Sommaire pour June - July 2024 de DestinAsian

“I DON’T KNOW WHERE I’M GOING FROM HERE, BUT I PROMISE IT WON’T BE BORING.”—David Bowie On a recent break in Belgium, I discovered that the “capital of Europe” was still as charming as I remember from my last visit 30 years ago. As I stood in Brussels’ cobblestoned central square after dark, gazing up at the illuminated facade of the Gothic Town Hall, I wondered why I had waited so long to return. Perhaps life got in the way — as did countless other trips over the decades to places like Bali, the Cyclades, America, and Australia. This year’s June/July edition comes packed with summery content. I’ve always been a big fan of tropical islands, and DestinAsian’s editor-in-chief Christopher P. Hill had the great fortune of staying in one…

First established 48 years ago, the biennial Rolex Awards for Enterprise recognize pioneers working on projects that expand our knowledge of the world, protect the environment, and improve human well-being. Although initially intended to be a once-off celebration, the Awards drew so much international interest that they became an ongoing biennial program that has since supported 160 Laureates whose endeavors have made a significant contribution worldwide to improving life and protecting our planet. Today the Awards serve as a pillar of Rolex’s Perpetual Planet Initiative, which also embraces an enhanced partnership with the National Geographic Society as well as support of legendary marine explorer Sylvia Earle’s Mission Blue, a non-profit organization that encourages communities and governments to shield marine life that is at risk from human pressures through protected areas…

Hopping off the train at the Chandrapur railway station in eastern Maharashtra, my husband and I are greeted by a life-size tiger sculpture solemnly staring into our eyes. A tiger cutout is perched atop the stone plaque a few steps ahead. As we exit the platforms, we can’t help but admire a vibrant tile mosaic mural depicting the striped cat alongside scenes from pastoral India. The burst of feline-inspired artwork around every corner seems to be announcing our arrival in tiger country. We are headed to the outskirts of the Tadoba Andhari Tiger Reserve for a long-envisioned safari getaway. Encompassing more than 600 square kilometers on the Deccan Plateau of central India, this is Maharashtra’s largest and oldest national park and a key habitat for the Bengal tiger, an animal…

NO 1 INATÔ An intimate à la carte experience that celebrates Filipino cuisine Since it opened earlier this year, Inatô has become the hottest table in town—or, as it only hosts eight seats at its counter—the hottest chair. At the helm is chef J.P. Cruz, alumnus of the award-winningToyo Eatery. Similar to Toyo, Inatô’s cuisine is globally informed and focuses on Filipino flavors and techniques, yet Cruz relies on his own experiences and interpretation of such, resulting in a menu that is uniquely Inatô. Unlike other modern Filipino restaurants that showcase their gastronomic point of view through tasting menus, Inatô is an à la carte experience that is then supplemented with a few surprises from the kitchen. Anecdotes and backgrounders on ingredients are shared for each course and give context to…

The plates keep coming, crowding the large wooden table until almost no space is left. A basket filled with hot flatbreads, freshly scraped from the clay wall of a tandoor oven. Platters of sweet tomato wedges and crisp cucumber slices. A sizzling cast-iron pan containing kuku, a flavorsome frittata with milled walnuts and browned onions, cut into triangles and drizzled with lemon juice. Ornate trays of pickled fruit: kiwis, blackthorns, feijoas. A porcelain bowl of turşkabab — chunks of beef and whole baby eggplants slowly stewed with chopped dill and parsley. Our host, Raftara Shukurova, brings out the main dish herself, crossing a gravel path flanked by lemon and fig trees with a plate of spit-roasted chicken. Stuffed with a delectable paste of walnuts, sumac, sour cherries, and pomegranate syrup,…

PHUKET Six years after introducing a rare combination of practical astronomy and fine drinks to an all-villa retreat in the Maldives, Bangkok-based Minor Hotels has built on that unique formula at Anantara Layan Phuket Resort. Patrons at the new Dara Cuisine (anantara.com) restaurant can step inside a custom-built dome observatory to view the night sky through the island’s most powerful telescope. A well-versed “sky storyteller” will be on hand to point out the celestial bodies as guests sip on constellation-inspired cocktails that champion Thai spirits and local botanicals. Another star attraction is the food. Helmed by chef Supakarn “Hong” Lien-panich, Dara’s kitchen plates up modern Thai dishes from across the kingdom: think Phuket-style pork belly, a northern jackfruit salad, and Isan specialty nam tok nuea (grilled beef salad) prepared with…

The first time I stepped aboard the Eastern & Oriental Express, more than a decade ago now, was at Hua Lamphong Station in Bangkok. Back then, the almost century-old structure was the Thai capital’s main railway hub, and under a vaulted iron roof, its passenger hall bustled with saffron-robed monks and backpackers and porters wheeling teetering baggage trolleys through the milling crowds. This journey, however, begins at the considerably less atmospheric Woodlands Train Checkpoint in northern Singapore. There’s not a jot of faded charm or chaotic bustle to the place, though it is spotless and efficient. My fellow passengers and I breeze through hushed immigration halls — one for Singapore, the other, Malaysia — in no time. But as soon as we step onto the platform, the Eastern & Oriental…

