Sunday, April 30, 2017

The True Cost of Travel


2017 USA Travel Expenses

First Uploaded: April 30, 2017 |  Latest Update: June 14, 2017

Earlier this month, in the post New York City On My Mind, I wrote that I had begun booking events in advance of my upcoming summer visit to that great city. On April 13, after booking return tickets from Adelaide, Australia to New York City, it occurred to me that it might be interesting to document every expense, no matter how small, that I will incur for this extended three month stay in America, most of which will be spent in the Big Apple.

I plan to account for my expenses across four major departments: Events & Activities; Food & Groceries; Transport & Accommodation; and Shopping & Sundries. Note: All figures in the tables are in Australian dollars. The running tally at the bottom of the screen grab below includes the total U.S. dollar amounts. Here's where things stand as of today ...



Total Expenses to Date: AUD$4916.10  -  (USD$3716.65)

NOTES
Figures are rounded up or down to the nearest five cents. Due to the constantly fluctuating exchange rates between the Australian and American dollar, anyone checking the above figures will almost certainly find their own calculations differ.

Saturday, April 29, 2017

New York City Round-Up #5

Hallett Nature Sanctuary, Central Park

The Central Park Edition: I have made many visits to Central Park during my four trips to New York City, and I have still not seen or experienced all that there is to see and enjoy in that magnificent 843-acre green space in the heart of Manhattan. So for this New York City Round-Up, I am focussing on the park, drawing mostly on information from the Central Park Conservancy, the organisation which overseas much of the ongoing work of upgrades and maintenance.

Specifically, I thought I’d look at the park’s three woodland areas—the Hallett Nature Sanctuary, the Ramble, and the North Woods. Public tours of the Sanctuary, and the Woods have now began and continue right throughout the summer by members of the Central Park Conservancy, and I have provided details and links to more information about the tours below.

In 2016, I managed to squeeze in a brief visit to the newly restored Sanctuary, a four-acre section of Central Park that had been closed to the public for many years. Located south of the Wollman Rink, and surrounded by the Pond at the southeast corner of Central Park, the closest street entrance is at Sixth Avenue and Central Park South.

The Sanctuary was originally called ‘the Promontory’, but in 1934 the location was closed to the public and preserved as a bird sanctuary by Parks Commissioner, Robert Moses. It was renamed in memory of George Hallett Jr., a birdwatcher, naturalist, and civic leader in 1986. Last summer—due to ongoing restoration work—there was limited entry to the Sanctuary, but happily this year the site will be open daily from 10:00am until 30 minutes before sunset. 

Tours of the Hallett Nature Sanctuary ($15; CPC Members $10), take place each Wednesday and Saturday, from now through until July, 2017, and beyond.

The Ramble, Central Park


The Ramble
Central Park’s chief designer, Frederick Law Olmsted, described the 36-acre Ramble as a “wild garden.” The area was planned as a tranquil spot where visitors could discover forest gardens rich with plants while strolling along the paths. As you walk through all three of the sites highlighted in this post, I’m sure you will find it as hard to believe as I did that everything you are walking through has been built by the hands of many men and women. The bedrock may be permanent, but the ten of thousands of plantings, trees, lakes, waterfalls, and other park features have each been placed there by hand and machine.


Below, Isabella Rossellini, Italian actress, filmmaker, author, philanthropist, and model, shares secrets of the Ramble. Central Park's 36-acre wild garden.


If you are visiting during Spring or Autumn/Fall, look out for some of the 230 species of birds that spend time in the park—which is part of the Atlantic Flyway—as they pass through on their annual migrations.

The North Woods, Central Park


The North Woods
Earlier this month, ABC7 New York ran a story about the restoration of Central Park’s North Woods, a 40-acre forest retreat at the top left of the park, where a man-made ravine meets the Harlem Meer. Interviewed for the television story, Doug Blonsky, of the Central Park Conservancy, said the area was created to mimic sections of the terrain around upstate New York.
“Olmsted and Vaux created areas like this for the typical New Yorker to experience the Catskills or The Adirondacks," he said.
Due to the lack of ongoing maintenance over many years, the North Woods had become overgrown and neglected, but now the Conservancy has returned an open waterway to the area, and put huge boulders of Manhattan schist back in place. 

