Thaindian News

Bangkok, July 29 (THAINDIAN NEWS) Travel magazine has conferred “Top City” award to Bangkok. Bangkok’s recent troubles of street rioting and associated curfew etc, has not affected its image of being a tourist friendly city, despite the riots, due to which almost all of the tourists left the city.

The reader’s choice poll is declared in the August edition of the magazine putting Bangkok on the top for the most preferred city for international tourists. The polling, which allowed the readers to poll from the month of December to March on their favorite city, saw Bangkok rising to the top on the poll. Incidentally the polling had stopped just before the trouble started to erupt in Bangkok, which resulted in 90 dead and 1400 hurt.

Bangkok’s Gov. Sukhumbhand Paribrata said that the award shows the trust and interest of the international tourists in Bangkok, and political rivalry and disturbances should not malign its image. Gov. Sukhumbhand said, the award gives the much-needed boost to the tourism industry and urged on the political protesters to behave themselves.

It may be recalled that the anti government protests that lasted about 10 weeks saw many tourists packing and going back to their native nations. Several hotels and malls had to be closed because of being surrounded by anti government protesters, who were often armed. The violence took toll not only on human lives, but on the Bangkok’s tourism too.

The Bangkok governor collected the award in New York last week from the magazine publishers.