“Ieoh Ming Pei has given this century some of its most beautiful interior spaces and exterior forms.” So said the jury who, in 1983, awarded the eminent Chinese-American architect the Pritzker Prize. Little did they know his most iconic masterpiece was still to come. Impressed with Pei’s recent work, French President François Mitterrand had secretly approached him to overhaul the outdated Musée du Louvre in Paris. Pei was reluctant at first, only accepting the commission after months of careful study. His sleek modernist plans — partly inspired by the gardens of 17th-century landscape architect André Le Nôtre — soon provoked outrage. Most contentious of all was the daring glass pyramid above a new subterranean lobby linking the Louvre’s three Renaissance-era wings. Though critics deemed it an architectural “obscenity” at first,…

“Morocco goes to your head. Its authenticity is inexhaustible, and, in a way, miraculous: Change Morocco as much as you wish, and it will remain the same, luminous and profound.”–FROM THE INTRODUCTION BY ARIEL WIZMAN…

maldives Furniture fashioned from driftwood, fish door handles made of recycled aluminum, plates blown from old glass bottles, bunnies bounding through tangled jungle, zip lines to dinner and waterslides into the ocean — Soneva was pioneering experiential back-to-nature travel long before it was in vogue. Now, 29 years after Sonu Shivdasani and his wife Eva Malmström opened their first resort, Soneva Fushi, in the Maldives, the godparents of eco-luxury have launched an ultra-bespoke concept some 140 kilometers to the north in the remote Makunudhoo Atoll. It’s called Soneva Secret, a private-island playground of just 14 villas, each with its own private chef, including a first-of-its-kind floating villa that can be moved to different locations around the lagoon. Here, Shivdasani discusses what makes it so special. What’s Secret all about?…

On a winter’s afternoon in Tokyo, I look out over the seemingly infinite sprawl of the Japanese capital. This is not the view from one of the city’s sky-high observation decks, mind you, but rather a metropolis in miniature on permanent display in the basement of a nondescript downtown office building. The 1:1000 scale model of Tokyo’s 13 central wards — that’s about 230 square kilometers of cityscape — encompasses everything from the soaring Tokyo Skytree (the world’s tallest broadcast tower) to the donut-shaped Ajinomoto Stadium, all painstakingly re-created from Styrofoam and hand-cut paper. I’m at the Mori Building Urban Lab, a research facility established by leading Japanese real estate developer Mori Building Co., whose logo crowns skyscrapers all over the city. With each click of his remote control, Masa…

A winding stretch of asphalt may not be a typical attraction on any tropical island. But as I stand in a hillside viewing suite above the Pertamina Mandalika International Street Circuit, looking straight down to the pit lane, I’m immediately impressed by its scale. The skies are clear and the light of the midday sun bounces off the bitumen. All is quiet now, but it’s not hard to imagine the festive atmosphere on major race days, when the grandstands must be packed with cheering motorsport fans. Inaugurated in late 2021 by outgoing Indonesian president Joko Widodo, this 4.3-kilometer motorcycle racetrack is at the heart of the government’s ambitious plans to transform a swath of coastal Lombok into the next-generation counterpart of nearby Bali’s upmarket Nusa Dua enclave. Hence the creation…

This is a story about tea. But in Sri Lanka, the story of tea begins with another beverage crop. Before swaths of Camellia sinensis bushes quilted the hills of the island’s central highlands, the forests here were dotted with coffee plantations. Early Dutch settlers were the first to try their hands at cultivating the bean, but it was the British who turned the colony they called Ceylon into one of the world’s biggest coffee producers; by the 1860s, they were exporting nearly 100 million pounds of the stuff each year. Then came an outbreak of leaf rust that wiped it all out. Most planters submitted to fate and returned to Britain; others followed the example of a doughty young Scotsman named James Taylor, who had established the island’s first commercial…

THE FIRST THING I LEARNED AFTER THE eight-seat Beechcraft turboprop touched down on Laucala was that I’d been pronouncing the island’s name wrong. It’s Lau-tha-la — the c’s in Fijian are said with a “th” sound. Second thing: Laucala employs some 350 people, a good dozen of whom were on hand at the airstrip to greet me with a jubilant welcome song, “Bula Melea.” For a private island with just 25 guest villas, that’s an extraordinary number. But then, as I discovered over the course of my four-night visit, Laucala is no ordinary resort experience. The remnant of an ancient shield volcano situated in Fiji’s northern archipelago, this 12-square-kilometer speck of jungle-cloaked hills and long, empty beaches is every bit the quintessential South Pacific paradise. Malcolm Forbes, who purchased Laucala…

A jungle-cloaked island of just 21 square kilometers in the Gulf of Thailand, Koh Tao has long drawn budding scuba divers with its abundant marine life. But Amsterdam-based illustrator Laurens van Gurp also found inspiration above the waves for his richly detailed drawings on a visit there last November, part of an epic six-month odyssey through Southeast Asia with his girlfriend. “One morning, we rode a scooter from our hostel to Tanote Bay on the east coast,” he remembers. “I liked how the bungalows at one end of the beach were stilted over the boulders and took that as my subject for this sketch.” Over the course of his week on Koh Tao, van Gurp also completed a pointillistic mural map for the hostel and gained his open water diving…