Check out the ABC7 New York story:

The North Woods renovation was part of the $300 million Forever Green campaign, which took two years to complete. Visit Central Park Forever Green, to learn more about the campaign, including more woodland restorations and the renovations of 21 playgrounds.

If You Go
Make sure you check out the 90-minute North Woods tours ($15; CPC Members $10), that are scheduled each Tuesday and Saturday, from now through July, 2017, and beyond.

I have often thought that even if you were to spend five days exploring Central Park, you would still be in danger of missing some beautiful corner of that magnificent site. There is much to discover and appreciate across those 843 acres, and I would urge you, dear reader, to at least allocate a morning or afternoon to discovering some of its many secrets. In future posts I will focus on locations and objects within the park.

More Information
Central Park Conservancy…

Wednesday, April 26, 2017

My 52-Book-Year: The Ways of White Folks

 Back in February, in a post titled, Writers From Life’s Other Side I wrote about how over the past few years I have been seeking out writers that have slipped under my radar, despite the accolades they have won for their writing. One of those writer’s is the great African-American author, Langston Hughes.


I have been aware of Langston Hughes for a long time—years in fact—but I had never read any of his poetry, plays, novels or short stories until I read The Ways Of White Folks.
James Mercer Langston Hughes (February 1, 1902 – May 22, 1967) was an American poet, social activist, novelist, playwright, and columnist from Joplin, Missouri. He was one of the earliest innovators of the then-new literary art form called jazz poetry. Hughes is best known as a leader of the Harlem Renaissance in New York City. He famously wrote about the period that "the negro was in vogue", which was later paraphrased as "when Harlem was in vogue”.
The Ways of White Folks is a collection of short stories first published by Hughes in 1934. Hughes wrote the book during a year he spent living in Carmel, California. Arnold Rampersad, in A Centennial Tribute to Langston Hughes writes that the collection is, “marked by pessimism about race relations, as well as a sardonic realism or, contextually: humorous racism,” and adds that the collection is among Hughes’ best known works. 

The Ways of White Folks consists of 14 short stories, including "Cora Unashamed”, “Home”, “Passing”, and “Father and Son.” The fourteen stories cover the gamut of white/black relationships, and Hughes is not shy about using the 'N' word—that is nigger—often, and in all its shades of meaning.

The collection opens with "Cora Unashamed" — described by David Herbert Donald (in a 1996 review for the New York Times), as “…a brilliantly realized portrait of an isolated black woman in a small Middle Western town, who stoically survives her own sorrows but in the end lashes out against the hypocrisy of the whites who employ her.”

Two of the stories, “Home”, and “Father and Son”, end with lynchings. In “Home,” Roy Williams, a brilliant young violinist returns to Hopkinsville, the small provincial Missouri town he left seven or eight years earlier to pursue a successful concert career in Europe (during the years between the two world wars). It is not long before Roy is confronted with the racism he had left behind years earlier:
“An uppty nigger,” said the white loafers when they saw him standing, slim and elegant, on the station platform in the September sunlight, surrounded by his bags with the bright stickers. Roy had got off a Pullman—something unusual for a Negro in those parts.“God damn!” said one of the white loafers.
As he departs the station platform Roy hears someone mutter, “Nigger.” His skin burned. For the first time in half a dozen years he felt his colour. He was home.”

Over a few short weeks, the resentment from the ‘loafers’ as Hughes calls them, continues to build until their animosity and envy boils over into uncontrolled rage at this black man, who had the temerity to escape the confines of his home town and travel to Europe, where he played the music of “Brahms and Beethoven, Bach and Cèsar Franck” in the great concert halls of Paris and Berlin.

When Miss Reese, “An old maid musicianer at the all white high school,” invites him to perform for her students, her well-meaning invitation only serves to stoke the anger and resentment from many in the town.
The students went home that afternoon and told their parents that a dressed-up nigger had come to school with a violin and played a lot of funny pieces nobody but Miss Reese liked. They went on to say that Miss Reese had grinned all over herself and cried, “Wonderful!” And had even bowed to the nigger when he went out!
The story ends when Roy takes a late night walk through the town centre, and is set upon by a mob who beat and kick him mercilessly. The final paragraph is both brutal and poetic:
The little Negro whose name was Roy Williams began to choke on the blood in his mouth. And the roar of their voices and the scuff of the feet were split by the moonlight into a thousand notes like a Beethoven sonata. And when the white folks left his brown body, stark naked, strung from a tree at the edge of the town, it hung there all night, like a violin for the wind to play.

