Travel briefs

Asian Art Museum acquires 999 new works

SAN FRANCISCO -- The Asian Art Museum of San Francisco is the proud owner of 999 new works of art for its growing collection.

The new works include more than 800 objects from the LLoyd Cotsen Bamboo Basket Collection. Costen also provided the museum with a research endowment.

The remaining objects come from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation's Southeast Asian Art Collection.

The Duke collection includes many rare paintings and decorative arts as well as Thai, Burmese and Cambodian sculptures. One of the Duke objects is an 11-foot-tall, 19th-century gilded Burmese throne for a Buddha image.

The Asian Art museum outgrew its first home and is set to reopen at the city's Civic Center in January.

Tourism official wants to shoot rude taxi drivers

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia -- Calling them traitors, Malaysia's tourism minister said taxi drivers who were rude to visitors should be "lined up against the wall and shot," the New Straits Times newspaper reported.

Culture, Arts and Tourism Minister Abdul Kadir Sheikh Fadzir said taxi drivers who were rude or had cheated tourists in Malaysia had become a "serious problem."

"The government has spent lots of money and put in a lot of effort to attract tourists here," Kadir was quoted as saying.

"Taxi drivers who behave in this way are traitors to our country and should be lined up against the wall and shot. This is the kind of treatment they deserve."

--From wire reports