A recent report from the United Nations-affiliated World Tourism Organization showed that last 2010, more than a billion tourists spent over US$1 trillion traveling around the world. Their top 10 destinations are: (1) France, (2) the United States, (3) Spain, (4) China, (5) Italy, (6) Great Britain, (7) Turkey, (8) Germany, (9) Malaysia and (10) Mexico.

It’s very interesting to note that the only Southeast Asia country in the top 10 is Malaysia. As the writer of the news article pointed out, Malaysia had 23.6 million visitors who spent $30 billion in tourism, that is so much more than the remittance of $18.7 billion of all our OFWs last year.

There is obviously so much opportunity in tourism that our country has yet to tap on. If Malaysia, a country with very similar tourist attractions like the Philippines, can attract that many people and earn that much money from tourism, what is hindering us from doing the same? What do we need to do or change or improve in order for our country to be a tourism billionaire as well.

The Philippines doesn’t have to entirely clean up, all neat and tidy and all that. We just need to know what market segment we play best. We could identify all these countries and peoples. If we can know that, then we will know who they are, how they work, how they live, how they play, what they want. I mean does everybody really, really want to go to Turkey, or Great Britain. This way, the government knows how and where to put its limited money.

DOT already knows what, how, and where are the Philippines’ best tourist and vacation spots. These sites should be promoted properly and marketed accordingly. But that’s just the first part. DOT needs to identify how and in what way would foreign tourists get to the Philippines and to the different tourist spots. DOT should make it easy and memorable for them. Every gesture must be backed up accordingly to the actual touring and vacationing. No bloated statements, no overrated slogans. They cannot afford to guess if the tourists are satisfied, felt let down, or totally disappointed. They are here to have fun and not feel sorry.

One more thing is infrastructure (roads, transport), facilities (even the miniscule CR must not be overlooked), and security that would resemble or exceed tourists expectations and what they are accustomed to back home. The national government, LGUs, and the different tourist groups must be united. Political will is also important. Also as important is that local inhabitants in the many tourist spots must be willing. They should be accommodating, able to share their knowledge to foreigners about their area, and can make every tourist’s stay as memorable as possible. After all, it is them and their place that will become famous.

I want to go around the world and help people. i don’t care where it is. i’m not affiliated with any religion. which organization can i contact?
how do i get there?

That’s awesome…try checking out the Peace Corp

http://www.peacecorps.gov/

God Bless

Okay. I’m a Junior in High school and i’m getting worried about what colleges in general. I really want to reach high, and go to the ivy leagues, but I don’t think i have what it takes to go there. I want to be something great. I want to go to the best college and ultimately, make something of myself in life. here’s my high school "stats" please give me feed back on if I’m on the right path or what should I do more of:

Junior Class Schedule:
0 Period-Jazz Band
1st Period-Pre Calculus
2nd Period-Honors LA 3
3rd Period-Advanced Band
4th Period-Physics
5th Period-AVID Tutoring
6th Period-AP-US History

These Classes are the highest in my school. My school doesn’t really have all the AP classes, but only some, and I would be willing to take all of them next year, if there will be some.

Extra Curricular Activities:
I am a Band Geek. I have around 7 years of band, three years of jazz band and three years of marching band. I am also the Drum Major of my high school’s marching band for two years when I graduate. Other than playing in the Jazz band, I also know how to play five instruments fluently. Other than band, I am a public speaker. I won many public speaking awards, such as first place regional’s for a public speaking competition at UCSC, and many preliminary competitions. I also am volunteering at my local hospital, which is very thrilling. I’m also very involved in my local perish. I’m the altar server and lector of some Sunday masses and recently, I made a church band and choir to expand my musical talents not just in school, but to my local church, which is really excelling. I also volunteer at my grandma’s Filipino society organizations with the clerical work and scheduled meetings. I also go to my local college and take come courses like ethnic studies, and Spanish. I was also the Junior Homecoming Prince Candidate.

Co Curricular:
I am involved in some sports. I took a season of baseball in my sophomore year, and I’m still actively in Marching Band and WinterGuard. I was the Manager for the Cross Country team, and take tennis lessons at my local tennis center, because there’s no boy’s tennis team in my school :’(

Curricular/Academic:
I am sure to take ALL the hard classes in my school. I’m taking my SAT and ACT this spring, and I’m studying now. I am in MESA (Mathematics, Engineering, Science, Achievement), which is affiliated with the public speaking awards. 3rd place Prelim freshman year, 1st place Prelims sophomore year, 1st place regional’s sophomore year, and this year 3rd place prelims for Pre-Calculus. Regional’s are in 3 weeks. I am active in many clubs such as CSF (California Scholarship Federation), AFS/WES, and I was the founder of the NHS (National Honor Society) Chapter in my school. We will be fundraising for Japan soon. I’m also the delegate/candidate for Boy’s State in my school.