Poster from the PBS American Collection
adaptation of Cora Unashamed (2000)
Clearly, Hughes pulls no punches in his depictions of 'white folks' and their foibles, fears, hates, contradictions, and murderous natures. To be black in America, when Hughes wrote these stories, was to live in fear that whites, well meaning and otherwise, had virtually free rein to do and say what they wanted when it came to the lives of the American negro in the years following the Civil War. The truly horrifying thing is realizing that today, in vast swathes of America, little seems to have changed.

All of the stories in this collection are brilliantly realized, and each one examines an aspect of the droll, horrifying, humorous, bizarre, and often mysterious—ways of white folks. The stories are steeped in the violence, and confusion of Depression Era America, and the collection immediately drew me into its orbit of small town Southern life, and big city mysteries.

On May 22, 1967, Hughes died in New York City at the age of 65 from complications after abdominal surgery related to prostate cancer. His ashes are interred beneath a floor medallion in the middle of the foyer in the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem. It is the entrance to an auditorium named for him. The design on the floor is an African cosmogram entitled Rivers. Within the center of the cosmogram is the line: "My soul has grown deep like the rivers,” from his poem The Negro Speaks of Rivers, which is reproduced here:

The Negro Speaks Of Rivers
I've known rivers:
I've known rivers ancient as the world and older than the
flow of human blood in human veins

My soul has grown deep like the rivers.

I bathed in the Euphrates when dawns were young
I built my hut near the Congo and it lulled me to sleep.
I looked upon the Nile and raised the pyramids above it.
I heard the singing of the Mississippi when Abe Lincoln
went down to New Orleans, and I've seen its muddy
bosom turn all golden in the sunset

I've known rivers:
Ancient, dusky rivers.

My soul has grown deep like the rivers.
~ Langston Hughes


Langston Hughes is surely a writer I need to read more of.

More Information about Langston Hughes 
Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture…

Monday, April 24, 2017

36 Hours In Zagreb, Croatia

Image by Suradnik13 via Wikipedia

I have only been to Zagreb, Croatia once, and that was way back in 1975—or was it 1976? It was so long ago that today I have trouble remembering exactly when. Anyway, at the time, I and a friend were two-thirds of the way through hitchhiking our way from London to Athens, and found ourselves in Zagreb for the night.

We were befriended by a couple of locals who invited us out to a club for the evening, with the promise of free accommodation in a recently built hotel that was still in the process of being fitted out.

I know, I know. The warning bells were ringing then as well, but to our relief our hosts were as good as their words, and we passed the night without incident before continuing on our way towards Greece.

I’m sure—in fact I am positive—that Zagreb has gone through countless changes since that brief 24-hour visit, not the least being those changes that were brought about by the brutal conflict that tore apart the country once known as Yugoslavia (as it was called when my friend and I passed through back in the 1970s). 

For a number of years, the New York Times has been producing a series of short videos for their 36 Hours In… series of articles. Reading the article, and watching the video, brought back dim and distant memories of that hitchhiking trip, and that overnight stop in the city, and that seemed like as good a reason as any to recall that trip and make the 36 Hours In Zagreb video the focus of today’s post.


Sunday, April 23, 2017

New York City Arts Round-Up #3

Getting ready for the 2017 Open Studios program
Open Studios, 2017
The Lower Manhattan Cultural Council was formed in 1973. I don’t know exactly when it began presenting its now annual Open Studios arts program, or their other major summer festival, the annual River to River music series, but both events provide much needed exposure to dozens of up-and-coming artists, dancers, writer’s and performers. While the River to River festival line-up is yet to be announced, the Open Studios season is begins this coming weekend (April 28-29, 2017), with Workspace Artists-in-Residence.

This free, two-day event shines a spotlight on the work of over 30 artists who are working across all disciplines and genres from painting and sculpture, to poetry and fiction, to dance and theater. The artists have been working in their studios at 28 Liberty Street since last September. They will open their studio doors to the public for two days only, offering a unique, behind-the-scenes window into their creative practices in the visual, literary, and performing arts. 

