KUALA LUMPUR: Firefly will double its Singapore-Ipoh services to 14 times weekly by January next year from seven times weekly now, a company official said yesterday.

She also told Bernama here yesterday that the community airline would be adding three ATR 72-500 aircraft by February next year to 10 from seven currently.

Meanwhile in a statement, Firefly managing director Datuk Eddy Leong said the airline would reinstate its Penang-Kuantan, Penang-Kuala Terengganu and Penang-Kota Bharu services in line with its expansion programme.

All-in fares from RM45 are being offered to celebrate the reinstatement.

“We envisage increased accessibility and convenient connectivity between the east and west coasts of Peninsular Malaysia and we are confident this will contribute positively towards boosting the local economy,” Leong said.

Firefly is also offering an all-in fare for the Subang-Langkawi, Subang-Kota Bharu, Subang-Kuala Terengganu routes from as low as RM45 one way and also Ipoh-Singapore and Subang-Singapore from RM75 one way.

The deals, in conjunction with the expansion programme, are now open for sale with a booking period from Sept 20 to Oct 17 this year for travel between Oct 31, 2010 and March 26, 2011. — Bernama

Fong Fei-Fei is a famous Taiwanese singer from the 1970s who is a Mandarin pop singer, but also has albums in Taiwanese too. She is well known of wearing a hat in all her performances and some even crown her as the “Hat Diva”. This Taiwan born artist had gain confidence and respect from all around the world with her recognition of the top ten famous artists in South East Asia. Her famous songs include “Applause Sounded” and she also acted in “The Flirting Scholar”.

For more information, please visit http://www.fireflyholiday.com/promotions/fong-fei-fei

Thank you.

Kota Kinabalu: Firefly, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Malaysian Airline System (MAS) Berhad, in collaboration with Tourism Selangor is sponsoring 30 bloggers from Singapore, Indonesia and Malaysia to participate in a four-day My Selangor Story competition.

This all-expenses paid trip to explore Selangor started on Friday and will stretch to Sept 27. The sponsorship consists of logistics expenses for all 30 bloggers to explore Selangor exclusively during this period.

“Firefly is proud to participate in this community programme by sponsoring a total of 30 tickets for the participants and prizes to the winners of the competition,” said Firefly’s Head of Marketing and Communications, Angelina Fernandez.

“It is an honour to be associated with this event, especially to play a role in the growth of both, regional technology and social media.

“In this strategic partnership, Firefly is poised to be a driver to encourage local and international bloggers through this kind of healthy community engagement. This is in line with our marketing efforts in the area of social media.”

Angelina said they are sponsoring 10 flight tickets for the Indonesian participants on the Medan-Subang-Medan sector and another 10 flight tickets for the Singaporean participants on the Singapore-Subang-Singapore sector.

“Additionally, we are also sponsoring 10 flight tickets as prizes to the winners – four return tickets from Subang to Terengganu and six return tickets from Subang to Langkawi.”

She added that Firefly hopes to contribute significantly to the tourism industry in Selangor and Malaysia overall by meeting the rising passenger traffic demand from the dynamic growth region of Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand and Singapore by providing an extensive cross-border route network.

The event is also seen as a platform of information that would be able to educate the bloggers on the connections from Selangor (Subang) to all other destinations of Firefly within Malaysia.

She declared that the first half of this year has seen more than three million visitors to Selangor.

The 30 shortlisted bloggers will compete by churning out the best documentation of their trip – their own original version of their Selangor story.

They will be judged based on the following criteria – their creativity in presenting their adventures in Selangor, the popularity of their blogs in terms of traffic flow and comments, the entertainment value and quality of the audiovisual uploads of their activities and most importantly, the relevancy of their commentary on their Selangor travel experience.

During their trip, the bloggers will be required to create a daily three-minute video diary that documents their activities for the day, which will be uploaded on YouTube, and its link posted on the official My Selangor Story website.

Readers will vote for their favourite blog on the same website too, and the judges will then decide which blogger deserves to win the grand prize of RM2, 500 plus a return trip for two, to visit Selangor once again, and a Pentax camera worth RM1, 099, among others.

Prizes will also be awarded to the first runner-up and the second runner-up.

Other prizes include the most creative blog, the best write-up, the best video, the most interactive blog and the best photos.