Travel Facts Kazakhstan is the world's largest landlocked country. Sri Lanka has lowest divorce rate in the world – and the highest rate of female suicide. Australians have a huge 380,000 sq m of land per person – and yet 91% live in urban areas. Nearly a quarter of people in Monaco are over 65.…

Oasis Hong Kong Airlines, a new start up company aims to be a low cost carrier but operate long haul routes. They plan to make their maiden flight from Hong Kong to London’s Gatwick Airport in June 2006 as Hong Kong’s first low-fare carrier. Oasis aims to price round-trip tickets starting as low as HKD$1,000…

A recent report in “Holiday Which?”, published by the British Consumers’ Association, found that the number of people who take “independent holidays” has now overtaken those booking the traditional package, predicting that 55 percent of overseas holidays in 2005 will have been arranged independently. Travellers are searching the internet and booking flights, cars and hotels…

Air New Zealand and Qantas Airways confirmed have barred men from sitting next to unaccompanied children on flights. The policy came to light after a man seated next to a child was asked to change seats with a woman in another row and was told by a Qantas flight attendant that the airline’s policy stipulated…

Bear in mind, before you read this, that this news is reported by the China Travel Service. “China is the main engine driving Asia-Pacific travel; and by 2020, China is expected to be the world’s No. 1 travel destination with an estimated 100 million tourists visiting every year. ”

Sent in by Francesca: ever fancied climbing Everest? Now there is a company that trains and supports amateurs. Check out about climbing Everest: http://www. everest2006. co. uk/

Visitors to Asia and the Pacific should look out for the new SkyTeam Asia Pass that gives access to 61 cities in 21 countries through three major gateways: Guam, Seoul and Tokyo, on flights with Air France, Continental Airlines, KLM, Korean Air or Northwest Airlines. You need to buy 3 coupons, or a maximum of…

A sparrow shot dead after flying into the middle of a Dutch world record attempt, knocking over 23,000 dominoes with a little flap of its wing is to be given pride of place at Rotterdam’s Natural History Museum. The bird, whose killing last month in the northern Dutch city of Leeuwarden enraged animal rights activists,…

A belated entry to the e-newsletter; this was passed to me by Padmassana whilst the Beetle was working away in SE Asia. Padmassana heard on the radio that a Thomsonfly a stewardess said she needed “eight fat people” to sit nearer the front because the captain of a half-full London-bound Thomsonfly flight was unhappy about…

Speak Chinese and travelling to Africa? You may get a chance to try it out. Zimbabwe’s government hopes to see Mandarin Chinese taught in universities as the school year starts in February. This is part of mad crazed dictator Robert Mugabe’s “Look East” policy of building closer economic links with China amid worsening relations with…