Author: Chad Merchant
Chad Merchant
As TEG Media’s Group Editor, Chad manages the editorial team and has been heading up the myriad publications and platforms of the company since joining in February 2012. He also writes for the various magazines and websites. A lifelong writer and English language enthusiast, Chad's background is primarily in business management, though he majored in education at Auburn University, and held jobs with editorial responsibility in his home country of the United States. Chad's interests extend to photography, travel, and a passion for good food and wine, along with a love of whisky, which has led to him serving as the Event Director for TEG Media’s popular WhiskyPLUS event, held annually since 2018.
The tiny city-state of Singapore, which is roughly the size of San Francisco, is home to somewhere between 1.1 to 1.4 million migrant workers who come from impoverished countries to work in Southeast Asia’s wealthiest country; many work as domestic helpers, cleaners, construction staff, and day laborers. Most do so to send money back to their families. Just four decades ago, Singapore was but a shell of what it has become today. The per capita income was barely $4,700 a year (today, it’s over $57,000). With few natural resources and a small population – both conditions that still exist now…
If there’s one arguably positive thing a pandemic tends to bring to the fore, it’s a reawakened sense of personal hygiene. For many of us – at least hopefully – our hands have quite literally never been so scrupulously, consistently clean. It doesn’t matter which public health agency, which healthcare worker, or which epidemiologist is being asked, if the question is, “What’s the most important thing I can do to help protect myself and others from the coronavirus?” then the answer has been startlingly consistent: “Wash your hands.” A Method to Combat the Madness? Let’s face it, human beings aren’t…
There would be a lot of pushback from whisky purists if you tried to characterise the current era as the ‘golden age of whisky’ — many consider that time to have long since come and gone — but what cannot be denied is that we are now living in a time where whisky is enjoying a renaissance and growth curve seldom seen in its history. With waves of new aficionados, new markets opening up, and these spirits being distilled in countries not historically associated with whisky, it may not be a golden age, but it’s certainly paying the bills like…
Now that we are fully into week two of the Movement Control Order, it’s likely that a lot of people are rediscovering the pleasures, born out of necessity, of preparing much of their own food and beverages at home. Many are still practising their morning coffee routine, but now at home, rather than at the office, a café, or a local kopitiam. So a question suddenly arises: What to do with all those used coffee grounds? You might be surprised at just how useful they can be. We’ve rounded up a few great uses for your leftover grounds after you enjoy…
Over the weekend, Malaysia, which had been showing manageable, linear growth in the day-to-day increase in new cases of the novel coronavirus, saw its largest single-day increase to date, adding 190 new cases to its record, nearly doubling the total number overnight. Whether this is a one-off instance, or signs of a new, disturbing shift to exponential, rather than linear growth, is not yet known. The new tally of 428 confirmed cases makes Malaysia, by a significant margin, the worst-affected country in ASEAN, though to be fair, the extent of testing that’s being carried out in several other neighbouring countries…
People around the world are taking measured precautions at the very least and going into wholesale panic mode at the very most as a result of the ongoing Covid-19 outbreak, which is almost certainly a pandemic now, whether or not anyone in authority wants to officially call it that. Confirmed cases now number over 93,000 and exist in 80 countries on every continent except Antarctica, so the likelihood seems very high that the only reason it hasn’t officially been named as a pandemic is because of socioeconomic considerations. However, despite plenty of hand-wringing by human beings, the rest of the planet is…
A substantial part of the luxury resort’s sprawling main building, along with a block of guestrooms, was largely destroyed. Langkawi had already just taken another punishing blow as the effects of MCO 2.0 cratered the just-recovering domestic tourism market. Reports were that some 60% of bookings had been cancelled in the immediate wake of the announcement of the country’s latest lockdown effort, along with 100% of all Chinese New Year holiday bookings cancelled, as well. Now, the tourism-reliant island has been dealt another crushing loss. The Andaman, a Luxury Collection Resort under the Marriott International umbrella, suffered major damage in two fires…
This story is brought to you in part by The Kasturi. For all its many appealing destinations, Malaysia really doesn’t have a huge number of options available to travellers when it comes to luxurious private villas – think of the huge number of such private accommodation in places like Bali and Phuket. Here, the few that are on offer seem to be in Langkawi. (Maybe there’s this notion that only islands can have these villas…?) Now, however, you don’t have to board a plane to get to just such a resort. Upmarket? Check. Beautiful design? Check. Private villas – each with…