The opportunity to meet them and see their work is not to be missed. But this is just the beginning. LMCC will host Open Studios events from April through September—click here to see the full calendar of Open Studios this year—all of which are free and open to the public.

If You Go: Open Studios with Workspace Artists-in-Residence
WHERE: In The Lower Manhattan Cultural Council’s Studios at 28 Liberty, 24th Floor.
WHEN: Friday, April 28, 2017 from 6:00–9:00pm
WHEN: Saturday, April 29, 2017 from 1:00–8:00pm

"The Silence of High Noon — Midsummer," 1907–08. By Marsden Hartley
Marsden Harley at The Met Breuer

The Met Breuer presents Marsden Hartley’s paintings of his home state, Maine
Marsden Hartley (1877-1943), was an icon of American modernism, He was born in Lewiston, Maine, and died in Ellsworth. In the early 1900s, he painted the state’s western mountains in a Post-Impressionist style. In his later years, he aimed to do for Mount Katahdin in Baxter State Park what Cézanne did for Mont Sainte-Victoire in Aix-en-Provence. For this exhibition, seven painted views, showing seasonal change, close the show and represent the culmination of a lifelong fascination.

In the 1930s, Hartley became increasingly aware of his legacy and strove to not just paint Maine but to “be recognized as Maine’s greatest modern interpreter,” the show’s co-curator, Randall Griffey, writes in the catalog.

The show at The Met Breuer is a hyper-local collection of rivers, hills, churches, logs and lobster traps. The mountainscapes — and logscapes — are characteristically devoid of people, unlike the Fuji views of Hartley’s heroes Hokusai and Hiroshige, which are sometimes peppered with small figures (eight gorgeous prints are on display).

If You Go
WHAT: “Marsden Hartley’s Maine”
WHERE: The Met Breuer, 945 Madison Ave., at 75th Street
WHEN: Through June 18, 2017

Is Chinatown the next Chelsea?
Is Chinatown the New Arts District?
Lily Haight, posed the above question this week while writing for Chelsea News
Chelsea's gallery district has reigned as the heart of the city's contemporary art movement since the late 1990s. But could skyrocketing rents, coupled to the availability of cheaper options in other parts of the city, mean the district is losing some of its cachet with gallerists?
An August 2016 report by StreetEasy found that real estate prices near the High Line had increased by nearly 50 percent since the park's opening in 2011. Longtime Chelsea gallerists have recently made the move to the Lower East Side, and new galleries are skipping over Chelsea altogether and setting up shop downtown.
However, not everyone is happy with the prospect of Chinatown become the new Chelsea. 
According to the Chinatown Art Brigade's ManSee Kong, residents of Chinatown and the Lower East Side are concerned that the influx of galleries will gentrify the neighborhood and raise residential rents.
“Chinatown is a working-class, ethnic immigrant community. Folks depend on these kinds of immigrant enclaves as a social network of cultural and ethnic resources,” said Melanie Wang, who works as an organizer with the Chinatown Tenants Union. “When galleries come in and are displacing businesses that provide those services and those employment opportunities, it represents a significant threat to the fabric of Chinatown's social community.”
Untitled. c.1968, by Alma Woodsey Thomas. In MoMA's current exhibition, Making Space

Not Only — But Also in April


Thursday, April 20, 2017

New York City Street Food

Kabir Ahmed cooks to order during the early shift in his food cart. Photo: An Rong Xu, for The New York Times
A Day in the Life of a New York City Food Vendor
Great story in a recent edition of the New York Times profiling Kabir Ahmed, one of New York City’s more than 10,000 mobile food vendors. Now 46, Mr. Ahmed, a Bangladeshi immigrant who moved to New York 23 years ago, operates a halal food cart with two partners on Greenwich Street, close to the World Trade Center. They are there all year long, rain, hail, snow or shine.

