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Vol. 5(Ii) - Cover And Table Of Contents

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

No abstract provided.

How Visible Are Sacred Sites Online? : Availability Of European Sacred Site Websites, Onur Akbulut, Yakin Ekin

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Sacred sites are places where the spiritual world meets the real world. Every culture in the world seeks to acclaim the mysterious, the divine, the martyred or the extraordinary. There are vast numbers of sacred places of prehistoric, historic and contemporary culture in the world. The internet has become a popular tool for gathering information about sacred sites as well as imagery and other required details related to the travel attraction of sacred sites. The internet sources possess an inevitable impact during the selection process of a sacred destination. This study aims to investigate the online background of sacred sites …

Commodification Of Islamic Religious Tourism: From Spiritual To Touristic Experience, Jahanzeeb Qurashi

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

In the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), the government and the local population of Mecca who used to facilitate pilgrims as ‘Guests of Allah’ free of charge have adopted the concept of ‘pay to pray’ (Shackley, 2001 & Woodward, 2004). In other words, given the escalating demand for religious tourism and the desire to achieve maximum economic benefits, the Saudi government is enhancing the hospitality, tourism and telecom sectors in general and transforming Mecca’s tourism infrastructure, in particular, developing it into a contemporary city / tourist destination by injecting US$80 billion into the local economy (Pecenoni et al., 2012). It …

Exposition Of St. Francis Xavier’S Holy Relics In Goa: An Importance-Performance Analysis, Subhash Kizhakanveatil Bhaskaran Pillai, Kaustubh Kamat, Miriam Scaglione, Carmelita D'Mello, Klaus Weiermair

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Pilgrimage Tourism, one of the oldest forms of travelling, is the largest tourism sector in India; annually more than 70% of domestic tourist movement is for religious purposes which comes to 250 million pilgrims (Jachowski, 2000, Singh, 2016) and accounts for 20% of the revenue generated in the tourism industry (Dewan et al., 2008), hence, making it significant religiously, economically, politically, as well as sociologically. The present study was based on a survey conducted among the visitors who came for the 17th Exposition of St Francis Xavier’s holy relics, a Christian religious event, from 22nd November 2014 to 4th January …

Living Like A Monk: Motivations And Experiences Of International Participants In Templestay, Byunggil Chun, Eugene Y. Roh, Samuel Arvin Spralls

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Templestay has transformed the perception and traditional role of Buddhist monasteries into a hybrid form of leisure and recreational dwelling that transcends religious boundaries. We identify four domains of motivational variables including learning, self-growth, being with nature, and relaxation. Based on data from 299 international participants in Templestay, empirical tests of the hypotheses revealed that motivational domains such as self-growth, nature, and learning exhibited significant differences based on the various socio-demographic backgrounds of international participants. Strategies are suggested for crafting Templestay as a cultural and monastic experience as well as segmenting and targeting international participants based on their needs.

Assessment Of Physical Carrying Capacity For Managing Sustainability At Religious Tourist Destinations, Ravinder Jangra, S.P. Kaushik

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Increased interest in the sustainability of tourism development has initiated concerns about the capability of tourist destinations. This concept implies a threshold or a number of assumptions that are supported by destinations and due to uncontrolled tourism activity it is essential to regulate and manage visitors as well as destinations. In the recent past, many miss-haps have occurred at famous destinations because such large numbers of visitors are unsupported by the destinations. This study aims to provide a examination of visitor thresholds. It tries to estimate the carrying capacity of Braham Sarovar, a very famous Hindu religious destination in Kurukshetra, …

Comparative Pricing Analysis Of Mecca’S Religious Tourism, Said M. Ladki, Rayan A. Mazeh

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

This study compares the costing practices of three religious tourists groups. Specifically, the study compares the costs of Islamic religious tourism to Mecca among three groups: 1) Indonesia and India, 2) Lebanon and Tunisia, 3) Dubai and Qatar. The selection of the three groups was based on the following principle: Group 1: Represents the most populated and less affluent Islamic countries. Group 2: Represents the less affluent Arab States with moderate income Group 3: Represents the richest Arab Islamic countries in the world. Results indicate that countries with wealthy economies charge much higher prices for Hajj packages than those with …

Terrorism, Tourism And Religious Travellers, Ayesha Chowdhury, Razaq Raj, Kevin Griffin, Alan Clarke

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Curiously, while tourism is cited as the world’s largest industry (UNWTO, 2016), it is simultaneously a fragile industry that is highly vulnerable to the impact of the ongoing threat of terrorism. Internationally, terrorism influences the tourist mind-set in a number of ways, in particular it creates fear for travellers and causes economic and social impacts to change the behaviour of people and dissuade them from visiting certain places in the world. Thus, the impact of terrorism has caused tremendous damage to the travel industry. A number of countries which previously depended quite heavily on the tourism industry are suffering in …

Vol. 5(I) - Editorial - List Of Reviewers ~ Conference Calls ~ Report On Annual Conference, Kevin Griffin, Razaq Raj

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

No abstract provided.

