Singer Taylor Swift Photo: AFP
As Taylor Swift's Eras Tour Singapore leg dropped the curtain on Saturday, the global sensation also garnered great interest from China, where the surge in travel marks the first boom since the implementation of a mutual 30-day visa-free policy between the two countries.
On Thursday, a video went viral on China's social media platforms. The video showed an attendant apologizing for a flight delay from Wuxi to Singapore by singing a Taylor Swift song to the passengers. "Nearly half of them are heading to the Eras Tour concert", according to one of the passengers.
The fan base includes the Chinese celebrity world, with Chinese table tennis world champion Fan Zhendong sharing his experience ofsinging along in the audience with other fans at the concert on Saturday.
As the World Table Tennis (WTT) Singapore Smash tournament is ongoing, some netizens questioned whether the player should participate in such an entertaining event during the intensive competition season, however more believe that "it is an athlete's freedom to do what they want in their spare time."
But one way or another, despite some considering public idol appreciation inappropriate, Taylor's fame in China is definitely a force to be reckoned with.
Following the conclusion of an eight-day concert series spanning six consecutive nights, beginning on March 2nd, a surge in tourism from China to Singapore has been ignited. This wave of travel follows a mutually beneficial 30-day visa-free arrangement between the two countries, initiated on February 9th.
On January 25, the Chinese foreign ministry said that China and Singapore had signed a mutual visa exemption agreement, allowing citizens of Singapore and China to enter each other's country without a visa, for a stay of up to 30 days.
"As the number of visa-free countries expands with China, some 'just-go' travels are becoming more and more convenient," tourism and travel expert Xu Xi'ao told the Global Times.
Statistics demonstrate a notable uptick in tourism interest and bookings for Singapore. Data from China's ticketing platform Ctrip reveal a nearly doubled volume of Singapore tourism bookings for the period of March 1st to March 10th compared to February, indicating a remarkable 158 percent year-on-year increase. Similarly, travel interest on Mafengwo has surged by at least 30 percent since March.
Figures from similar service platform Tongcheng Travel corroborate this trend showing a significant rise in domestic users' interest in Singapore since March, with a 486 percent increase in hotel inquiries.
According to reports from Yicai, the areas showing the most interest in Singapore include Shanghai, Guangdong, Chongqing, Jiangsu, and Shandong, among others. Interest in Singapore flight bookings has soared by 13 times, with cities like Guangdong, Shanghai, and Beijing leading the trend.
"This has become a trend in cultural and tourism consumption today. If an influential performance is held in a city, it can stimulate consumption in various industries including dining, accommodation, transportation, and shopping," said a travel consumption analyst.
"It's rare to see so many restaurants with long queues. But because of the concerts, many local restaurants and shops are crammed with customers than usual," Mao, a young Chinese woman who has lived in Singapore for a long time told the Global Times.
For "Swifties" like Wan, a 21-year-old senior student from the Xiamen University in East China's Fujian Province, who has followed Swift's career for nine years, attending her Singapore concert on Saturday is a long-awaited dream come true.
"The stage was lit, everyone was super enthusiastic, screaming their hearts out. The setup was very beautiful with professional lighting and sound," Wan shared with the Global Times.
Taylor Swift's concert film, Taylor Swift: The Eras World Tour, is still very popular in China. As of Sunday, the picture grossed over 100 million yuan ($13.8 million) at the box office, with its release date extended till March 12.
Even with this movie's enormous success, critics and viewers have differing perspectives. Some see "concert films" as extending the definition of cinema and improving theater offerings, with additional features like musicals and sports broadcasts to be added in the future. Others doubt whether non-fans would find such videos interesting, arguing that they often don't do a good job of capturing the concert's ambiance and lack the conventional narrative essence of traditional movies.