If you have ever been to New York City, you will of course, have seen many of these vendors on the streets of Manhattan, and to a lesser extent in the other four boroughs. In four extended visits to the city, I think I have eaten a New York hot dog just once, but I have eaten many ‘chicken over rice’ meals from food carts similar to the types in this New York Times feature.
These vendors are a fixture of New York’s streets and New Yorkers’ routines, vital to the culture of the city. But day to day, they struggle to do business against a host of challenges: byzantine city codes and regulations on street vending, exorbitant fines for small violations (like setting up an inch too close to the curb) and the occasional rage of brick-and-mortar businesses or residents. Not to mention the weather, the whims of transit and foot traffic, and the trials of standing for hours, often alone, with no real shelter or private space.
The location of Mr. Ahmed's food cart
Using Google Maps and their Street View software, I took a ‘walk’ down Greenwich Street using as my guide, clues in the article—“near the World Trade Center”, “in front of the BNY Mellon building”—and found what I am certain is Mr Ahmed’s food cart on the corner of Greenwich and Murray Streets.

If you have ever wondered, like I have, about the source of food used by these vendors, the article provides the following:
The food comes from a commissary kitchen attached to the garage in Long Island City, Queens; the city requires that food carts be serviced and supplied by a commissary, and there are many of them, of varying sizes, with different owners, all around New York. At an extra cost, this one has provided everything Mr. Ahmed needs for the day: heads of lettuce, a few dozen tomatoes and potatoes, ready-sliced halal lamb, several bags of boneless chicken thighs, two 12-pound bags of basmati rice, four large plastic containers of potable water for cooking and washing, clamshell containers and napkins.
While I have had many a ‘chicken over rice’ plate, the article praises Mr. Ahmed’s chicken biryani:
“…regulars know to ask for the chicken biryani, flecked with fried onion and cilantro, garnished with half a hard-boiled egg, all for $6, with a drink. He’d like to raise the price, but worries that he would lose customers.”
Stock photo of food cart meals
Wow, six dollars! This must be one of the cheapest, if not the cheapest meal of this type in New York City. Later in the article readers learn that after paying the man who delivers the cart to Greenwich Street (and then returns it to a secure garage at the end of the day), and also paying the garage, Mr. Ahmed earns about $125 after splitting the day’s takings with his colleagues.

Again, Wow. For an eight-hour shift this works out to around $15/hour, which may seem good given the low wages most American workers receive, but to me this seems low given the amount of work that goes into running such a food service.

The article, by Tejal Rao, provides a fascinating glimpse into a way of life that millions of visitors to New York—and millions more locals—have come to rely on for their daily meals and snacks. I will be back in New York for almost three months from mid-June, and you can be sure that I will make a point of seeking out Mr Ahmed's food van for one of those chicken biryani meals.

Read the full article here… 

Every Dreamer Knows...


Every dreamer knows that it is entirely possible to be homesick for a place you’ve never been to. ~ Judith Thurman

Wednesday, April 19, 2017

2017 Wonderwalls Festival, at Pt Adelaide

Vans the Omega’s ‘Flower’,
on the side of YHA building in Adelaide.
Port Adelaide (South Australia), will once again become a giant, interactive canvas with the return of the hugely popular Wonderwalls street art festival this coming weekend (April 21-23, 2017).

This year will see more art unfold from huge international names such as Fats, Inti, Natalia Rak and Telmo Miel, as well as plenty of exceptional local artists, transforming the Port into an open air gallery with large scale murals, artist talks, live art, guided tours and entertainment during the free three-day festival.

The Wonderwalls Festival brings together the best mural artists from around the world and is presented by Renewal SA and artist collective The Hours and project managers Verb Syndicate, together with City of Port Adelaide Enfield and art suppliers Ironlak and Taubmans. Renewal SA is also working with the community to create a ‘living port’ that celebrates the maritime past while embracing the future.

The Wonderwalls movement was started by The Hours and Verb Syndicate in Wollongong in 2011 and is celebrated as one of the leading street art festivals in Australia.

FESTIVAL MAP
With so much to see and do in just three days, we’ve helped you figure out your every move with our Festival Map. The map features not only this year’s who, what, where and when, but also pinpoints the hot spots from Wonderwalls 2015. Download the PDF Map…

PARTICIPATING ARTISTS
Telmo Miel, Inti, Natalia Rak, Amanda Lynn, Fats, Georgia Hill, Merda, KAB 101, Masika126, Sam Songailo, Jake Logos, Claire Foxton, Elizabeth Close, Zedr, Fortrose, Jimmy C, Numskull, Muchos, Brigid Noone, Cam Kerr, Epyk, Fuzeillear, James Dodd, Josh Smith, J2SKE, Mimby Jones, Mimi, Rick Hayward, Sam Brooke and Vans The Omega.