This year, I plan to go to a leadership camp at UCSC in two weeks, and in the summer, I plan to go to Boy’s State, do some marching band parades, go to a Catholic leadership camp, volunteer more at the hospital, and intern at a healthcare business administration company in LA.

Freshman GPA: 4.0
Sophomore GPA: 3.8
Junior GPA (as of now): 3.9

Is this too little? Is this too much? Am I on the right track? I know there are more people that do more than I do, and have better grades and have better scores than I do. I want to reach for the highest. Am I doing so? What should I work on? What should I do more of, or what do you think I should do to get into that ivy league school of my dreams and be someone in this world? College students would really help me right now!

Thank You for taking your time to read and answer this question I really appreciate it!

You don’t need to attend an ivy league college to be successful in life.

In fact, since you live in California, there are plenty of terrific universities in the state that would provide you with an education that would enable you to do pretty much anything you want to do in life.

Until you take your ACT/SAT test this spring, it would be difficult to determine which types of colleges that you would probably be admitted to. Personally, if I lived in California when I was in high school (I was #1 in my high school class and scored a 28 on the ACT), I would have tried to get accepted into Cal-Berkeley. To me, that is the best school in the state for the money.

Let’s start at 5:00pm, an hour before the 2nd Coming of Christ and the Judgment of All Mankind is scheduled to occur, according to his brilliant numerology:

5:00pm = Everyone gets into their Sunday Best and goes to Chur- um…I mean, random parking lots and community centers all over the world to dance around singing "Hallelujah.Hallelujah."

5:30pm = Last meal before the Rapture, funds are kind of tight so everyone will have to settle for Franks and Beans in the western hemisphere and just beans everywhere else. "Close your eyes and imagine it’s a juicy Thanksgiving Turkey, like the Israelites ate of the Mannah!" Camping will say.

5:59pm : Arms raised, hands joined with white knuckles, lots of crying and speaking in tongues…aaaaaaaaannnndddd…

6:05pm: ….arms getting tired… lots of people sneaking peeks at their wristwatches and pre paid cell phones …

6:20pm : Someone turns on the radio and flips through stations, listening for emergency reports of massive natural disasters….. nothing….. nothing… BBC football.. nothing… weather reports… top 40…nothing….

7:00pm : Evening News van crew outside the parking lot has went from snickering to belly laughing at the crowd , who is now milling around and thinning out.

8:50pm: Word is out that Harold Camping has been found dead in his broadcasting booth, dead from self inflicted gunshot wound into the brainstem. Around him are shredded pages of his personal bible , and scrawled on the glass of the booth in cupcake frosting are the words "DAMMIT I WAS SO SURE THIS TIME."

10:00pm Camping’s family announces that an empty pile of clothes were found in Camping’s booth, and that they were closing the radio ministry and changing it to a Top 40 station affiliate, in order to pay off massive debts Camping accumulated these last few months.

12:00 AM 5/22/2011 : News reports start trickling in around the world of mass suicides of Campings followers, mostly overseas.

10AM 5/22/2011: Churches around the world have Sunday Service as usual, throwing in a quick word about "It does indeed say in the bible in several places that nobody knows when the end will come, just look at THAT idiot…" and life goes on.

The End.

What do you think?

Sounds about right to me, except for the 8:50pm point. If he is a true believer, he will simply adapt and move on, putting this sorry business behind him, inventing new terrors to frighten with the foolish, the gullible and the ignorant. Just like he did the last time.

May 06, 2011. NBA fans around the world have been wondering what is wrong with NBA star Pau Gasol. Throughout the playoffs Pau’s game seems to be off.

Well according to a MediaTakeOut.com snitch – it’s because Pau and his LONGTIME GIRLFRIEND and FIANCE Sylvia broke up . . . and he blames a TEAMMATE for him getting DUMPED!

The insider, who is affiliated with the Lakers, told MediaTakeOut.com that Pau’s girlfriend SYLVIA and a teammates wife (who will remain nameless) became good friends. And two weeks ago Pau was ROCKED by news that his girlfriend/fiance DUMPED HIM.

The snitch told MediaTakeOut.com, "Pau thinks that [TEAMMATES] wife was behind it. Sylvia didn’t have many friends and he’s convinced that [wife] either is behind it, or could have talked Sylvia out of it." And word is that when Pau’s TEAMMATE [the husband] tried to talk to Pau about it, the two got into an ARGUMENT – with each saying some very RECKLESS THINGS about each others LADIES.

