there are websites which offers everything in bits and pieces, no one really offers everything integrated into one and offer it to customers. A user end up having gone to three different website for three different but entirely interlinked need.

Travel 3.0 would be a phase where all the above three phases would be integrated seamlessly to give the user a single window for his/her entire travel need.

Travel 3.0 will be all of sales, peer reviews and social networking

There are couple of websites like wayn.com and travelobuddies.com still in beta (and I think will take its own sweet time to get launched) are attempting to become one.