Here’s a short promotion video for the event:

IF YOU GO
Friday, April 21
Art exhibition, 6pm–11pm

Saturday, April 22
Canon photo tours, 9am–11.30am / 3pm–5.30pm
Artist talks, 3pm–4pm
Art exhibition, 11am–11pm
Street party, 6pm–11pm

Sunday, April 23
Canon photo tours, 9am–11.30am / 3pm–5.30pm
Artist walking tour, 11am–12.30pm
Art exhibition, 11am–5pm

More Information

Monday, April 17, 2017

New York City Round-Up #4


SummerStage 2017
SummerStage is New York City's largest free performing arts festival, bringing more than 100 free performances to Central Park and neighborhood parks throughout the city. Since its inception, more than six million people from New York City and around the world have enjoyed SummerStage, turning parks into vibrant destinations for the arts.

Programs like SummerStage, and other similar events such as the Lincoln Center Out Of Doors series, are why I love to visit New York over the hot summer months. There is a huge smorgasbord of free or low-cost events to select from, and to enjoy and participate in.

As in previous years, the 2017 SummerStage season features more than 100 free performances across 16 neighborhood parks. The first major free event of the summer takes place in Central Park on Saturday, June 3, with a performance from gospel legend Mavis Staples. I was delighted to see Mavis and her brilliant musicians perform as the support act for Bob Dylan last year in New York, and I would love to be at the June 3 show. Unfortunately, I don’t arrive in New York until later in the month.

Coming up later through June and the summer are alternative hip-hop trio Digable Planets, the 25th anniversary of the Charlie Parker Jazz Festival in August, featuring an expanded four days of performances including the Joshua Redman Quartet, the Anat Cohen Tentet, and many more. 

Visit the SummerStage website to get full program details & watch the official SummerStage season announce trailer below. While you are there, don't forget to become a SummerStage Member!


More Information
SummerStage is produced by City Parks Foundation

Connect with SummerStage
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Lower Manhattan Cultural Council Open Studios
{Lower Manhattan Cultural Council}Open Studios inspire local residents and workers in the neighborhood by connecting them to artists, new ideas and perspectives, and other art-lovers to demonstrate the role that artists play in creating vibrant, sustainable communities.

This initiative is a year-round series of events that brings audiences closer to the creative process and can take several forms, ranging from visits to visual artists’ studios to open rehearsals with performing artists and talks that engage artists and other creative practitioners in conversation about their work. LMCC encourages audiences of all ages and backgrounds to engage with creative work and the individuals who make it, on a personal level, leading to a deeper appreciation for the process of creativity and an understanding of the role artists play in their communities.

More Information

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NYC Ferry a Month Ahead of Schedule
New York City Mayor, Bill de Blasio announced recently that the first route in New York's eagerly-awaited and much expanded ferry system will be launching on May 1, one month ahead of its initial scheduled date. The announcement also noted that the system will be donning a new name. Rather than the Citywide Ferry Service, the network will be named "NYC Ferry," which rolls off the tongue a bit easier. The city even put together a cute new video that features the ferry's new logo and projected opening dates for each of the system's routes (give it a watch below).

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What’s On, Watson?
================

Thursday, April 13, 2017

TripAdvisor: World's Top 10 Airlines

Emirates voted the best airline in the world


With all the much deserved fuss that is bedeviling United Airlines for the appalling treatment of passengers following this week's overbooking incident, I had planned to add a major post about that controversy to this blog. However, I have decided instead to add this much more positive post, which is essentially a media release from TripAdvisor, in which they announce the Top Ten best airlines as chosen by their reviewers. It is surely no surprise that United Airlines does not appear in the Top Ten.
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TripAdvisor, the world's largest travel site recently announced the 2017 Travelers' Choice Awards for Airlines, Based on Flyer Reviews

Emirates is the #1 Airline in the World; Delta and JetBlue Top North American Lists
Emirates: "Excellent Experience" Dale B > "My experience was excellent. Food was great, inflight entertainment was top notch, very modern and up to date system."
TripAdvisor, the travel planning and booking site, today announced the winners of its first annual travelers' Choice awards for airlines, recognizing travelers' favorite carriers around the globe. Emirates was named the top airline in the world, followed by Singapore Airlines and Azul.

