India outlines new steps to tackle tourism and hotel scams

India outlines new steps to tackle tourism and hotel scams

The Government of India Ministry of Tourism has set out updated actions to tackle fraudulent practices affecting hotel services and other tourism suppliers. The clarification comes amid reported complaints of misleading packages, overcharging and exploitation in travel and hospitality services. The initiative forms part of broader efforts to improve tourist protection and online booking transparency…

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“The President’s Cake” Is a Neorealist Treasure from Iraq

“The President’s Cake” Is a Neorealist Treasure from Iraq

In the city, the story splits in half: Lamia gets separated from Bibi (for reasons I wouldn’t dare disclose) and searches for the one person she knows there, a classmate’s father, who supposedly works at an amusement park. At the venue, she espies the classmate, a boy named Saeed (Sajad Mohamad Qasem), picking someone’s pocket.…

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The Movie That Inspired Gregory Bovino to Join Border Patrol

The Movie That Inspired Gregory Bovino to Join Border Patrol

For all the scenes of jeeps raising dust in the desert and migrants wading through the Rio Grande, “The Border” is something of a two-hander. Charlie’s prevailing disgust with his fellow-officers, most of whom all but openly take part in a human-trafficking operation, is sharpened when a young migrant from Mexico, named Maria, has her…

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Listening to Joe Rogan

Listening to Joe Rogan

Long John Nebel and Art Bell are gone, but the tradition they embodied has a prominent inheritor. In an age of diminishing attention spans, “The Joe Rogan Experience” is free-form, runs around three hours, and can feel like the old midnight sprawl reborn online. It’s the most popular podcast in the world, and there are…

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The Race to Give Every Child a Toy

The Race to Give Every Child a Toy

Actually, they did want to be. There is a reason Morris Michtom moved his family from the Lower East Side to the row houses of Brooklyn as soon as he could. (When his youngest son was born, in the back of his Tompkins Avenue candy store, he named him Benjamin Franklin; he might as well…

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The Eighty-Six Wants You to Want In

The Eighty-Six Wants You to Want In

Exclusivity, like any product, gets more valuable the more people want it; it is both the cruellest and the most honest thing that a restaurant can sell. The Eighty-Six, a mega-swank steak house that opened in the West Village last fall, was, from Day One, clubby, celeb-packed, and impossible to get into—no surprise, as it’s…

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A Pioneer of Electronic Music Reanimates Old Songs

A Pioneer of Electronic Music Reanimates Old Songs

The project evolved out of an informal recording session. In the summer of 2025, the Copelands were offered two free days in a studio in Montreal, and they hired a choir to sing with them. In a recent video call, Elizabeth told me, “It was just, let’s put this stuff down so we have it…

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12 Magical Places in Poland That Surprise First-Time Visitors

12 Magical Places in Poland That Surprise First-Time Visitors

Landing in Poland can feel as though you stepped into a living atlas: dynastic history, Baltic seafront, primeval woodland, and bold contemporary culture sit within comfortable rail distance. The trick is choosing stops that show contrast, not chasing every headline attraction. A few of the picks below sit on the UNESCO list, though the real…

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Russian pensioners turn to soup kitchen as war economy stutters

Russian pensioners turn to soup kitchen as war economy stutters

Dishes clatter, steam bursts from large cooking pots and music is seeping through the bustling chatter of Russian pensioners, hunched over bowls of free meals in a Saint Petersburg soup kitchen. The general mood is upbeat but the place, at full capacity, is a testament to financial hardships plaguing an ever-increasing number of Russia’s elderly…

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