Category Archives: world cup 2014

WhaleTales Tourism, Food, and Wine news headlines: 19/20 July

WhaleTalesTourism, Food, and Wine news headlines

*    Cape Town will host the 14th World Summit of the Noble Peace Prize Laureates from 13 – 15 October, the first time that it will be held in Africa, report the Cape Times and Weekend Argus.  A total of 1500 delegates is expected to meet at the Cape Town International Convention Centre, with the topic ‘Peace: living it’.  Previous Noble Peace Prize recipients such as Mikhail Gorbachev and Lech Walesa will join FW de Klerk and Archbishop Desmond Tutu.

*   The largest number of international visitors to Cape Town in the third quarter of last year, ranked by figures just released by Wesgro, were from Germany, the USA, the UK, and Italy.  Gauteng was the largest source of local visitors, followed by those from other parts of the Western Cape.

*   Rio de Janeiro received close to 900000 visitors during the Soccer World Cup, spending $4,4 million, with more than half of the visitors planning to return in two years to attend the 2016 Olympic Games.  The city hosted the closing Final, which was viewed by 3 billion TV viewers, and its iconic statue of Christ the Redeemer against a sunset was shown during the broadcast, as Continue reading →

WhaleTales Tourism, Food, and Wine news headlines: 18 July

WhaleTalesTourism, Food, and Wine news headlines

*   The Reserve Bank has increased the repo rate by 25 basis points, giving a new interest rate of 5,75%. Governor Gill Marcus blamed inflation for the rate increase.

*   Brazil welcomed more than 1 million visitors during the Soccer World Cup, almost double the estimated 600000 travelers.  Most tourists had never been to Brazil before, visiting from more than 200 countries.  The infrastructure and tourism services generally, and the hospitality and cuisine specifically, were praised by the visitors.  The soccer matches were seen by 3,4 million soccer fans in the stadia over the month-long event.  Visitors stayed in Brazil for 13 days on average.   Brazilians were good soccer fans too, more than 3 million travelling around their own country during the soccer tournament.

*   Melanie Verwoerd has compiled a book ‘Our Madiba: Stories and Reflections from those who met Nelson Mandela‘, containing short stories of numerous persons that met the late Nelson Mandela, including Pieter-Dirk Uys/Evita Bezuidenhout, Adam Small, Francois Pienaar, Amanda Strydom, Sir Richard Attenborough, and many by Mrs Verwoerd herself.

*   The Drinks Business and Intangible Business in the UK evaluated the world’s ‘most powerful Champagne and Continue reading →

WhaleTales Tourism, Food, and Wine news headlines: 14 July

WhaleTalesTourism, Food, and Wine news headlines

*  The 2014 World Cup is done and dusted.  Official airline sponsor Emirates received a last minute ‘branding’ boost when its distinctly uniformed stewardesses brought the medals to be awarded to the teams of Germany and Argentina.  They remained on the stage, standing behind German President Joachim Gauck, Chancellor Angela Merkel, and the winning German team, guaranteeing excellent coverage for the airline.  A viewership of more than 1 billion is estimated.

*   New Social Media records were set during the World Cup Final last night. The number of Tweets peaked at 618275 per minute, up from the 580166 peak in the Semi Final against Brazil.  However, the total number of 32 million Tweets during the Final failed to beat the record of close to 36 million set in the Semi Final.   German player Lukas Podolski’s selfie of him kissing Bastian Schweinsteiger was retweeted 88620 times, and was favourited 78169 times.  His selfie with German Chancellor Angela Merkel was retweeted 25000 times, and favourited almost 30000 times.  Similarly the sporting event was the most written about event on Facebook, with 280 million posts, likes, and comments during the Final last night coming mainly from the USA, Brazil, Argentina, Germany, and Indonesia.  Its previous record was 250 million for the Super Bowl last year.

 *   Cape Town is ranked number one on a list of 20 most beautiful cities in the world, ahead of Rio de Janeiro and Continue reading →

So who really won the 2014 Soccer World Cup?

World Cup 2014We are on the eve of the closure of what many describe as the greatest World Cup, and tonight the world will see Germany and Argentina fight for the title of World Cup Champion.

An interesting survey was conducted, to establish which were the best advertisements made for the 2014 World Cup, by interviewing top advertising industry executives in the USA.   These were the brands that were rated as having the best TV commercials, most of them closely linked to the world’s best soccer stars:

1.   Brazil: as a host country it was described as a ‘proud country being the perfect host’, in its welcoming nature to the soccer fans, and its team losing with such good spirit in the semi-final against Germany earlier this week

2.   Adidas trainers:  Using the pay-off line ‘all in or nothing’, the latest commercial is called ‘The Final‘, and it predominantly focuses on the Final tonight, with Lionel Messi and Thomas Müller.  It asks who wants the World Cup more, with ‘two teams, one trophy’.  The ‘Wake Up Call’ commercial was posted on YouTube on 12 June, at the start of the World Cup, and already has in excess of 7 million views!  It focuses on Argentinian Lionel Messi preparing on his own, with less airtime give to Bastian Schweinsteiger, representing the German team.  The commercial shows excerpts of a number of the earlier matches, and some of the soccer greats in action, including Mesut Özil scoring for Germany, Manuel Neuer defending so boldly for Germany, as well as Luis Suárez of Argentina, and Dani Alves of Brazil. Continue reading →