Vol. 5(I) - Cover And Table Of Contents, Kevin Griffin, Razaq Raj

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

No abstract provided.

Ocean's Elevenses 美饌巡航, Mercedes Hutton

AMBROSIA 客道 : The Magazine of The International Culinary Institute

Catering to discerning passengers on cruise ships is a major undertaking, but it offers wonderful and bountiful rewards.

在郵輪上為高品味的旅客提供高質素的餐飲服務，是一項龐大而重要的任務，然而對廚師而言，這是個難得而又豐盛的經驗。

Foreign Exchange Rate Effect On International Gaming Demand: An Examination From An Upscale Las Vegas Casino, Myongjee Yoo, Ashok K. Singh, Kasra Ghaharian

UNLV Gaming Research & Review Journal

Las Vegas has developed into one of the world’s top tourist destinations, and the international market has become a vital stream of the city’s revenue. The objective of this study was to understand the foreign exchange rate as a determinant for international gaming demand in the Las Vegas gaming industry. This study applied the econometric modeling method of panel data analysis to secondary data originated from a Las Vegas Strip casino property. This study attempted to validate the foreign exchange effect through empirical investigation. Results of this study showed that foreign exchange rate has an impact on international gaming demand.

The Gettysburg Economic Review, Volume 10, Spring 2017

Gettysburg Economic Review

No abstract provided.

The Effects Of Airline Behavior On Aircraft Accidents, Anneliese S. Brown

Gettysburg Economic Review

The purpose of this paper is to study the effects of specific airline business decisions on aircraft accident propensity. Airline safety affects everyone and has large regulatory and policy implications. Existing research has focused largely on three areas: airline financial health, safety and the resulting effects of accidents. I use both Poisson and Negative Binomial models to study two different airline features: low-cost carriers and flight length, and how they relate to the probability of an aircraft accident. Based on results using a Generalized Negative Binomial model, I find statistically significant evidence at the 99% confidence level that a 1-unit …

Food Tourism In Cork’S English Market - An Authentic Visitor Experience, Lisa O'Riordan, Prof. Margaret Linehan, Aisling Ward

Irish Business Journal

Authenticity is deemed to be a crucial element in many tourism experiences. Tourism, however, is often accused of succumbing to notions of perceived authenticity to ensure commercial success, leading to misrepresentations of cultures. Food tourism, conversely, is advocated as a means of encountering genuine culture, history and lifestyle. This paper investigates the role of food tourism as an authentic representation of culture in Cork’s English Market. In-depth interviews were conducted with market traders and analysed through the grounded theory method. Results indicate that, allowing for natural evolution, food tourism is providing a platform for the continuation, sharing and development of …

The Right Message To The Right People: Developing Effective Crisis Response In Cruise Travel, Bingjie Liu

ICHRIE Research Reports

Purpose

The purpose of this study was to provide insights into developing effective crisis responses within the cruise industry. Particularly, this study tested the effects of different crisis responses on individuals’ safety perceptions and cruise travel intentions. This study also tested how individual characteristics; such as past cruise experience and demographic characteristics, may affect the communication outcomes.

Originality/Value

Using an interdisciplinary approach, this study applied crisis communication theories to a cruise travel context. The findings of this study can be directly applied to develop effective crisis responses for hospitality practitioners, which exemplify the essence of translational research.

Relevance of the …

Pricing Decisions During The Fifa 2014 World Cup: São Paulo And Rio De Janeiro, Albert A. Barreda, Sandra Zubieta Zamudio, Han Chen, Marina Cassilha, Yoshimasa Kageyama

ICHRIE Research Reports

Purpose: This report explores the host destination’s response to the 2014 FIFA World Cup. The study establishes how the hotel Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) of two of the main cities in Brazil reacted to the World Cup.

Originality/value: Exploring Brazilian hotel revenue managers’ responses to a major sporting event in Latin America is the main contribution of this research report.

Relevance of the topic: Several business sectors in the travel and hospitality industry experience distinctive positive and negative performance for hosting mega-sporting events. The findings of this research report will be helpful for hotel revenue managers who regularly propose strategic …

Competency-Based Training In Aviation: The Impact On Flight Attendant Performance And Passenger Satisfaction, Latoya Gibbs, Lisa Slevitch, Isaac Washburn

Journal of Aviation/Aerospace Education & Research

According to the United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO, 2017), over one billion tourists traveled the globe in 2016. In spite of this increase of travelers, airlines are faced with declining levels of customer service and quality of customer experience (American Customer Satisfaction Index [ACSI], 2012). Frontline service employees, like flight attendants, create a critical impression of the service which affects customer perceptions and satisfaction. Nevertheless, many unknowns exist about what creates such impression and how it can be improved. In particular, no study has investigated the effects of Competency-Based Training (CBT) on flight attendants’ performance and consequently passengers’ satisfaction. …