The awards honor 50 airlines overall, including top lists for the World, Europe, North America, the Middle East and Africa; as well as 16 regional winners. The awards also highlight top airlines by level of service, covering First Class, Business Class, Premium Economy and Economy. Award winners were determined using an algorithm that took into account the quantity and quality of airline reviews and ratings submitted by travelers worldwide, over a 12-month period. The hallmarks of Travelers' Choice award winners are outstanding service, quality and value.

"We are proud to announce the inaugural Travelers' Choice awards for airlines, to help travelers make the most well-informed air travel decisions, based on the experiences of the global TripAdvisor community," said Bryan Saltzburg, senior vice president and general manager for TripAdvisor Flights. 

"The airline industry is investing billions of dollars in new aircraft and service enhancements to differentiate the flying experience and these awards recognize the carriers offering the very best experiences and value to the traveling public."

"We are honored to be named the Best Airline in the World in the TripAdvisor Travelers' Choice Awards for Airlines 2017," said Sir Tim Clark, President, Emirates Airlines. "The fact that the awards are a result of unbiased reviews and feedback speaks to our commitment to deliver a superior travel experience for our customers. We want travelers to continue making Emirates their first choice whenever they think to travel. That is why we continue to invest in products and services across all classes, and why our service teams work hard and put their hearts into providing the very best experience for our customers both onboard and on the ground every day."

"Our mission of inspiring humanity sets us apart from every other airline," said Joanna Geraghty, JetBlue executive vice president of customer experience. "This recognition by TripAdvisor and our customers demonstrates once again, that we are on the right path.  Thanks to our 20,000 crewmembers who live and breathe our unique values every day. It's our culture that inspires us to provide exceptional service, while we continue to build upon the product our customers love."

Singapore Airlines came in at the number two spot



Among the top 10 global list, Asia holds the highest number of individual winners, with total of five (Singapore Airlines, Korean Air, Japan Airlines, Thai Smile and Garuda Indonesia); followed by the United States, with two airlines in the top rankings: JetBlue and Alaska Airlines, in fourth and ninth places, respectively.

Top 10 Airlines in the World:
1.      Emirates, United Arab Emirates
2.      Singapore Airlines, Singapore
3.      Azul, Brazil
4.      JetBlue, United States
5.      Air New Zealand, New Zealand
6.      Korean Air, South Korea
7.      Japan Airlines, Japan
8.      Thai Smile, Thailand
9.      Alaska Airlines, United States

10.  Garuda Indonesia, Indonesia
2 Singapore Airlines: "My preferred airlines. Great food, really helpful flight crew. The best." Anne B > "I love travelling with Singapore airline. It is a real pleasure. The flight crew are always caring and courteous. The in flight food excellent. Good leg room. Definitely my preferred airline."
Class of Service Global Winners:
Best First Class: Emirates, United Arab Emirates
Best Business Class: Aeroflot, Russia
Best Premium Economy Class in the World: Air New Zealand, New Zealand

Best Economy Class in the World: Emirates, United Arab Emirates

Jet Blue was named the best of the American airlines


North America Awards:
Top Major Airline in North America:
Delta Air Lines, United States

Top Mid-Size & Low Cost Airlines in North America:
1.      JetBlue, United States
2.      Alaska Airlines, United States
3.      Southwest, United States
4.      Virgin America, United States

5.      Westjet, Canada
4 JetBlue: "Awesome!" Cheryl T. B > "The crew was just awesome. From their greeting to their smiles. The flight was smooth and the seats were amazingly comfortable."
For the complete list of winners from the 2017 Travelers' Choice awards for airlines, visit  www.tripadvisor.com/TravelersChoice-Airlines. Travelers can also follow the conversation on Twitter at #TravelersChoice.

TripAdvisor is the world's largest travel site**. Travelers can read millions of reviews and opinions and book their next trip at: www.tripadvisor.com.

Methodology: Winners were based on airline reviews submitted on TripAdvisor Flights from February 2016 to February 2017.
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