So now Pau and THIS teammate are no longer speaking to each other. And their ON COURT chemistry is definitely off.

Now we know why Bynum was talking about "Trust Issues". Thoughts?

Pau doesn’t have a girlfriend. Pau is gay. Seriously.

Well does it change anything?

If so… What difference does it make?

At least we knew the player before, now he is a martyred and soon after new chap will run the show with vengeance of whom we will know very little.

However evidence points out that there is no centralized structure in al qaeda.

Independent cells of extremists around world are only affiliating themselves with al qaeda when it suits them.

So what difference does it make in the world, for the war effort, for Libyans, Iranians and Pakistanis and most of ALL to Western World and Society.?

It doesn’t end anything but yes it does make a difference. In particular is boosts the morale of the US and damages the morale of al qaeda, which is probably a good thing.

i guess my first decision will be founding an affiliated philanthropic syndicate to help improve our image around the world , accepting only members with higher education to cope with technological requirements of our age , opening membership to all nationalities and religions, step up efforts in south america to destabilize us supported military dictatorship regimes there for our benefit .

well i’d lead my people to victory against the infidels that make up the united states.

we’d engage them at brand new levels never before considered anything more than science fiction.

to gander new support for this movement we’d need to improve our image (more terrorist attacks on Americans) and open membership to anyone of any religion or race, so long as they hate the US also i really doesn’t matter.

from my current point of view, I think terrorists are idiots. they had everything at their finger tips and all they could manage is use planes a a weapon of terror? really? fly some planes into a few major buildings, get some people killed. its retarded! such as complex plan with so many things that can go wrong and foil the plot. took a huge amount of effort to execute and its only due to the sheer incompetence and narrow-mindedness (if it doesn’t affect the economy its not an issue) of the US government that they managed to pull it off.

obviously if i was a terrorist leader i’d be 100 times better than bin Laden was. the first thing i’d do is take revenge on Americans for killing my comrades (bin laden & others). I’d give the order for each of my men & supporters to kill at least 100 Americans, whenever they see them, talk to one, or even heard about them being somewhere. many of them will die, the worthy ones will survive. this done hte US would have paid dearly for its murder of bin laden. there will be tens of thousands dead, sudden drop in american tourism anywhere in the globe (people too scared to even leave their homes) many US buildings destroyed or damaged.

Baby, drill except for the US and why is he not worried about the US economy but instead the world economy?

"We’re talking to oil producers around the world and letting them know it’s in their interest to make sure that high oil prices don’t end up hurting the world economy," Obama said in an interview with the CBS affiliate WTKR in Hampton Roads, Virginia.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/04/26/usa-obama-oil-producers-idUSWEN188820110426

However it is not normal for a president to not issue drill permits for the US,,,,maybe he should be talking to the EPA.
Proud union tug: We are into 2011,,,,the post was from tuesday, attempt to stay on topic.

Because he is trying to "spread the wealth around".

What that means is Americans need to lower their lifestyle so other countries can raise theirs. (0bama’s plan not mine)

Spreading the wealth is really spreading the poverty.

The minute ANYTHING happens around the world, the U.S. quickly intervenes. A great example is what is going on in Libya right now. I know we haven’t fully considered arming the rebels with weapons yet, but I’m sure we’ll give in eventually. We are one of the youngest countries and we have a LONG way to go if we want as much power as we think we have. I’m so sick of this "protecting America’s interst" b.s. when a conflict happens in a third world country. It would be in our BEST interest if we paid attention to what’s going on within our own country, before we stick our nose in other people’s business don’t you think? i.e. economy, unemployment, border security, etc.I’m not sure what party embraces this ideal more and I don’t care. I’m conservative and I think this just makes the most sense to me. Anyone else agree/disagree with me. BTW please don’t turn this into a political debate pointing fingers at the opposite party you’re affiliated with. I just want some input and your points of view. Thanks guys!

I completely agree…. America has plenty of problems. We are far from the worst country but we are definately not fit to be role models at this point. We have many flaws, so who are we to tell another region how to run their country? I always assume our government is trying to portray it in the media as "helping" another country, but possibly they are only invading because they want something in return (like evoking fear of America, stealing oil, etc.). There is a lot of work to be done on our own territory… I’m only 19, but as far back as I can remember, it seems to me that America has always been the world bully.

xo,
Tuff Luv

Google Chrome Terms of Service
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Just forget that top part. It’s all the "legal" stuff I got when I tried to download Google Chrome. All this stuff worries me because I don’t know what it means or what it’s asking.

Basically, it’s saying ”Even though you download our programs on YOUR computer, we’re allowed to make changes, and Google is not responsible for any negative feedback” this is what lawyers are for. They’re trained to know these things.